We We'd Up

When I was starting to do a lot of hyperobjects lectures, there was a respondent, I can't remember his name exactly, but he was at a university that is kinda famous for being a particularly WW1-type of a place. (Aka seething with envy energy.)

And I remember him saying, with a flourish as if this was a clincher as to my badness, “Who is the we in Morton's discourse?”

Well, in normal-ish world, we is a pretty useful pronoun. We all use it knowing (see, I just did it) that it's interpellative. You can identify with it or not.

But all pronouns are this way. What's better about “one” or “I” or “you” or some awkward attempt to circumvent awkwardness by trying not to use pronouns at all? And wouldn't that also be interpellative?

How come cynical reason got so stuck on trying to be so pure? And how come this has become such an easy way to cause complex and necessary thought (for instance in the feminist prose of this book I'm reporting on right now) to get really scarily jammed up so it can hardly say anything?

How come we spend all this time fighting our near thought neighbors? I've heard it called the narcissism of small differences and maybe this is correct.

Luckily for “you” and “me” (I think) the respondent didn't kill me. He made me feel a bit like crying, for maybe five minutes.

I'm going to keep saying we. And I encourage you or us or one or the reader to do the same.