Between deference and insolence

In reviewing this book about the social, political and intellectual indispensability of disrespect, I should perhaps declare an interest: I am several times disrespected in it. I hope the author will not conclude, if I fail to take my revenge on this occasion, that I am suffering from the wrong kind of niceness. All my niceness is of the right kind.

My problem is that I agree with quite a lot of what the author says, at least in his individual judgments, though I am not sure that he provides anything like a coherent or consistent argument. For example, he uses the term ‘deontological’ as a term more or less of philosophical abuse, claiming to be himself a utilitarian, without realising that his own utilitarianism, according to which all sentient or conscious beings are to count in the assessment of the utility of any action or policy, itself rests upon a deontological foundation.