As of right now (9 pm), I'm going to focus on two of Martha Nussbaum's central capabilities of all humans, as she lists in her book:
"2. Bodily health. Being able to have good health, including reproductive health; to be adequately nourished; to have adequate shelter.
. . .
9. Play. Being able to laugh, to play, to enjoy recreational activities."
I'm focusing on these two in particular for two reasons: partially so I can have something to write tonight and partially so I can give a somewhat decent reason for not writing a full-length blog on time. (I plan to actually write tomorrow afternoon at the latest).
I'll start with number nine. This morning, I woke up late (after yet another dream-filled night that doesn't leave me feeling rested), rushed to get ready for work, then rushed to work. I then worked a seven-hour shift with no break. For employees like me, we are entitled to a 30-minute break every time we work. For most, breaks are protected time of rest and nourishment. They are, in a sense, a protected time of leisure. For me, they rarely happen. I was not able to eat for the seven and a half hours between my rushed breakfast and my sneak-bites-of-food-when-I-can lunch.
The rest of my day was filled with to's and from's up to this point. I've had no leisure time. Actually, what I consider my leisure time will be when I go to sleep in a few minutes. So, there went my number nine central capability.
I'm sure you've figured out by now why I also chose number two. Last week, I was sick (which is the opposite of bodily health) and I'm still trying to get my health back under control. Not getting adequate good sleep is a part of that issue. I certainly am not adequately nourished at this point . . . unless you count the multivitamin I try to remember to take each day. While I have decent shelter, it isn't the healthiest place to live since I haven't had a chance to clean in over a week. Even when it is clean, its an old drafty trailer next to a field, so I often get field mice inside. Its a roof over my head, but drafty windows and mice mixed with inadequate nourishment and inadequate sleep lead to staying sick most of the time.
Long story short, I'm going to publish this little bit tonight. And, unusually for me (I was always the kid who freaked out when they didn't finish a homework assignment), I'm not going to feel guilty about it. Martha Nussbaum has helped me realize that my health and sanity are more important than school or work.
On that note, goodnight for now.
Monday, January 30, 2012
Monday, January 23, 2012
"If you suffer your people to be ill-educated, and their manners corrupted from infancy, and then punish them for those crimes to which their first education disposed them, what else is to be concluded, sire, but that you first make thieves and then punish them?"
I always have troubles trying to start a blog about something that completely pisses me off. When I rant, I usually start in the middle of the story since I'm usually talking to someone who knows everything that has been going on. However, with this, I know I need to start at the beginning. But where is the beginning?
Perhaps the beginning would be the beginning of this semester and the first book I read for my senior colloquium class. On the first day of class, I learned I would be helping tutor low-income children in Asheville, NC through the I Have a Dream Foundation. Before this, I knew that this foundation gives children a chance to go to college by paying their way if they graduate high school. I figured this was simply because the children, nor the parents, have any way of paying for it themselves. Little did I think, little did I know, and little do I still know about the real circumstances behind these children's lives.
Keep in mind, I never had any reason to think about what low-income children go through in school. I was raised by middle-class parents who have been together since marriage, grew up in church, lived in the country, went to decent schools out in the country, and my college experience is paid for, without too much strain on their financials, by my parents. I knew about places called “the ghetto,” but didn’t really understand the concept of low-income housing. When I moved to Asheville, I still didn’t understand the concept of low-income housing, despite these housing opportunities are scattered throughout (mostly) west-Asheville. I only began to learn when I started working at McDonald’s, where many of my coworkers used to or still live in either Pisgah View or Hillcrest Apartments. My knowledge of public housing deepened further when I started dating someone who lived in Pisgah View. I knew I was taught to be extremely cautious around areas like these when I was younger, but I didn’t know why until about a year ago. All I’ve heard about are fights, gun shots, muggings, murders, etc. The first good thing I’ve heard about that community is the I Have a Dream Foundation.
