Most anyone who has had a discussion with me about anything remotely related to politics (and I can relate anything to politics -- trust me) would probably agree that if we were forced to use labels, I'd be labeled as some kind of Marxist. Sometimes it's said with a chuckle (even by me) and an admittance that it means I'm kind of crazy. Sometimes, I imagine, it's said with disdain (though usually not in front of my face). Sometimes it's said with a sneer by someone who knows better about how flawed or confused Marx (is/was). But for most who know me, it's said.
So let me say it. I am some kind of a Marxist. There's so much packed up into that word that I don't want to leave it out there without the qualifier "some kind of," because without such a qualifier there are just too many layers (or, perhaps as Derrida would say, "spirits," or "ghosts") to Marx (even as he gets packaged more and more reductively both in common parlance and academic conversation).
I'm currently taking a class on Jacques Derrida, and it is forcing me every week to rethink my own conceptions of the political; of what my purpose, my mission, my reason on this earth is; of how I expect to authentically act on this purpose, mission, reason; of my intellectual commitments to a fundamentally Marxist project; of my simultaneous weariness and forcefulness in claiming a Marxist identity; of my very conception of what it means to do work, or even to do; of my (mis-)understandings of the divisions between schools of thought. In short, the class makes me think. And rethink. A lot.
So the past three weeks we've been working through Derrida's Specters of Marx, and I have found our slow walk through this book (in a grad school life where I'm reading entire books each week only to discuss them for two hours in class before moving on to the next book, the time we take to dwell in this class is incredibly refreshing) to be enormously troubling, confusing, and invigorating.
There's so much I'm thinking about right now as I sit here and type just after getting out of this class that I don't even yet have the language to express what I'm thinking nor the intellectual force to even organize what I'm thinking into a mental substance fit for language. But I will try, since this is a blog post and I kind of want to keep this short and readable, to limit my discussion here to one of the critical points on which I'm meditating:
What is my responsibility as a socially and politically engaged intellectual? What does it mean to actually be an academic (as I hope to be), but to always be identified (for almost always others point it out about me before I admit it myself! - as happened in this Derrida class) as a Marxist? What are my ethical obligations and how can I go to sleep at night with my dreams of changing the world (because, after all, of what else does a Marxist dream?!) knowing that my hands and feet aren't all that tired from a day of dirty work? (and that last question, as one of my most important mentors knows, has been haunting me since before I got to Cornell)
I must confess that I've been struggling since the Occupy movement became visible* to justify (not sure if this is the right phrasing, but it's what I've got now) to myself my career aspirations, namely, my decision to attempt to earn a PhD and become a professor somewhere. Indeed, one professor I spoke to voiced that they believed I seemed better suited to work for a nonprofit or some such similar work. And I struggled with this as I watched people doing the "dirty work" of camping out in Zuccotti Park and marching and demonstrating and organizing organic conversational committees and leaderless groups. "Why am I not down there?" I though. What the hell am I doing up here in the academy?
As if the academy was separate from Zuccotti Park!
I had a crucially important conversation with someone (I'm not sure this person even realizes how important this conversation was to me) about this reservation before leaving Geneseo to begin the project that is graduate school. And this conversation helped me to understand activism in a way that was much more broad (and historically and factually accurate!) than my previous conception. It helped me to understand that there are spaces besides the streets in front of the cameras where activist work takes place, and that the halls of academia are one such place. And so I found myself rethinking my conception of activism and agency. We can do work in the academy to affect change in real social conditions. We are not (unless we choose to be -- which is itself always a political choice even as it masks itself as apolitical) separated from "the real world" or in some kind of bubble just because we spend our time reading, thinking, and talking (and being, right Heidegger?). There is work to be done in all spaces, including academia.
But what is "the work" I am talking about when I talk about "doing the work"? What the hell does that vague phrase which I repeat ad nauseum all the time, mean?
Well, for me it means, as I said in a previous post, crafting my career in the model of a public intellectual. Of extending my teaching beyond the walls of the classroom, of writing in a style that appeals to more readers than other academics (not instead of, but in addition to academic writing), of writing in venues besides academic journals and university presses, etc.
So you can imagine my feeling when today in class my professor directly asked the question, "What is the responsibility of the intellectual?" and began to spin this story I just spun about engaging in the project of being a public intellectual in the extremely condensed way I just described only to end by exclaiming, "Hogwash! Don't give me that. Your only responsibility is to think."
How dare he mock the career trajectory I have been thinking and talking seriously about for a year now! (for indeed, as he himself said, he was mocking on purpose)
But as I listened and thought, I realized something about myself: even as I so strongly value intellectual virtue, even as I take great pleasure in the life of the mind, even as I thirst for knowledge and understanding about any topic imaginable, I had, without realizing it or ever explicitly saying it, formed a binary at the bedrock of my thinking that placed thinking in opposition to "doing the work." Or, if not in direct opposition, then I had defined thinking as necessarily being that which in itself is never enough to qualify as work.
