Wednesday 10 May 2017

British Personalist Forum Blog: Reboot the Second

The following lines were found nailed to a tree on Hindhead Common by an escaped gorilla of no fixed abode. The gorilla, which was carrying a bottle of blackcurrant cordial and searching for a large barrel of cider to mix it with, was kind enough to pass his find to a Concerned Citizen. 

A Blog for all Seasons

Spring has returned to the Northern Hemisphere – one of the two best hemispheres there is, in my view – blithely bringing with it reminders of what a good time it is to start new ventures and restart old ones. The grey chill days of February have slithered damply out of sight at last; the celestial blues and brilliant-butter yellows of the summer are on their way; it is such a relief to see the seasons change.
Although, of course, as right-thinking people know very well, all change is bad, up to and perhaps even including underwear.
Leaving underwear aside for the time being, if we may, it has occurred to me of late that, given the propitious nature of the season, now might be the perfect time to re-open the lines of communication. Again. Should you have passed this way before – though heaven knows why you would remember – you may be aware that I first rebooted this blog and re-opened the lines of communication two years ago. Then, I was inspired by finding myself deep in the Irish countryside, surrounded by sheep and hills, and faced by a telecommunications industry that wouldn’t have looked out of place in the 14th Century. I felt the need to reach out. Barely a year later, however, that fruit had withered on the vine.
Back on the British side of that ‘scrotum-tightening sea,’ great grey-green Mother, with the dullthudding of Guinness’s barrels faded into distant memory, now seemed as good a time to start again as any other. Better, given recent history, when ‘us’ and ‘them’ has become the dominant motif. The ability to overcome, to heal, such damaging divisions is one of the most vital and most powerful aspects of Personalist thought, howsoever broadly construed.  For, in seeking to place persons at the heart of epistemology, of metaphysics, and every kind of thought about our selves and our world, Personalism insists upon the dignity, the fundamental moral value, not only of individuals, but of all that connects them. Those connections are precious; they make us who and what we are.
This is because there is a pragmatic psychology built into Personalist thought, one which is as essential to philosophy and theology as it is to all the social, political, and physical sciences; essential, that is, to their healthier, ineluctably inclusivist modalities. Essential too, to both the form and content of this blog. Philosophically speaking, that psychology is an antidote to the debilitating dualisms that continue to cripple so much Western thought. Mind and body, individual and society, subject and object, and, most frightening of all, us and them: such antediluvian oppositions are reintegrated in a Personalist framework in which we are intimately reconnected to one another. 
Such, once again, or perhaps more accurately, still, is the point and purpose of these dispatches: to consider the questions with which personalist thinkers ought to – and, in fact, frequently do – concern themselves. In so doing, dialogue, conversation, is surely the ultimate goal. So we follow Jonas Mortensen’s most excellent example and strive to drag our philosophy – kicking and screaming if need be – from the old cold cloisters of academe out into the agora. After all, practitioners of Personalism stake their claim to real insight into all the richness and complexity of the human condition; that is where it belongs.
That, then, is my aim; or rather, I should say, our aim. This time I have not come alone. For your edification and entertainment, I have gathered about me a company of fine scholars and remarkable writers, deep thinkers all; also the usual gang of ne’er-do-wells, layabouts, and bums. Long did I search to find, if I may paraphrase the ‘Swan of Lichfield’, the shiftless, the senile, the drunken, the lunatic, and the unhygienic. Such is the range of perspectives and interests purveyed by this rabble, that I feel entirely confident in declaring readers will be endlessly fascinated, absorbed, and excited by their every invitation to dialogue. There will be, as they say, something for everyone. It will be grand, I can promise you that.
This, then is our grand reopening, our return to the universe of intelligent discourse, thoughtful comment, and expert analysis that is the modren internet. Not, perhaps, with a bang, nor exactly a whimper; at the very least, with a stifled yawn and a soft burp – we’re back! Third time’s the charm, as the saying goes. And this time, should we avoid Armageddon, swift-approaching from the United States, it will be the greatest thing the world has ever known, as voted for by at least 51.9% in my household. With such overwhelming support, how can we fail?

Tune in again next time for another spine-tingling episode of Tales from the BPF Blog!

No comments:

Post a Comment