Without the knowledge that I have of low-income housing opportunities, Jonathan Kozol’s book The Shame of the Nation wouldn’t have affected me as much as it did. In fact, the state of public education Kozol preaches about probably wouldn’t make much sense to me. It may make me sad for some of these children, but my main reaction would either be along the lines of “Surely, things can’t be this bad” or “Why should I care?”
Kozol focuses mainly on inner-city schools in places like New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Massachusetts. His concern is that children of inner-city schools are deemed by the state “cheap children” because they come from low-income backgrounds. Because of this viewpoint, less is spent on these children’s education than children from higher-income families. It just so happens that most children in the decent schools that come from middle- and high-income neighborhoods are Caucasian. On the opposite end of the spectrum, it just so happens that most children in the schools that Kozol points out are either black or Hispanic. Because of this coincidence of the different races having unequal educational experiences, Kozol blames the majority of the problems on the racial aspect of the children.
I agree that no child should have to deal with rotting buildings, overcrowded classrooms, and standardized teaching (no teacher should have to either). However, I don’t think this can be blamed simply on the race of the children. The problems go back way farther than this. The problem most likely starts at the cycle of poverty that started back before the Civil War.
I’m sure you’ve all had a history lesson at some point in your life, but just so you can see it as I see it (and I’m sure my history and current politics needs much brushing up on, but this will hopefully at least get the point across): African-American slaves were brought over to America and bought by white people (not just in the south either). The slaves were freed thanks to good ole Abraham Lincoln. However, many of them had no place to go, so they stayed in a system called sharecropping, which isn’t much better than slavery. Fast forward through history. I’m not really sure how the concept of public housing was started, but they did start. People of low-income status, or poverty, went to public housing as an affordable option to live in. Those who tried to move to a suburban area soon found their white neighbors moving away because they were afraid that their property value would decline (or so they said). So that area would soon most likely become an area of public housing again. Getting out of poverty isn’t easy, especially when race is a factor that no one will admit is a factor.
Fast-forward to today and just imagine for a moment: your great-grandparents were in poverty, your grandparents were in poverty, your parents are in poverty, and now you as a child are in poverty. After generations of your family being in poverty, along with all the families around you being in poverty, and not having the education to get out, it isn’t hard to imagine why the crime rate would go up: people get desperate to feel better and to have more, even if they can’t achieve it by natural means. So they go to drugs and alcohol, which can easily lead to violence. They steal the things they want.
This reminds me of a little piece of Thomas More's Utopia, which I first heard mentioned in the movie Ever After. Fast-forward to approximately 6:30 on this clip:
The children of inner-city schools end up going to an institution in which they are treated as no different than anyone else. They came from poverty, they will stay in poverty. They have no special knowledge and no special talents. They barely get to learn the basic skills that most people in America deem necessary. Without a decent education, the likelihood that they will get a decent job is diminished, leaving them in poverty and low-income housing. It simply continues the cycle.
While I agree with Kozol that the state these schools are in is horrible to the children, I have to say that it’s also damaging to the society in which these children live. Also, the solution does not start within the school systems, but with the ways in which public housing and property taxes are set up. Perhaps if public housing is spread throughout middle- and high-income neighborhoods without the fear that the property value will go down, the children will be exposed to decent education, leading to decent jobs, which could lead to the ending of at least on poverty cycle.
Perhaps the beginning would be the beginning of this semester and the first book I read for my senior colloquium class. On the first day of class, I learned I would be helping tutor low-income children in Asheville, NC through the I Have a Dream Foundation. Before this, I knew that this foundation gives children a chance to go to college by paying their way if they graduate high school. I figured this was simply because the children, nor the parents, have any way of paying for it themselves. Little did I think, little did I know, and little do I still know about the real circumstances behind these children's lives.