I had become so invested in the materialist concerns of Marxism that I had adopted (ideologically and dogmatically perhaps -- which is ironic, not characteristic of Marxism**, by the way. But see my second footnote so this parenthetical remark doesn't get even longer) a view of mental work as being insufficiently disconnected from the material. But perhaps this isn't the case. Thinking is work. What was Marx himself after all (well, he said he wasn't a Marxist, to be fair) but a thinker? The project of Marxism is, fundamentally, the realization of Justice (and this is why I am, for all of my problems with some of the particulars of Marxist theory, fundamentally a Marxist). And how do we get to Justice without thinking? Thinking our past, thinking our present, thinking our future? There is no activism without thinking; there is no Justice without thinking. Thinking matters. It is work.
Now, this does not mean I have converted to my professor's dismissive position regarding that whole public intellectual issue. I still want to do all of those things like write for a newspaper as well as for academic journals (an idea he seemed to be particularly vicious towards). But I have been forced to rethink what I think about thinking. And man, is this hard work.
-------------
*(I say "became visible" rather than "began" because it can, I think, be less than ideal to
start discussions about when a social movement "began," as if it wasn't
an extension of what has already been -- and yet the particulars of our
age demand that we begin again as if for the first time (every time), as Derrida
says! But I digress...)
**Marx was nothing if not open to self-criticism. He wrote into his own theory the possibility of himself being superseded. Marxism is not merely a dogmatic list of propositions, as so many people (even folks who teach it in their course on Literary Theory) think. It is a way of thinking the world, a way of thinking about one's place in the world and one's responsibility to humanity. And part of that thinking is a commitment to critique everything, including the thinking itself.
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
Monday, September 17, 2012
On keeping the "martial" in Martial Arts
After all that talk about becoming a public intellectual in my last post, this one has nothing to do with academia. Instead, I want to start here:
I am a martial artist.
Not, "I do/practice martial arts." Nope. I am a martial artist.
Because this is so much at the core of my identity, I wear it on my sleeve (or, I guess, on my skin...) proudly. Not in the way where I walk around like "I know how to fight and I bet I could kick your ass." Well, that should be obvious, because a martial artist in the proper sense would never do that. We don't care about whose ass we could or could not kick until there's no other choice. It seriously has nothing to do with competition.
So you see, I get kind of irked when folks -- especially those who also practice martial arts or call themselves martial artists -- immediately begin talking about being turned off by competition or being more interested in the "tradition" or "spiritual" side of martial arts when they hear me describe the way I train and the way my home school (Holbrook Kempo!) trains.
People are usually interested in the fact that I train until I get to the part where I talk about hitting. In the school that I come from, we like to hit each other. A lot. Pretty hard. Not to hurt each other on purpose, but enough so that we know when we get hit it isn't a tag or a touch. It's a hit. It's unpleasant. Sometimes someone leave a sparring class with a bloody nose or a black eye (I know I've had both!). And that's ok. We check our egos at the door so it's not about besting each other or getting someone back for doing so. We should train harder to not get hit. Or if we ever do get hit during an actual fight, we won't be surprised by the feeling.
But when people who don't train hear this, they get really surprised. And I get that. It's weird if you don't train to hear someone say that they "miss" -- sincerely miss -- hitting and getting hit. But what gets me is the dozens and dozens of times people who do train hear me describe that mentality and immediately recoil, as if the folks with whom I train and I are kind of crazy.
Immediately, I usually get one of two (if not both) responses:
(1) "We're more into the traditional/spiritual side of training."
(2) "We're not into competition."
I take severe exception to these responses. Not in a way that makes me angry or upset, but in a way that irritates me, mostly because of how tired I am of the repetition. (So if you've said one of these things to me before, I was probably very annoyed, but it's not personal -- I'm annoyed at the larger script, as I'll explain here)
First of all, I'll get (2) out of the way, since it's so easy to do away with. In no way is hitting equatable with competition. Just because we hit each other and spar regularly does not in any way mean we're in competition with each other. I could not care less about being better or worse than anyone else on the face of the planet at fighting. That's not the point of sparring.
Sparring is not about competition.
Sparring is not about competition.
Sparring is not about competition.
Got it? Good.
Sparring is about learning about yourself, your strengths and weaknesses. It's about learning to be a better fighter. It's about testing your self-control and seeing just how far you've come in your training at keeping your ego in check in a controlled, safe environment. Sparring is not real fighting. It is training. But it still hurts. And it should. But that doesn't mean the two people sparring are competing with each other. It means they are each pushing each other to better themselves. They are on a collective mission for individual improvement. By committing to give your sparring partner an honest hit (not tag or touch) when they leave themselves open, you are helping them become better. And likewise when they commit to do the same for you.
Now, let's talk about (1). The logical assumption that underlies this reply to my description of "hitting" is that somehow by being focused on the combative side of a martial art, that makes one less in touch with the spiritual side.
This, to be blunt, is bullshit. I kind of apologize for the language, but not really.
"Martial Art" is a single noun made up of two words, and both words share equal importance. I take both sides very seriously -- that's why after 16 years of training I still call myself a beginner.
A martial art is an art. It is beautiful. It is creative. It is intellectual, working multiple layers of theories and principles and concepts into techniques and forms which take years -- decades! -- to truly understand in any meaningful way. I'm still learning lessons from my white belt techniques! This is art. This is tradition.
