Epistemic Resistance and Intellectual Refusal

Sor Juana refused to accept the Church's monopoly on truth and interpretation. She engaged theology and philosophy directly, using her own reason to evaluate claims, and insisted on her capacity for independent judgment. This epistemic resistance—refusing to passively accept what authorities declare true—is a libertarian practice. It asserts that your mind belongs to you, that you have the right and capacity to evaluate ideas, and that no institution owns the truth. Epistemic resistance protects intellectual freedom by preventing capture of the knowledge-making process itself. When Sor Juana questioned assumptions and demanded evidence, she was claiming property in her own rational faculties. In modern contexts, this validates skepticism toward institutional expertise when it overreaches, supports alternative knowledge traditions, and protects individuals' right to their own conclusions. It resists epistemic injustice—the systematic denial of someone's credibility or authority to know. For libertarian justice, this means defending spaces where people can think against the grain and refuse imposed interpretations.