Keep in mind, I never had any reason to think about what low-income children go through in school. I was raised by middle-class parents who have been together since marriage, grew up in church, lived in the country, went to decent schools out in the country, and my college experience is paid for, without too much strain on their financials, by my parents. I knew about places called “the ghetto,” but didn’t really understand the concept of low-income housing. When I moved to Asheville, I still didn’t understand the concept of low-income housing, despite these housing opportunities are scattered throughout (mostly) west-Asheville. I only began to learn when I started working at McDonald’s, where many of my coworkers used to or still live in either Pisgah View or Hillcrest Apartments. My knowledge of public housing deepened further when I started dating someone who lived in Pisgah View. I knew I was taught to be extremely cautious around areas like these when I was younger, but I didn’t know why until about a year ago. All I’ve heard about are fights, gun shots, muggings, murders, etc. The first good thing I’ve heard about that community is the I Have a Dream Foundation.
Kozol focuses mainly on inner-city schools in places like New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Massachusetts. His concern is that children of inner-city schools are deemed by the state “cheap children” because they come from low-income backgrounds. Because of this viewpoint, less is spent on these children’s education than children from higher-income families. It just so happens that most children in the decent schools that come from middle- and high-income neighborhoods are Caucasian. On the opposite end of the spectrum, it just so happens that most children in the schools that Kozol points out are either black or Hispanic. Because of this coincidence of the different races having unequal educational experiences, Kozol blames the majority of the problems on the racial aspect of the children.
I agree that no child should have to deal with rotting buildings, overcrowded classrooms, and standardized teaching (no teacher should have to either). However, I don’t think this can be blamed simply on the race of the children. The problems go back way farther than this. The problem most likely starts at the cycle of poverty that started back before the Civil War.
I’m sure you’ve all had a history lesson at some point in your life, but just so you can see it as I see it (and I’m sure my history and current politics needs much brushing up on, but this will hopefully at least get the point across): African-American slaves were brought over to America and bought by white people (not just in the south either). The slaves were freed thanks to good ole Abraham Lincoln. However, many of them had no place to go, so they stayed in a system called sharecropping, which isn’t much better than slavery. Fast forward through history. I’m not really sure how the concept of public housing was started, but they did start. People of low-income status, or poverty, went to public housing as an affordable option to live in. Those who tried to move to a suburban area soon found their white neighbors moving away because they were afraid that their property value would decline (or so they said). So that area would soon most likely become an area of public housing again. Getting out of poverty isn’t easy, especially when race is a factor that no one will admit is a factor.
Fast-forward to today and just imagine for a moment: your great-grandparents were in poverty, your grandparents were in poverty, your parents are in poverty, and now you as a child are in poverty. After generations of your family being in poverty, along with all the families around you being in poverty, and not having the education to get out, it isn’t hard to imagine why the crime rate would go up: people get desperate to feel better and to have more, even if they can’t achieve it by natural means. So they go to drugs and alcohol, which can easily lead to violence. They steal the things they want.
This reminds me of a little piece of Thomas More's Utopia, which I first heard mentioned in the movie Ever After. Fast-forward to approximately 6:30 on this clip:
The children of inner-city schools end up going to an institution in which they are treated as no different than anyone else. They came from poverty, they will stay in poverty. They have no special knowledge and no special talents. They barely get to learn the basic skills that most people in America deem necessary. Without a decent education, the likelihood that they will get a decent job is diminished, leaving them in poverty and low-income housing. It simply continues the cycle.
While I agree with Kozol that the state these schools are in is horrible to the children, I have to say that it’s also damaging to the society in which these children live. Also, the solution does not start within the school systems, but with the ways in which public housing and property taxes are set up. Perhaps if public housing is spread throughout middle- and high-income neighborhoods without the fear that the property value will go down, the children will be exposed to decent education, leading to decent jobs, which could lead to the ending of at least on poverty cycle.
Monday, January 16, 2012
How do you generate an elegance of earned self-togetherness so that you have a stick-to-it-ness in the face of the catastophic? - Cornel West
Is there a better way to start out a post about the meaning of life than with a little bit of humor? I don't think so.
On a more serious and personal note, I grew up in church from the time I was born. I've heard people try to define the meaning of life as anything from doing good deeds to simply believing in God. Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life, suggests that the purpose of life is to love God since He made us simply to love us. Some believe that there is no purpose to life. I have entertained this option and decided that, if there is no purpose to life, I might as well go walk out onto a busy interstate and get killed by a car. Why not?