And it is important for a martial artist to grow and cultivate the body, mind, and spirit as one. We not only exercise our bodies -- keeping our hearts and other muscles strong and conditioned, reducing unnecessary tension which impedes effective motion, strengthening our lungs and diaphragm to help make breathing more controlled and efficient, trying to keep ourselves flexible as we age, etc.; we also exercise our minds -- some of my favorite aspects of the martial arts are the mental aspects, the layers upon layers of theory and conceptual work built into tiny pieces of technique which can provide a practitioner with years of exciting training as they try to truly understand how that technique actual works -- and how it doesn't!; and we also exercise our spirits: martial arts is inherently a character building and spiritual experience.
Think about it this way. Should I ever get into a physical confrontation in which I have to, out of necessity, physically fight to protect myself or those that I love, I am trained to destroy -- my instructor has an affection for the word "liquify" -- my opponent. That is a huge, huge responsibility. Such training must by necessity be balanced by intense spiritual training -- and by that I don't necessarily mean prayer and chanting (though that works for some people). I mean serious training in humility and compassion, in the rules of respect, discipline, and self-control.
In my system, our "front position" which signifies our simultaneous relaxed alertness, involves making a fist with one hand and holding it close to your body in front of your chest, in front of your heart, and then covering the fist with the other hand. This gesture is not merely a hand position; it means something. It tells a story. It says, "I have a weapon -- my martial arts skill -- that I treasure and carry close to my heart. I can use this weapon effectively if pressed, but I wish to keep it covered. I wish to keep it close to me and not use it."
So you see, just because we like to hit each other does not in any way mean we do not value tradition or spiritual growth and development. I spend just as much time talking about character when I teach (with both adults and children) as I do talking about fighting. Because the two are inseparable. If you are a responsible teacher you can't teach how to destroy something unless you also teach of the terrible consequences of destruction, of the extremity, not normalcy, which breeds destruction, and of the imperative to not only avoid destroying but to preserve and cultivate whenever possible.
I want to end by returning to this sense of the singe noun made up of two words: the singular duality of the noun "Martial Art."
This single noun encompasses two spaces of meaning. It describes an Art: something which requires training and a precise set of skills, and perhaps something which can achieve or express certain forms of beauty. It also describes something Martial: something having to do with combat, with fighting.
In order to be training in a true martial art as a true martial artist, one must recognize the equal importance of these two dimensions in their unification in the term "Martial Art."
Too often today, I believe folks drift towards one end of a spectrum of emphases over another.
In general, some MMA folks are so focused on competition that they forget about the rich cultural traditions and spiritual journeys packed into techniques they're learning in their quest to become the most efficient fighters they can be. And for a lot of them, that's fine, and they would admit that, since for them they're training to fight, period. And honestly, because of this honesty, I find this polarization easier to stomach than the other trend that I see.
The other trend is in practitioners of traditional martial arts (as I consider myself to be), and I believe it comes from both the emergence of a vibrant MMA community across the US and the explosion of popularity of Kenpo, Tae Kwon Do, and bastardizations of Japanese Karate schools (this explosion of popularity means TMA has become a viable and vibrant business model, which means there is more incentive to start a scholl to earn money and therefore a large number of poor quality martial arts schools, especially in the most popular styles).
It is this almost complete disconnect from the "Martial" in "Martial Art." There are many traditional martial arts practitioners now (I see them all over the place at tournaments) who train for years and attain high ranks without ever seriously considering the martial applications and implications of what they do.
For some, to focus on the combative side of the martial art would somehow violate some kind of moral high ground on which they place their martial art. As if they're above fighting and have progressed to the point where they simply focus on tradition and spiritual development. But as I already explained, the spiritual development inherent in true martial arts training is explicitly intertwined with the martial context in which all of the training develops. While not all martial arts are Eastern or explicitly ground themselves in this particular school of philosophy, I think most display an uncanny embodiment of the philosophy of balanced unison of opposites permeating the Taoist text, the Tao-te Ching. Not to mention, for all the talk of tradition, it would do these folks well to remember just how many martial arts (at least of Chinese, Japanese, and Okinawan origin; I don't know as much about Korean, Western, Philipino, or other arts) actually developed as ways to train to fight on the battlefield or protect oneself from thieves or oppressive ruling classes. Their founding contexts are martial. The spirituality, in a way, grows out of the combative.
For others, they train simply to compete at tournaments, and so for them it's about the flash. Can I throw my weapon in the air and make it spin more times than the other guy before I catch it? Can I learn more gymnastic tricks which will make my forms look more impressive in front of judges? Can I learn the best strategies to score points in the heavily structured game of point sparring? These folks, admittedly, drive me absolutely crazy. Don't even get me started on the phrase, "extreme martial arts"! (Is that still even a thing? I hope not.) These folks have no understanding -- and in many cases no desire to have any kind of understanding -- of the martial application of what they're doing.
