Stephen Matheson

I have been thinking regularly about complicity for the last several
years. It became a central ethical theme of mine in 2016 and it has
occupied my thoughts and ideas since. And yet, it recently occurred to
me that I seem to be using it as a folk remedy, a kind of [folk
science](https://sfmatheson.blogspot.com/2007/12/on-folk-science-and-lies.html){target="_blank"}
in which I use the concept in my thought and sometimes in my
conversations as a kind of prop without careful definition of what I
mean when I say it. So I decided to work on that, and came home from
last month\'s [Tucson Festival of
Books](https://tucsonfestivalofbooks.org/){target="_blank"} with a stack
of treasures that
includes *[Complicit](https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691236544/complicit){target="_blank"}*
by Max Bazerman.

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I haven\'t started it yet (I\'m currently slogging through the *[Six
Myths of
Evolution](https://www.google.com/books/edition/From_Extraterrestrials_to_Animal_Minds/xwZXEAAAQBAJ){target="_blank"}*
mess by Simon Conway Morris). And this means I have an opportunity to do
a little experiment. In the spirit of pre- and post-instruction
assessments in education, I thought I\'d write about what I think now
about complicity. Then after I\'ve read the book, I\'ll write about what
I\'ve learned and what has changed.

First, why 2016? It\'s not that the concept was new to me then. It\'s
that a particular kind of evil was erupting, coincident with my own
reflection as a secular humanist (aka atheist) on my many years as a
Christian. It was the year of the public emergence of the hate-based
cult of Donald Trump, a cult that relies almost entirely on conservative
Christianity. Then, as now, I pointed out that Trump is not the cause of
the sickness of the right [---
]{style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;"}he\'s
a symptom. The causes include nationalism, racism, ignorance,
dishonesty, and fear-based hate. All of those things have deep roots in
American conservative Christianity. And for more than 25 years, I had
been a part of American conservative Christianity, which I\'ll call
evangelicalism.

[Continue
reading\...](http://sfmatheson.blogspot.com/2023/04/thoughts-on-complicity-before-reading.html#more)


I have been thinking regularly about complicity for the last several years. It became a central ethical theme of mine in 2016 and it has occupied my thoughts and ideas since.

Messaggi di Rogue Scholar

Thoughts on complicity before reading Complicit by Max Bazerman