I would hope that many would agree with me when I say that is a depressing way to look at life. So I choose to have a purpose.
What other opinions are there on the meaning of life, though? I would imagine it is a question that has lasted throughout the history of human life. Also, how do you find the meaning of life, if there is one? What questions do you have to ask? Who do you have to ask? Plato said, "The unexamined life in not worth living." So perhaps to find the meaning of life, you must start with examining your own life, as well as life around you.
In search of other opinions on this subject, I watched a movie called Examined Life. This film features several philosophers from around the world. They speak on giving life meaning, as well as many other issues that may come up as you examine your life.
The film starts out with Cornel West. However, I will save what he had to say until last, mainly since he was one of my favorite philosophers in this film. Next was Avital Ronell. I will start by saying that, out of all the philosophers featured, I had the hardest time following her train of though. She spoke in terms of the abstract, with little concrete evidence; however, she did reference meaning in life the most. She said she is skeptical about meaning because she views meaning as a way of covering up the wounds of non-meaning. (As I said, she was the hardest to follow). The craving for meaning often leads to grasping for a belief in God, patriotism, or some other form of greater being than the individual self. She believes that if there is no meaning, you have to do more work to define your own ethics because you aren't following what someone else has decided is right or wrong. She continues by saying that if you have a good conscious, you're not responsible and that the responsible being is the one who feels they've never been responsible enough.
This all leads well into what Peter Singer spoke about. He defines ethics as how a person chooses to spend their lives (a more concrete way of seeing how someone spends their lives is to look at what they spend money on - as well as what they don't - which is a principle I've heard many other places before). He uses specific examples, which he is very fluent in describing.
He finishes by saying that we make our lives most meaningful when we contribute to important causes (such as sending money to organizations to help children). If we do this, we have made at least a small difference in life around us.
Kwame Anthony Appiah continues this thought by saying that we are in a virtual relationship with millions of people. His main approach to life is cosmopolitanism. He says that, in today's world, we will care about everyone . . . but only if they are like us. Cosmopolitans care about everyone, and it is perfectly okay for everyone to be different. That included behaving differently, having different beliefs, and having different morals.
I think Slavoj Zizek follows this up the best in his discussion of love. He says that love is not the idealization of another person. It is accepting their whole person with their stupidities. It is finding perfection in the imperfection. We should learn to love the world like this, with its imperfections. He thinks that meaning is a common ideology because meanings make catastrophes feel a little bit better. If there is a reason this happened, it has meaning, therefore there is a sort of silver lining around the catastrophe. This is an important ideology because nature is a big series of unimaginable catastrophes. Think about our biggest source of energy: oil. Oil is a reminder of the catastrophe that caused all those prehistoric creatures to die and be compressed over millions of years, thus creating our oil.
Speaking more on the terms of nature than of catastrophe, though, is Michael Hardt when he talks about human nature. He talks about the transformation of human nature being revolution. How do we change human nature, though, especially when so many just go through the day without paying much attention to what effect they have on the world?
Now, to talk about my favorite philosopher in this entire film: Cornel West. He asks the questions that really can get you thinking. What do you do once you start examining your life? What happens when you start interrogating yourself? What happens when you call into question assumptions that you've never questioned before? And begin to become a different kind of person?
Let me pause here to say that these are very relevant questions, at least in my life. Especially the last one: what do I do if and when I begin to become a different kind of person because I start examining my life? Will I perhaps like myself better? How will others react? Will I be supported in any kind of changes I make to how I spend my time or my energy?
Cornel West introduced a quote to me which helped me face those worries. William Butler Yeats said, "It takes more courage to examine the dark corners of your own soul than it does for a soldier to fight on the battlefield." West continued to say that courage is the main virtue for any human being in the end.
