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The first criticism that springs to mind of this idea is, "But isn't this just going to kind of be re-treading all the analysis of how the out-group has been portrayed as 'disgusting' in order to reinforce the in-group's belief in their own superiority?" But we'd have to actually read it to see whether it is just kind of a re-tread, or actually says something novel and interesting. I suppose if they awarded her a doctorate, her committee must at least have appreciated what she had to say.

But of course the right wing crowd isn't interested in criticism or challenges of that kind of thing, because they _like_ imposing a hierarchy and declaring that the Other is vile and sub-human. Steve Bannon just wrote the foreword to a book, Unhumans, arguing that leftists have forfeit their human rights, and the Right has a responsibility to exterminate them.

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Huh. "Come up with ever more elaborate arguments that when Jesus spoke about loving your neighbor, he didn’t really mean the immigrant, the drug-afflicted, the political opposite, or whoever the villain of the week is." I hadn't considered the distinction between neighbor and, ah, random person. In my defense, I'm not a Christian.

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Jesus is explicit that even one's enemies are neighbours

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Enemies, check. Foreigners, strangers, junkies, et cetera? Was he, ah, prolix or inferential?

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One would assume that if even mortal enemies are neighbors, so are foreigners, strangers, and junkies. Indeed, this is how all essentially Christian theology has interpreted the term. Neighbour=every single person. You are to love them as much as you love yourself

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That's... not what neighbor means. Wouldn't Love Everyone Equally have been more straightforward? Sorry for the digression; I, ah, lack imaginary friends. Also, I see an implied prohibition against loving people *more* than you love yourself; this is another useless digression, I know, but did he mean that too, or am I amiss again?

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Seems that Ms. Louks has gotten something of a rough ride.

From Amos Wollen ("funniest philosopher on Substack"):

"In Defense Of Writing A Quirky Thesis On The Politics Of Smell In Modern Literature

Anti-intellectuals on Twitter are at it again":

https://wollenblog.substack.com/p/in-defense-of-writing-a-quirky-thesis

An "anti-thesis":

"But Is It Anti-Intellectualism, Really?

It is totally fine to feel disillusioned about academia":

https://fairyland.substack.com/p/but-is-it-anti-intellectualism-really

Louks' introductory "intersectional and wide-ranging study of olfactory oppression ... in creating and subverting gender, class, sexual, racial and species power structures" reads like something created by a post-modernism generator:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodernism_Generator

I'd tend to go with the "disillusioned about academia" ...

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I agree that the abstract is a bit clunky and formulaic, but to be fair, the abstract is where the pressures that create clunky, formulaic writing are strongest. You have to demonstrate “relevance,” familiarity with the language of the field, and so on, in a relatively short space; that this is the space that would also be best positioned to show off more prose verve and the like sucks, but that’s the conventions of the form for you.

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ICYMI, you might read Dawkins review of Intellectual Imposters, a critique of the postmodernist claptrap that seems to characterize too much of philosophy these days, particularly that "through a feminist lens" like what Louks is peddling:

https://physics.nyu.edu/sokal/dawkins.html

No doubt there are useful and durable concepts in postmodernism, notably in the view that all of our categories are "socially constructed". But where too many proponents go off the rails and into the weeds is in "thinking" that there aren't sound scientific and philosophical reasons for many of them.

Apropos of which, my justifications for the biological definitions for the sexes:

https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/rerum-cognoscere-causas

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