And there's a problem with both of these groups of students that tend to focus too heavily on the "art" without the "martial": without a grounding in the combative elements of what you're doing, a martial art becomes nothing more than choreographed calisthenics. If that's what you want to do, fine with me. Just don't call it a "martial art," then, because you're ignoring an entire half of the term you're using. (And that's why these people tend to bother me more than MMA folks. They're not honest about their imbalance. They profess to be teaching balance in many cases, but in fact forget a half. At least an MMA athlete who doesn't care about the tradition or spirituality -- and I'm not saying they're all like this, because in fact there are many MMA athletes who care deeply about tradition and spirituality -- will usually come out and say so.)
So I guess what I'm trying to say is actually quite simple. Be true to the wholeness of the Martial Arts. They are truly amazing bodies of knowledge, sites of memory of cultural traditions, beautiful fields of performance art, ways of telling and re-telling stories, sites of improvisation, and sets of tools for engaging in human-to-human combat. And all of those things are equally valuable. And in order to be a true martial art, it must encompass all of these aspects. And in order to be a complete martial artist, one must strive to train and understand all of these aspects together.
I hope I'm doing a good job myself, but I can always be better.
Ouss!
I am a martial artist.
Not, "I do/practice martial arts." Nope. I am a martial artist.
Because this is so much at the core of my identity, I wear it on my sleeve (or, I guess, on my skin...) proudly. Not in the way where I walk around like "I know how to fight and I bet I could kick your ass." Well, that should be obvious, because a martial artist in the proper sense would never do that. We don't care about whose ass we could or could not kick until there's no other choice. It seriously has nothing to do with competition.
So you see, I get kind of irked when folks -- especially those who also practice martial arts or call themselves martial artists -- immediately begin talking about being turned off by competition or being more interested in the "tradition" or "spiritual" side of martial arts when they hear me describe the way I train and the way my home school (Holbrook Kempo!) trains.
People are usually interested in the fact that I train until I get to the part where I talk about hitting. In the school that I come from, we like to hit each other. A lot. Pretty hard. Not to hurt each other on purpose, but enough so that we know when we get hit it isn't a tag or a touch. It's a hit. It's unpleasant. Sometimes someone leave a sparring class with a bloody nose or a black eye (I know I've had both!). And that's ok. We check our egos at the door so it's not about besting each other or getting someone back for doing so. We should train harder to not get hit. Or if we ever do get hit during an actual fight, we won't be surprised by the feeling.
But when people who don't train hear this, they get really surprised. And I get that. It's weird if you don't train to hear someone say that they "miss" -- sincerely miss -- hitting and getting hit. But what gets me is the dozens and dozens of times people who do train hear me describe that mentality and immediately recoil, as if the folks with whom I train and I are kind of crazy.
Immediately, I usually get one of two (if not both) responses:
(1) "We're more into the traditional/spiritual side of training."
(2) "We're not into competition."
I take severe exception to these responses. Not in a way that makes me angry or upset, but in a way that irritates me, mostly because of how tired I am of the repetition. (So if you've said one of these things to me before, I was probably very annoyed, but it's not personal -- I'm annoyed at the larger script, as I'll explain here)
First of all, I'll get (2) out of the way, since it's so easy to do away with. In no way is hitting equatable with competition. Just because we hit each other and spar regularly does not in any way mean we're in competition with each other. I could not care less about being better or worse than anyone else on the face of the planet at fighting. That's not the point of sparring.
Sparring is not about competition.
Sparring is not about competition.
Sparring is not about competition.
Got it? Good.
Sparring is about learning about yourself, your strengths and weaknesses. It's about learning to be a better fighter. It's about testing your self-control and seeing just how far you've come in your training at keeping your ego in check in a controlled, safe environment. Sparring is not real fighting. It is training. But it still hurts. And it should. But that doesn't mean the two people sparring are competing with each other. It means they are each pushing each other to better themselves. They are on a collective mission for individual improvement. By committing to give your sparring partner an honest hit (not tag or touch) when they leave themselves open, you are helping them become better. And likewise when they commit to do the same for you.
Now, let's talk about (1). The logical assumption that underlies this reply to my description of "hitting" is that somehow by being focused on the combative side of a martial art, that makes one less in touch with the spiritual side.
This, to be blunt, is bullshit. I kind of apologize for the language, but not really.
"Martial Art" is a single noun made up of two words, and both words share equal importance. I take both sides very seriously -- that's why after 16 years of training I still call myself a beginner.
A martial art is an art. It is beautiful. It is creative. It is intellectual, working multiple layers of theories and principles and concepts into techniques and forms which take years -- decades! -- to truly understand in any meaningful way. I'm still learning lessons from my white belt techniques! This is art. This is tradition.
And it is important for a martial artist to grow and cultivate the body, mind, and spirit as one. We not only exercise our bodies -- keeping our hearts and other muscles strong and conditioned, reducing unnecessary tension which impedes effective motion, strengthening our lungs and diaphragm to help make breathing more controlled and efficient, trying to keep ourselves flexible as we age, etc.; we also exercise our minds -- some of my favorite aspects of the martial arts are the mental aspects, the layers upon layers of theory and conceptual work built into tiny pieces of technique which can provide a practitioner with years of exciting training as they try to truly understand how that technique actual works -- and how it doesn't!; and we also exercise our spirits: martial arts is inherently a character building and spiritual experience.