So, with all this in mind, I suppose it is time for me to decide for myself what my purpose in life really is. I'm beginning to piece together perhaps all the different aspects of what my own purpose is, thanks to the help of philosophers I've never met. They give me more ideas to bounce around in my head in my process of graduating college and heading out into the world. This outta be fun.
What other opinions are there on the meaning of life, though? I would imagine it is a question that has lasted throughout the history of human life. Also, how do you find the meaning of life, if there is one? What questions do you have to ask? Who do you have to ask? Plato said, "The unexamined life in not worth living." So perhaps to find the meaning of life, you must start with examining your own life, as well as life around you.
In search of other opinions on this subject, I watched a movie called Examined Life. This film features several philosophers from around the world. They speak on giving life meaning, as well as many other issues that may come up as you examine your life.
The film starts out with Cornel West. However, I will save what he had to say until last, mainly since he was one of my favorite philosophers in this film. Next was Avital Ronell. I will start by saying that, out of all the philosophers featured, I had the hardest time following her train of though. She spoke in terms of the abstract, with little concrete evidence; however, she did reference meaning in life the most. She said she is skeptical about meaning because she views meaning as a way of covering up the wounds of non-meaning. (As I said, she was the hardest to follow). The craving for meaning often leads to grasping for a belief in God, patriotism, or some other form of greater being than the individual self. She believes that if there is no meaning, you have to do more work to define your own ethics because you aren't following what someone else has decided is right or wrong. She continues by saying that if you have a good conscious, you're not responsible and that the responsible being is the one who feels they've never been responsible enough.
This all leads well into what Peter Singer spoke about. He defines ethics as how a person chooses to spend their lives (a more concrete way of seeing how someone spends their lives is to look at what they spend money on - as well as what they don't - which is a principle I've heard many other places before). He uses specific examples, which he is very fluent in describing.
Kwame Anthony Appiah continues this thought by saying that we are in a virtual relationship with millions of people. His main approach to life is cosmopolitanism. He says that, in today's world, we will care about everyone . . . but only if they are like us. Cosmopolitans care about everyone, and it is perfectly okay for everyone to be different. That included behaving differently, having different beliefs, and having different morals.
I think Slavoj Zizek follows this up the best in his discussion of love. He says that love is not the idealization of another person. It is accepting their whole person with their stupidities. It is finding perfection in the imperfection. We should learn to love the world like this, with its imperfections. He thinks that meaning is a common ideology because meanings make catastrophes feel a little bit better. If there is a reason this happened, it has meaning, therefore there is a sort of silver lining around the catastrophe. This is an important ideology because nature is a big series of unimaginable catastrophes. Think about our biggest source of energy: oil. Oil is a reminder of the catastrophe that caused all those prehistoric creatures to die and be compressed over millions of years, thus creating our oil.
Speaking more on the terms of nature than of catastrophe, though, is Michael Hardt when he talks about human nature. He talks about the transformation of human nature being revolution. How do we change human nature, though, especially when so many just go through the day without paying much attention to what effect they have on the world?
Now, to talk about my favorite philosopher in this entire film: Cornel West. He asks the questions that really can get you thinking. What do you do once you start examining your life? What happens when you start interrogating yourself? What happens when you call into question assumptions that you've never questioned before? And begin to become a different kind of person?
Let me pause here to say that these are very relevant questions, at least in my life. Especially the last one: what do I do if and when I begin to become a different kind of person because I start examining my life? Will I perhaps like myself better? How will others react? Will I be supported in any kind of changes I make to how I spend my time or my energy?
Cornel West introduced a quote to me which helped me face those worries. William Butler Yeats said, "It takes more courage to examine the dark corners of your own soul than it does for a soldier to fight on the battlefield." West continued to say that courage is the main virtue for any human being in the end.
So, with all this in mind, I suppose it is time for me to decide for myself what my purpose in life really is. I'm beginning to piece together perhaps all the different aspects of what my own purpose is, thanks to the help of philosophers I've never met. They give me more ideas to bounce around in my head in my process of graduating college and heading out into the world. This outta be fun.
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