New Agers Deserve to be Deeply Discredited

The political correctness list serv "tone" police are at it again, this time to protect proponents of the “new age” from stigmatization from bigots such as myself. The concept of stigma, as described by Goffman, refers to deeply discrediting someone on the basis of their membership in a particular class or group. Of course, if someone is stigmatized for being African-American, being gay, being a woman, or for their civil status, that is wrong and I deplore that sort of stigma.

However, it seems that the concept of stigma is now suffering from bracket creep in some circles. As an example, I posted something to a list serv where I criticized new agers and stated that I had no desire to “welcome’ them. What I got in response was someone accusing me of stigmatizing a “class” of people and later, a warning note from the moderators who reprimanded me about my “tone” and about “stigmatizing” new agers. What is astonishing to me about this is that the particular list serv in question is one that is supposed to be about the discussion of a particular therapy that has a scientific approach to its study. Here is the e-mail I just received from the moderators:

We appreciate the spirit of your recent contributions to uphold scientific endeavors. We believe that your contributions are important and want to be sure they are heard. On that note, we are a bit concerned about the tone of several recent postings. In the spirit of encouraging more debate in the future, we would like to suggest that you choose your wording so that it is less an attack on individuals and more a statement of your ideas. We were concerned specifically about stigmatizing "new agers" as a group of people (see post #__), rather than a set of beliefs, as well as other attacks directed at individuals (see post #__). This is in NO WAY meant to ilence you, only to suggest ways to keep the conversation a bit lighter and thus inclusive.

What did I do to deserve this?  For the record, here is the offending e-mail that I had posted in response to someone who remarked she got “antsy” about the marketing of new age concepts:

I know what you mean, re getting antsy about the marketing and selling of new age concepts, which is why I'm concerned about the influx of new agers into [a particular therapy], although it appears that some are
already here and there will be more to come. Just as we can't do much about the high price of oil, there probably isn't much to be done about this either other than just sit with the feelings of revulsion I have about all this, or avoid them by not checking in on this board as often. I really shudder to think of [this particular therapy] being promoted as some kind of tool to be "awakened" or "enlightened" or be able to model oneself after Tolle.
As for harm, I'm not so sure Tolle is so harmless. It would be very difficult to test in an empirical way how much harm is done to people when they are told to give up their minds, judgment and "egos" and from what I've seen on the Oprah Boards, many people are not holding this lightly at all. I suspect it might be more harmful than shelling out a few extra dollars for the high price of oil. It seems the only evidence possible would be carefully reported single case studies, as was done with individual cases where people suffered from negative effects after attending EST trainings and it got published in journals. Since we're not going to be able to do RCTs on harm from Tolle and his ilk, what it comes down to is opinion and a judgment call.
In the end, as others have mentioned, I would hope that [this therapy] would be judged on the quality of its actual evidence, but people are only human and associations create biases that are hard to overcome, even for scientifically minded people.

This brought a response from someone who tried to equate my criticisms of new agers and lack of desire to “welcome” them with bias against gays and lesbians! I responded:

This has nothing to do with heirarchy, so please stop trying to turn this into an issue of political correctness because I do not take orders from self-appointed PC police, especially when they use it to try to stifle criticism of a belief system [new age] that richly deserves it. People can choose to believe in new age or not. It has nothing to do with "class" and your attempting to put it in a category with tolerance for GBLT's is far off base. Being GBLT is not a choice -- adopting a new age belief system is a choice, so there's a big difference. New age is a belief system and I will continue to label it as such, criticize it and make no apology for that.

After that, I got the warning letter from the moderators. The most ironic part was the part where she stated that she in “NO WAY” trying to silence me (as if her use of all caps was going to make me believe that).  Oh no, she doesn’t want me to stop posting – the little dictator only wants to control the way I write. I have responded to the moderators that I will not be submitting to micro-management by the “tone police” and let them know that I think they owe me an apology.

On a more positive note, as a contrast to this, I’m a member of another list serv called SSCPnet (the list serv for the Society for a Scientific Clinical Psychology) that is a tone-police free zone, where people are free to openly express criticism and don’t have to walk on eggshells.

Clearly, it is unjust to deeply discredit (stigmatize) someone because of their race, gender, civil status, etc. However, when people attempt to extend the boundaries of stigmatization to include criticism of certain belief systems that richly deserve it, that is doing a disservice to people who are truly stigmatized by trivializing the construct.  Is holding people accountable for the belief systems they freely choose to adopt “stigmatization” or is it just another manifestation of political correctness gone amok? When someone makes the choice to promote a new age belief system, they are responsible for that choice, which is open to challenge, debate and yes, it is valid to make judgments about the individual for making such a choice. People who align themselves with new age belief systems deserve to be deeply discredited.

Comments

[Rachel]

Thank you, Monica, for your continued criticism of new age approaches to silencing critical thinking (whether that's the new age "teaching" itself or censorship on boards)! It is always so refreshing to read your willingness to not be silenced! New agers are taking on the same privilege that religious people hold up when they don't want to deal with criticism and scream discrimination.

[Citizen Deux]

Monica - the continual problem is that ultimately these boards and list servers are not protected free speech zones. They enjoy an inherent editorial capability. In extreme cases , members are banned and their postings stripped. It is not a location for open debate.

As a skeptic at heart, it is hard to engage "true believers" in any meaningful, objective discussion. I can query them about their beliefs, discuss alternatives but as soon as I pose possible challenges to their worldview - down comes the curtain of silence.