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Or sign-in if you have an account.French national flag flaps in the wind under the Arc de Triomphe on May 8, 2026. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / POOL / AFP via Getty Images)I would like to apologize, on behalf of all French people, for having given birth to French Theory (which gave rise to the worst of all ideological excrement: wokism).Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.Exclusive articles by Conrad Black, Barbara Kay and others. Plus, special edition NP Platformed and First Reading newsletters and virtual events.Unlimited online access to National Post.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.Support local journalism.Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.Exclusive articles by Conrad Black, Barbara Kay and others. Plus, special edition NP Platformed and First Reading newsletters and virtual events.Unlimited online access to National Post.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.Support local journalism.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one account.Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments.Enjoy additional articles per month.Get email updates from your favourite authors.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one accountShare your thoughts and join the conversation in the commentsEnjoy additional articles per monthGet email updates from your favourite authorsSign In or Create an AccountorWe have given the world Descartes, Pascal, Tocqueville. And then, in the intellectual ruins after 1968, we gave the world Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze. Three brilliant men who, in the elegance of the French language, built the ideological weapon that now paralyzes the West.What they did needs to be understood. Michel Foucault taught that truth does not exist, that power relations disguised as knowledge are all there is. That science, reason, justice, medical institutions, schools, prisons, sexuality, are all but stage productions of domination. Jacques Derrida taught that text has no stable meaning, that all signifiers slip away, that all readings are a betrayal, that the author is dead and the reader reigns. Giles Deleuze taught that the rhizome had to be preferred over the tree, the nomadic over the sedentary, desire over the law, becoming over being, difference over identity.This newsletter from NP Comment tackles the topics you care about. (Subscriber-exclusive edition on Fridays)By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc.We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try againConsidered individually, these arguments are questionable. Combined together, exported, popularized, they form a system. And this system is toxic.Because this is what happened. These texts, incomprehensible in France, crossed the Atlantic. Departments at Yale, Berkeley, Columbia absorbed them during the 1980s. They found fertile ground that did not exist over here: America’s puritanism, its racial guilt, its obsession with identity. French theory wedded itself to this substrate, and the child of this marriage is called wokism.Judith Butler read Foucault and invented gender as performance. Edward Said read Foucault and invented academic post-colonialism. Kimberlé Crenshaw inherited this frame and invented intersectionality. At every step, the mould was French: there is no truth, there is only power, and so all hierarchy is suspect, every institution is oppressive, every norm amounts to violence, all identity is constructed and thus negotiable, every majority is guilty.Such is how three Parisian philosophers, who likely never imagined their practical impact, provided the operating system for a whole generation of activists, university bureaucrats, human resource directors, journalists, legislators. Such is how we ended up with a civilization that no longer knows whether a woman is a woman, if its own history is worth defending, if merit exists, if truth can be distinguished from opinion.It’s crap for a simple reason, and it needs to be said calmly. A civilization stands on three pillars: the belief that there exists a truth accessible to reason, the belief that good is distinct from evil, the belief that it has an inheritance to transmit. French theory undertook to dynamite all three. Not out of malice. For the sake of an intellectual game, out of fascination with the suspect, out of hatred for the bourgeoisie that had nourished them. But the result is before us. An entire generation has learned to deconstruct and has never learned to build. An entire generation knows how to be suspicious and no longer knows how to admire. An entire generation sees power everywhere and beauty nowhere.I want to apologize because we, the French, bear a special responsibility. Our language, our universities, our editors, our prestige gave this nihilism its chic veneer. Without the legitimacy provided by the Sorbonne and Vincennes, these ideas would have never crossed the ocean. We have exported doubt as others export weapons.What is being built now, in Silicon Valley, in AI labs, in startups, in workshops, in all the places where people still build things instead of deconstructing them, that is the answer. A civilization that rebuilds itself through those who build, not by commentators. By those who believe that truth exists and is worthy of being pursued. By those who assume a hierarchy of the beautiful, the true and the good, and are not ashamed to pass it on.So please forgive us. And let’s get to work. Join the Conversation This website uses cookies to personalize your content (including ads), and allows us to analyze our traffic. Read more about cookies here. By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.