Think about it this way. Should I ever get into a physical confrontation in which I have to, out of necessity, physically fight to protect myself or those that I love, I am trained to destroy -- my instructor has an affection for the word "liquify" -- my opponent. That is a huge, huge responsibility. Such training must by necessity be balanced by intense spiritual training -- and by that I don't necessarily mean prayer and chanting (though that works for some people). I mean serious training in humility and compassion, in the rules of respect, discipline, and self-control.
In my system, our "front position" which signifies our simultaneous relaxed alertness, involves making a fist with one hand and holding it close to your body in front of your chest, in front of your heart, and then covering the fist with the other hand. This gesture is not merely a hand position; it means something. It tells a story. It says, "I have a weapon -- my martial arts skill -- that I treasure and carry close to my heart. I can use this weapon effectively if pressed, but I wish to keep it covered. I wish to keep it close to me and not use it."
So you see, just because we like to hit each other does not in any way mean we do not value tradition or spiritual growth and development. I spend just as much time talking about character when I teach (with both adults and children) as I do talking about fighting. Because the two are inseparable. If you are a responsible teacher you can't teach how to destroy something unless you also teach of the terrible consequences of destruction, of the extremity, not normalcy, which breeds destruction, and of the imperative to not only avoid destroying but to preserve and cultivate whenever possible.
I want to end by returning to this sense of the singe noun made up of two words: the singular duality of the noun "Martial Art."
This single noun encompasses two spaces of meaning. It describes an Art: something which requires training and a precise set of skills, and perhaps something which can achieve or express certain forms of beauty. It also describes something Martial: something having to do with combat, with fighting.
In order to be training in a true martial art as a true martial artist, one must recognize the equal importance of these two dimensions in their unification in the term "Martial Art."
Too often today, I believe folks drift towards one end of a spectrum of emphases over another.
In general, some MMA folks are so focused on competition that they forget about the rich cultural traditions and spiritual journeys packed into techniques they're learning in their quest to become the most efficient fighters they can be. And for a lot of them, that's fine, and they would admit that, since for them they're training to fight, period. And honestly, because of this honesty, I find this polarization easier to stomach than the other trend that I see.
The other trend is in practitioners of traditional martial arts (as I consider myself to be), and I believe it comes from both the emergence of a vibrant MMA community across the US and the explosion of popularity of Kenpo, Tae Kwon Do, and bastardizations of Japanese Karate schools (this explosion of popularity means TMA has become a viable and vibrant business model, which means there is more incentive to start a scholl to earn money and therefore a large number of poor quality martial arts schools, especially in the most popular styles).
It is this almost complete disconnect from the "Martial" in "Martial Art." There are many traditional martial arts practitioners now (I see them all over the place at tournaments) who train for years and attain high ranks without ever seriously considering the martial applications and implications of what they do.
For some, to focus on the combative side of the martial art would somehow violate some kind of moral high ground on which they place their martial art. As if they're above fighting and have progressed to the point where they simply focus on tradition and spiritual development. But as I already explained, the spiritual development inherent in true martial arts training is explicitly intertwined with the martial context in which all of the training develops. While not all martial arts are Eastern or explicitly ground themselves in this particular school of philosophy, I think most display an uncanny embodiment of the philosophy of balanced unison of opposites permeating the Taoist text, the Tao-te Ching. Not to mention, for all the talk of tradition, it would do these folks well to remember just how many martial arts (at least of Chinese, Japanese, and Okinawan origin; I don't know as much about Korean, Western, Philipino, or other arts) actually developed as ways to train to fight on the battlefield or protect oneself from thieves or oppressive ruling classes. Their founding contexts are martial. The spirituality, in a way, grows out of the combative.
For others, they train simply to compete at tournaments, and so for them it's about the flash. Can I throw my weapon in the air and make it spin more times than the other guy before I catch it? Can I learn more gymnastic tricks which will make my forms look more impressive in front of judges? Can I learn the best strategies to score points in the heavily structured game of point sparring? These folks, admittedly, drive me absolutely crazy. Don't even get me started on the phrase, "extreme martial arts"! (Is that still even a thing? I hope not.) These folks have no understanding -- and in many cases no desire to have any kind of understanding -- of the martial application of what they're doing.
And there's a problem with both of these groups of students that tend to focus too heavily on the "art" without the "martial": without a grounding in the combative elements of what you're doing, a martial art becomes nothing more than choreographed calisthenics. If that's what you want to do, fine with me. Just don't call it a "martial art," then, because you're ignoring an entire half of the term you're using. (And that's why these people tend to bother me more than MMA folks. They're not honest about their imbalance. They profess to be teaching balance in many cases, but in fact forget a half. At least an MMA athlete who doesn't care about the tradition or spirituality -- and I'm not saying they're all like this, because in fact there are many MMA athletes who care deeply about tradition and spirituality -- will usually come out and say so.)
So I guess what I'm trying to say is actually quite simple. Be true to the wholeness of the Martial Arts. They are truly amazing bodies of knowledge, sites of memory of cultural traditions, beautiful fields of performance art, ways of telling and re-telling stories, sites of improvisation, and sets of tools for engaging in human-to-human combat. And all of those things are equally valuable. And in order to be a true martial art, it must encompass all of these aspects. And in order to be a complete martial artist, one must strive to train and understand all of these aspects together.
