Monday
Speaking truth to power is the subject of a series of classroom lectures by French philosopher Michel Foucault. It’s also the focus of a two-person panel I’ll be joining later today with Eva Bahovec, a member of the University of Ljubljana’s philosophy department and a long-time friend. Fearless speech (“parrhesia” as the Greeks called it) is of particular interest to Eva, who focuses on it in her own work on feminism. Today you get some of my initial thoughts.
I appreciate how Foucault, famous for exploring the workings of power in criminality, abnormality, sexuality, and other charged topics, leans heavily on literature in his parrhesia lectures. The subject of fearless speech also shows up in a number of the Greek playwright Euripides’s plays.
Parrhesia is what I strive for in my own communications, I should note, and it is also the ideal that Socrates and Plato aspire to. As Foucault describes it, in parrhesia the speaker
uses his freedom and chooses frankness instead of persuasion, truth instead of falsehood or silence, the risk of death instead of life and security, criticism instead of flattery, and moral duty instead of self-interest and moral apathy.
Foucault also describes parrhesia as
a form of criticism, either towards another or towards oneself, but always in a situation where the speaker or confessor is in a position of inferiority with respect to the interlocutor. The parrhesiastes is always less powerful than the One with whom he speaks. The parrhesia comes from “below,” as it were, and is directed towards “above.” This is why an ancient Greek would not say that a teacher or father who criticizes a child uses parrhesia. But when a philosopher criticizes a tyrant., when a citizen criticizes the majority, when a pupil criticizes his teacher, then such speakers may be using parrhesia.
Parrhesia is particularly important in a democracy because, as Foucault notes, it is “an ethical and personal attitude characteristic of the good citizen.” Think of how we rely on frank and open speech to insure the smooth running of an organization or a community. How else can we hope to assess our challenges and arrive at solutions? We’re aware, of course, that sometimes our leaders will shade the truth—or perhaps flatter us rather than confront us with unpleasant facts—but in those cases it is up to us to invoke the ideals of parrhesia in order to arrive at a solid basis for action.
The same applies to being truthful about ourselves. Indeed, in his lectures Foucault quotes at length from the Roman philosopher Serenus about the importance of counteracting our own prejudices, which often stem from self-interest. He recommends that we seek out people who will function as tough-love parrhesiastes so that we can grow into our full potential.
Authoritarian figures like Donald Trump are dangerous because they seek to jettison the parrhesiastic ideal altogether. Experts on authoritarianism such as Timothy Snyder and Ruth Ben Ghiat point out that fascists seek to undermine truth so as to leave us vulnerable to their emotion-laden fabrications.
An instance of parrhesia as central to democracy gets voiced in the Euripides play The Phoenician Women. Jocasta is welcoming back one of her sons, who has been exiled by the other:
Jocasta: This above all I long to know: What is an exile’s life? Is it great misery?
Polyneices: The greatest; worse in reality than in report.
Jocasta: Worse in what way? What chiefly galls an exile’s heart?
Polyneices: The worst is this: right of free speech (parrhesia) does not exist.
Jocasta: That’s a slave’s life–to be forbidden to speak one’s mind.
Polyneices: One has to endure the idiocy of those who rule.
Jocasta: To join fools in their foolishness–that makes one sick.
Polyneices: One finds it pays to deny nature and be a slave.
The Greeks spoke also of the importance of parrhesia in authoritarian situations. Distinguishing “monarchic parrhesia” from “democratic parrhesia,” Foucault says the situation involves people telling the sovereign what he or she needs to know, regardless of the consequences. A good king or tyrant, Foucault observes,
accepts everything that a genuine parrhesiastes tells him, even if it turns out to be unpleasant for him to hear criticisms of his decisions. A sovereign shows himself to be a tyrant if he disregards his honest advisors, or punishes them for what they have said. The portrayal of a sovereign by most Greek historians takes into account the way he behaves towards his advisors—as if such behavior were an index of his ability to hear the parrhesiastes.
I think of how President George Walker Bush had an advisor who, living in New York, would fly in to tell him unpleasant truths. Bush recognized that he needed someone not part of his inner circle if he was to face up to certain realities. Donald Trump, by contrast, surrounds himself with sycophants.
While King Pentheus in The Bacchae is a bad king in other respects, at least we see him using parrhesia properly in Euripides’s play. The episode involves a herdsman who is bringing him bad news about the rampaging women:
Herdsman: I have seen the holy Bacchae, who like a flight of spears went streaming bare-limbed, frantic, out of the city gate. I have come with the intention of telling you, my lord, and the city, of their strange and terrible doings–things beyond all wonder. But first I would learn whether I may speak freely of what is going on there, or if I should trim my words. I fear your hastiness, my lord, your anger, your too potent royalty.
Pentheus: From me fear nothing. Say all that you have to say; anger should not grow hot against the innocent. The more dreadful your story of these Bacchic rites, the heavier punishment I will inflict upon this man who enticed our women to their evil ways.
As Euripides’s plays progress, instances of parrhesia, which have seemed straightforward, become more complicated. In Electra, for instance, the daughter—planning to kill her mother for having killed Agamemnon—subverts the “parrhesiastic contract” between monarch and subject (she herself being at that moment in the latter position). Clytemnestra has just told her, “Use your parrhesia to prove that I was wrong to kill your father,” at which point Electra, after confirming that in fact she won’t pay a price for her fearless speech, proceeds to unload:
Electra: Do you mean you’ll listen first, and get your own back afterwards?
Clytemnestra: No, no; you’re free to say what your heart wants to say.
Electra: I’ll say it, then. This is where I’ll begin …
After her accusation, however, comes the killing.
Issues surrounding parrhesia become even more complex in Euripides’s Ion, for reasons that I won’t go into here. Suffice it to say that the playwright is picking up on various themes regarding fearless speech, both for democratic and authoritarian societies. As Foucault sums up the issues raised,
Who is able to tell the truth? What are the moral, the ethical, and the spiritual conditions which entitle someone to present himself as, and to be considered as, a truth-teller? About what topics is it important to tell the truth? (About the world? About nature? About the city? About behavior? About man?) What are the consequences of telling the truth? What are its anticipated positive effects for the city, for the city’s rulers, for the individual?, etc. And finally: What is the relation between the activity of truth-telling and the exercise of power?
If truth-telling can lead to positive political outcomes, then we in the United States have reasons to feel pessimistic given how falsehood has become so prevalent in certain quarters. To find our bearings, however, there is one resource we can turn to: literature.
In a 2018 New Yorker essay, Indian author Salman Rushdie, responding to the torrent of lies emanating from the Trump White House, pointed out that the classics will always remain relevant because of their commitment to truth. At a time where political con artists face few constraints to manufacturing their own realities, we find in good literature a “no bullshit” zone, a friend that will have our deepest interests at heart.
Poetry as parrhesia. Now that has a nice ring to it.
Further thought: Because, in our cynical times, we long for authentic speech, one should add to Foucault’s exploration the danger of faking parrhesia. To quote the saying ascribed to comedians Groucho Marx, George Burns, and others, “Sincerity. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.”
