Motte-and-bailey

What "Abolish X" really means

A poster on the UMass Boston campus, November 2022

Those of you who scored in our November 18, 2022 quiz know that on November 16, UMB’s Center for Humanities, Culture, and Society hosted a talk entitled: ‘Abolish the Family’, by Dr. Sophie Lewis.

But what does “Abolish X” really mean? Well, according to some, this phrase is a telltale sign of the “motte-and-bailey” doctrine being deployed:

• You invite a friend over for a drink (the motte), but when he comes, he finds that he is charged with dog-sitting of your dog while you hit the clubs, because “Luna gets sooo lonely when alone.” (the bailey)

• “We could learn to care for each other with dignity, to challenge our capacity for harm by lovingly welcoming the most painful parts of ourselves:”¹ it would be so nice if everybody loved you as much as your mother does (the motte). We won’t need the institution of family then: “Mothering against motherhood!”² (the bailey).

• “It is not possible for power to be exercised without knowledge, it is impossible for knowledge not to engender power”³ (the motte). “Truth isn’t outside power… Each society has its régime of truth, …the mechanisms and instances which enable one to distinguish true and false statements”⁴ (the bailey).

Here is your homework assignment: decode what “Abolish the Police” really means. And if you liked this post (the motte), …

…(the bailey).

1. O’Brien (2019), M.E. ‘Junkie Communism’. Commune, 3. Quoted in Lewis, S. A. (2022). Mothering against motherhood: doula work, xenohospitality and the idea of the momrade. Feminist Theory, 0(0).

2. Lewis, S. A. (2022). Mothering against motherhood: doula work, xenohospitality and the idea of the momrade. Feminist Theory, 0(0).

3. Michel Foucault (1975). Interview, “Prison Talk”, 51-52.

4. Michel Foucault (1977). Interview, “Truth and Power”, 131.