I hope I'm doing a good job myself, but I can always be better.
Ouss!
Saturday, September 15, 2012
Why the heck do I keep blogging? Imagining my career path already...
Yeah yeah yeah, it's been three weeks since my last post. I know. But I just started a PhD program, so I'm not doing much other than reading, and reading, and reading lately. But I want to keep this up, so I will try to keep doing blog posts once in a while, but probably even less regularly than I did over the summer.
Let me take a quick moment to explain one of my reasons to continue to keep up this blog. I know not a lot of people read it, but it's important to me, personally, to keep writing it. This is not only because of the need for an outlet I expressed in my very first post, but also because of my hopes for the kind of academic career I want to have.
Now, what could blogging have to do with becoming an English professor? Well, while many of my professors here at Cornell are repeatedly telling me and the rest of the first-year cohort it's too early to be thinking about the job market or professionalizing in general, I have to say it's hard for me to not think about it. I mean, we all imagine what we want to be when we grow up, right? I'm still doing that. I know not to stress about the market, but I certainly have a vision (that very well could change!) of what kind of professional I want to be. So it was interesting when on the very first day of the course I'm taking titled "Toni Morrison's Novels" part of our discussion was about the question of "what is a public intellectual?"
In all of my wide-eyed first-year graduate student naivety I have this idea of somehow shaping myself into some kind of public intellectual. For me, while I very much look forward to teaching, research, and even the challenges of faculty governance (though from what I'm hearing this will very very quickly dissipate!), I also want to do work "outside" the traditional bounds of the academy. I want to provoke discussion not only in the classroom, but also at the dinner table or the pub about power structures and cultural issues. I actually enjoy academic writing, and like a lot of my young peers I've met so far at Cornell have ambitions of publishing articles in prestigious academic journals or even an academic book one day. But I also want to write newspaper columns, books for readers beyond the world of academia, and blog posts.
Yes, blog posts. Because of the work that I do and the topics that are of greatest interest to me (structures of power which shape the material/political conditions in which people live, especially as related to race in the United States), I believe it is imperative that serious discussions about these topics happen in as many places as possible with as many people as possible. And I mean discussions, not me lecturing the world about what I think all of our problems are as I stand on a huge soap box. I think it's important for folks to talk about these things together. At least in this country, our public discussions about race that get media coverage are often superficial at best and deeply problematic at worst. I want to do whatever little bit I can to change that. And that means doing different kinds of writing besides the traditional academic articles or books.
So keeping this blog alive is important to me because it's good training. It helps me to keep writing in a not so formally academic voice. And who knows, maybe some folks will read some of the things I post and have a discussion with a friend or coworker about them. And maybe some good discussions will be had.
That's the hope anyway.
Let me take a quick moment to explain one of my reasons to continue to keep up this blog. I know not a lot of people read it, but it's important to me, personally, to keep writing it. This is not only because of the need for an outlet I expressed in my very first post, but also because of my hopes for the kind of academic career I want to have.
Now, what could blogging have to do with becoming an English professor? Well, while many of my professors here at Cornell are repeatedly telling me and the rest of the first-year cohort it's too early to be thinking about the job market or professionalizing in general, I have to say it's hard for me to not think about it. I mean, we all imagine what we want to be when we grow up, right? I'm still doing that. I know not to stress about the market, but I certainly have a vision (that very well could change!) of what kind of professional I want to be. So it was interesting when on the very first day of the course I'm taking titled "Toni Morrison's Novels" part of our discussion was about the question of "what is a public intellectual?"
In all of my wide-eyed first-year graduate student naivety I have this idea of somehow shaping myself into some kind of public intellectual. For me, while I very much look forward to teaching, research, and even the challenges of faculty governance (though from what I'm hearing this will very very quickly dissipate!), I also want to do work "outside" the traditional bounds of the academy. I want to provoke discussion not only in the classroom, but also at the dinner table or the pub about power structures and cultural issues. I actually enjoy academic writing, and like a lot of my young peers I've met so far at Cornell have ambitions of publishing articles in prestigious academic journals or even an academic book one day. But I also want to write newspaper columns, books for readers beyond the world of academia, and blog posts.
Yes, blog posts. Because of the work that I do and the topics that are of greatest interest to me (structures of power which shape the material/political conditions in which people live, especially as related to race in the United States), I believe it is imperative that serious discussions about these topics happen in as many places as possible with as many people as possible. And I mean discussions, not me lecturing the world about what I think all of our problems are as I stand on a huge soap box. I think it's important for folks to talk about these things together. At least in this country, our public discussions about race that get media coverage are often superficial at best and deeply problematic at worst. I want to do whatever little bit I can to change that. And that means doing different kinds of writing besides the traditional academic articles or books.
So keeping this blog alive is important to me because it's good training. It helps me to keep writing in a not so formally academic voice. And who knows, maybe some folks will read some of the things I post and have a discussion with a friend or coworker about them. And maybe some good discussions will be had.
That's the hope anyway.
