"Lived experience" matters—but not more than everything else

Student political activists have come in for criticism recently—much of it justified. They have been attacked for their apparent hyper-sensitivity, for example their focus on “microagressions”—small slights such as talking over someone. Perhaps the most frequent criticism has been directed at students who “no-platform” speakers who disagree with them. (These problems, and others related to them, were unpicked at length by Frank Furedi in our February issue.)

But one worrying trend on campus seems to have slipped by without being challenged to the same extent. Among the student left there is a worrying privilege granted to “lived experience,” which has become a go-to phrase among many young politically-minded people. They believe that it is wrong for someone to have an opinion on something if they have not been directly affected by the issue at hand. In order to speak with authority on any issue, you must have experienced it—or so runs the thinking.

“Lived experience” is now an embedded part of discussions on the student left. This article on 4th wave feminist website Everyday Feminism mentions it. As does this one. Perhaps the best-known recent example of someone privileging “lived experience” was when Owen Jones, after the massacre in Orlando, told his fellow panelists on Sky News: “You don’t understand this because you're not gay.” (This was perhaps his only unreasonable moment—those he was debating with behaved rather obnoxiously.)

Nowhere does “lived experience” carry more weight than on Cuntry Living—a feminist Facebook group once-affiliated with an Oxford University-based publication of the same name—which has become the epicentre of the student left. (If you are unfamiliar with it I recommend seeking it out.) On a recent browse through it I saw two instances of “do not undermine their lived experiences” being used as a tool for shutting down discussion.

It’s worth unpicking what’s behind this. In a sense, the view that the voices of those affected by the problem should be privileged is not unresaonable. We all believe in humans’ capacity to learn from experience. Through our interactions with the world we learn and improve. Accepting this principle probably helps us cope with the tribulations of life.

What’s more, it is aimed at ensuring that those affected by problems have a voice in discussions about fixing them, and giving women, ethnic minorities and gay people control of their own narratives. In some ways, this is a great thing: those who have suffered oppression must be able to talk about it if they wish, particularly if throughout history their stories have been twisted by parties with their own agendas. An attempt to break from this, whatever its drawbacks, deserves some praise.

But that’s where the emphasis on “lived experience” stops being sensible. It’s clearly not the case that we only learn from direct experience. To suggest that we do is to stray into a belief that abstract thinking, working a problem out through reflection and reading, is insufficient. It is the idea that feeling, not thinking, is the most important thing when solving a problem. This belief would set us on a dangerous path if universally adopted, but it is implied each time “lived experience” is referred to as though it is an argument-winner.

Not only is the “lived experience” trend based on shaky philosophical ground—it has knock-on effects that are deeply problematic.

Like it or not, it is the case that those in privileged positions have the loudest voices. There is a tight connection between privilege and having a platform—the former often provides you with the latter, and the latter entrenches the former. Those who emphasise direct experience would have it that those from disadvantaged backgrounds had platforms—newspaper columns, seats on committees—from which to voice their opinions.

But we do not live in that world. It ought to be a source of regret for all of us, but those from disadvantaged backgrounds—or those who continue to be disadvantaged—are less likely to be heard. Therefore any movement which aims to ensure that people can only speak with authority on issues that affect them risks shooting itself in the foot. It may end up having the unintended consequence that rather than the disadvantaged discussing systems of oppression, those already with a platform continue to use it—but only to discuss issues that affect them. Oppression falls off the agenda.

This seems already to have occurred. The current focus on campus sexual assault may be a symptom of the increasingly common belief that people should only discuss issues that affect them. While it is clearly all sexual assault that is a problem, a bizarre phenomenon seems to have emerged wherein a disproportionate amount of discussion of the topic concerns university students alone. See this article, for example. Or this article. Or this Joe Biden speech.

Much that is said on Cuntry Living—and by the typical young lefty—is not as ludicrous as is often suggested. The insanity of the student left is rather blown out of proportion, and I think I know why. The student movement politicises notions that we have come to think of as being in the aesthetic realm. Ninety-nine per cent of us do not violate the rules laid down by members of Cuntry Living because we would consider behaviour that violates them to be vulgar—even socially awkward. Going on about an issue over the voices of those in a room who have more experience than you do of it is, frankly, socially defective. It is the politicisation of beliefs that we like to think of as being in the aesthetic realm that has generated the strong criticism.

So students who emphasise the importance of "lived experience" aren't completely unjustified, nor have they summoned up a crazy belief out of thin air. This point of view deserves to be treated with charity just as the wider student left does, for who could dispute that their hearts are in the right place? They are also not the first group to make the personal political; in some strands of feminism arguments have been constructed on that assumption for decades.

Those who have direct experience of oppression must be listened to, always. But those who listen are not necessarily obliged to agree with someone just because they have suffered. The listener should have empathy and respect—and then make up their mind based on the merits of the argument, not on the background of the person making it.