Philosophy must tear through social veils by open thinking, not pure method.

Evidence

Thinking that turns towards objects openly, consistently, and on the basis of progressive knowledge, is liberated in relation to those objects in such a way that it cannot allow organized science to prescribe rules for it. It turns the epitome of the experience accumulated within it towards the objects, tears through the social veils that conceal them, and perceives them afresh. If philosophy could rid itself of the fear spread by the terrorism of dominant tendenciesthe ontological fear of thinking anything impure; the scientistic fear of thinking anything not based on' the corpus of scientific evidence already recognized as validthen it might even be in a position to perceive what this fear has forbidden it, what uncorrupted consciousness actually aims for. What philosophical phenomenology once dreamt of, like someone dreaming that he has woken up, its To the things themselves!’ (Zu den Sachen'), could be achieved instead by a philosophy that does not hope to obtain such things’ by the magical stroke of contemplating general essences', but instead simultaneously takes account of their subjective and objective mediations, and does not allow itself to become dependent on the latent primacy of the method being usedwhich for the various schools of phenomenology always produced mere fetishes, self-made concepts, instead of the longed-for things themselves’. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2265

Categorization

• DEFINE: Captures Adorno’s late statement of what authentic philosophy should be, in contrast to phenomenology’s fetishized method.
• XREF: Adorno’s ‘tearing through social veils’ resonates with the ‘Attention!’/‘gaze’ themes in critical theory readings elsewhere in this collection. — connects to: Philosophy’s task is resisting the status quo’s suggestive compulsion; Common sense is the sediment of past philosophy, not fixed belief — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2: Identity…, 123; Modern philosophy voluntarily shrinks itself to avoid touching established reality — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 648 (+4 more)
• DEEPTHINKING: Dense manifesto passage: the terrorism of dominant tendencies, the fear of impurity and of unsanctioned thought, and phenomenology’s longing for ‘things themselves’ achieved only through mediation — a paradigm-statement of Adorno’s mature position.

Broader Connections

• Philosophy’s task is resisting the status quo’s suggestive compulsion #expands (0.85)
• Mass philosophy must start from common sense and take polemical form #corroborates (0.85) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1506
• Modern philosophy voluntarily shrinks itself to avoid touching established reality #corroborates (0.80) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 648
• Passing judgment on veiling requires an explicit normative framework, not raw empirics. #qualifies (0.75) — A. Hussain, N. Meer, Framing Muslim Integration, 597
• Common sense is the sediment of past philosophy, not fixed belief #corroborates (0.70) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 123
• Open-mindedness is impossible because thought requires preexisting categories #contradicts (0.70)
• Dialectical criticism reveals rather than fabricates the bond between private and social realities. #corroborates (0.70) — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 775