Thursday, August 23, 2012
A new home, a new chapter: Leaving an experience behind while bringing the feeling forward
Of course, the reason for the location is that I am beginning graduate studies in English at Cornell University this week. There is only one way I feel about this: excited! I look forward to the challenges ahead as I strive to continue the work that I do and learn how to do it better. I look forward to learning how to be a more effective scholar, and how to execute the skills necessary to succeed as an academic. I look forward to learning just how much have to learn and to realizing even more saliently than I see now how little I really know. I look forward to meeting new people whose interests intersect with my own, and people whose interests don't. I look forward to carrying my formative stories from SUNY Geneseo with me across the Cornell campus, and adding to but not overwriting these stories.
Well that brings me to one of the less than spectacular things about the move: as excited as I am for Cornell, it does feel strange not being in Geneseo. I've written enough gushing facebook statuses and had enough conversations with folks both within and outside the school about how much I freakin' love that place, so I won't go all-out here. But I'm going to miss that community. Not in the sense that I won't be able to enjoy where I am and treasure the present moment -- I fully understand that I am at the moment where I ought to be -- but I will miss Geneseo in the sense that even though I know it is healthy for me to grow and move physically away from it, my identity is still very much connected to it. Geneseo was my home for four years. And I mean that. During summer vacations I would intentionally avoid saying I was "home," because I honestly did not think of the place where I grew up as such. By the time I was ready to go away to school, I had really begun to think of my martial arts school as my home on long island, and after a year at Geneseo that became my home throughout the academic year. So yeah, I'm a little homesick.
And there it is too, the dojo, the place I feel most at home. For 16 years --that's 73% of my life on earth! -- I've trained at the Kempo Martial Arts Dojo of Holbrook. I started assisting classes 11 years ago. I've been an instructor teaching classes on my own for 7 years. There is absolutely nothing on this earth that has had a larger impact on my life and on who I am today than my time training in White Tiger Kempo. And by training I mean living, breathing, eating, sleeping, and thinking Kempo. I mean being Kempo. Training has reached a point where for me it is a way of being in the world. As I wrote in my last black belt essay, I don't do martial arts, I am a martial artist. And so it is difficult to leave this time around. It's different from going to Geneseo. Four years ago I knew that I would be coming back to the island every summer and so my training would continue sporadically but predictably for the next four years. And like clockwork, for four years, late May would roll around and I would be back in the dojo, seven days a week (usually training 5 and teaching 2). But this is different. This move is much more permanent. My Cornell fellowship thankfully supplies summer funding, and because I'm leasing an apartment I am contractually attached to my place of residence for 12 -- as opposed to 9 -- months. This means no more spending 3 and a half months every summer training at the dojo. This means a week or two here and there. I cannot even conceptualize that yet. I have no idea how I will deal with this part of the new chapter in my life. I know I will continue to train in the martial arts. I know I will always be a martial artist. I know I will always be true to my Kempo roots. I know I will always remember the instructors who cultivated me and work to honor them in my own training. But I don't know yet how I will deal with not physically being in that dojo. I know I will always be part of the family, but I don't know how often I will see my Kempo brothers and sisters. And that's tough.
But as Sarah reminded me, I'm not leaving anyone behind. I carry all these people with me, along with all of the other folks that touched my life in numerous ways be it by playing in a shitty band for 3 weeks in high school, getting lost in New Orleans, mentoring me through academic and personal crises, being there to learn with me how to do work inside of human relationships, or working on the school newspaper with me for 3 or 4 years at Geneseo. Yeah yeah yeah, cliche cliche cliche you've heard all this before and I'm sounding way too sentimental and repetitious. While obviously self-conscious of this, I don't care enough to not post it =P
But again, to be clear, I am beyond excited for this next step. I am already learning to love Cornell and the city of Ithaca one small piece at a time (though I wish the Africana Center wasn't so far away on the northernmost edge of campus...). I feel closer to being a professional, and it feels good. And I cannot express how great it feels to have my own space. After a lifetime in a space crawling with toxicity (not only toxicity, as distance and age is teaching me, but certainly corrosive toxicity nonetheless), it is wonderful to nurture my own space. I will strive to make it a space in which I can be most able to do the work I want to do to continue to shape spaces and clean toxicity elsewhere as well, wherever I can and with whomever I can.
So while I will treasure all of my experiences and the family I found throughout my story thus far, for now I will enjoy making my new home and putting pen to paper for a new chapter.
* * *
The old ones speak of winter
The young ones praise the sun
And time just slips away
Running into nowhere
Turning like a wheel
And a year becomes a day
Whenever we dream
That's when we fly
So here is a dream
For just you and I
We'll find the Sacred Heart
Somewhere bleeding in the night
Look for the light
And find the Sacred Heart
Here we see the wizard
Staring through the glass
And he's pointing right at you
You can see tomorrow
The answer and the lie
And the things you've got to do
Oh, sometimes you never fall
And ah - You're the lucky one
But oh - Sometimes you want it all
You've got to reach for the sun
And find the Sacred Heart
Somewhere bleeding in the night
Oh look to the light
You fight to kill the dragon
And bargain with the beast
And sail into a sign
You run along the rainbow
And never leave the ground
And still you don't know why
Whenever you dream
You're holding the key
It opens the door
To let you be free
And find the Sacred Heart
Somewhere bleeding in the night
Run for the light
And you'll find the Sacred Heart
A shout comes from the wizard
The sky begins to crack
And he's looking right at you - Quick
Run along the rainbow
Before it turns to black - Attack
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Injuries and my fears of aging
Yes, this is another blog post following a very prolonged gap. Yes, I changed the name of the blog to something more reflective of the general range of topics about which I've been writing. Moving on.
So in the past few weeks, I've had a chunk of my lip ripped nearly off and fixed with stitches (now it's fixed and all that's left as evidence is an irregular spot on the inside of my lip and a slightly loose tooth which my dentist says may die at literally any random time), broken a finger, and apparently had an impact on my knee which caused a little pocket of fluid to swell up along w/the regular bruising. Yes I'm a martial artist, but only one of those three was because of martial arts. The other two were from basketball. Though my Sensei will continue to say all of them are from the latter. Two out of three injuries not being from my lifestyle of electing to get punched in the face is enough irony for me.
But anyway, I've been thinking about my body and aging as I deal with this succession of injuries which each wind up having effects on my ability to engage in regular physical activities in ways disproportionate to their external appearance. Seriously, the bump on my knee has a circumference about the size of a nickle, but the pain after going to class at the dojo last night and playing basketball tonight was unbelievable. And that's saying something coming from me. I think I have a pretty high pain tolerance, and folks who know me know that I am totally that guy who never admits to being hurt or needing medical assistance (much to the chagrin of a few of my close friends -- sorry!).
Ok, back to my body and aging. I hate being physically unable to train the way I normally do when at the dojo. It makes me angry, upset, and when it lasts longer than one single day, it makes me kind of depressed (in the colloquial sense, not the clinical sense).
After my four years at Geneseo, most people know me as an intellectually-oriented individual, someone who spends most of his time working with his mind. And that's true, in a sense. I do identify that way -- I am, after all, on a path to hopefully have a career in academia.
But I'm also a martial artist. That should make it obvious that I also identify strongly with my physicality as well as my intellectual inclinations. While training and exercise eclipses a bit during the academic year because of just how time-consuming my academic life is, I still work hard to keep myself active and training.
And you know what? I'm proud of that. I'm proud of the fact that I can keep my everyday resting heart rate hovering down around 45. I'm proud of the fact that, while I am an absolute failure at pretty much every sport I've ever tried, I still pass as an athlete of sorts. And I'm proud (evidently proud enough to tout my own horn in a blog post! hahaha) because I know I work hard (not to disavow luck -- I was blessed with a fast metabolism and other genetic factors that help out, as well as others that don't). Being proud of those kinds of things is part of my sense of identity. Part of me sense of self is my self-knowledge of my body's capabilities and a personality trait of refusing to accept apparent limitations (except for when my fears of heights or deep water factor in!). I relish in my martial arts training for many reasons -- martial arts has influenced literally every dynamic of my persona (that's a future blog bost). But one of those reasons is the pure physicality of it.
So that brings me back to the topic of injuries. I get a ton of bumps and bruises and there's always a part of my body that's sore -- to the point where I honestly answer "I don't know" when people ask me where some bruise or bump came from or why my legs or shoulders or whatever hurt. But rarely do these things impede my capacity to train at the level of intensity at which I like to train. When something happens that does impede me, however, I become very upset. And like I said, I become kind of depressed. I know it's not a unique feeling. A ton of people, within and outside the world of martial arts, have felt that kind of depression when you realize your body won't do something it usually has no problem doing. I am lucky beyond belief that I have never had such an injury last permanently and still enjoy the privilege of being able-bodied. But again, I know tons of people have had that temporary state where they can't quite perform the way they usual do.
I don't know about you, but for me, this depression at having my body limited by injury gets me thinking about the prospect of aging. Honestly, I am afraid to age. Not because I'm afraid of living on my own. Not because I'm afraid of trying to find a job. Not because I'm afraid of adult responsibilities. But because I'm afraid of what's going to happen to my body as I age, especially because at some point the effects of aging are outside of our control! (Don't get me started on my control issues!) The day will come when I can't run as fast, fight for as long, or get hit as hard as I can now. I already feel I'm getting older as I wake up each morning knowing whether it will be a "good" day or a "bad" day for my wrists (the difference being measured most accurately by my discomfort in the high plank position). I can tell that I'll have arthritis in my hands at some point (I've broken, sprained, or severely jammed 9 out of 10 fingers).
This stuff scares the crap out of me! Like I said, I'm somewhat mentally prepared (I think) for bills, jobs, and responsibilities. I am not at all mentally prepared for my body to age.
I know this has been a very self-centered post. All about me and my feelings. But I'm curious. How do any of (the two or three of) you who read this feel about your body aging, and more importantly, about the effects of that aging process being at some point outside of your control?
So in the past few weeks, I've had a chunk of my lip ripped nearly off and fixed with stitches (now it's fixed and all that's left as evidence is an irregular spot on the inside of my lip and a slightly loose tooth which my dentist says may die at literally any random time), broken a finger, and apparently had an impact on my knee which caused a little pocket of fluid to swell up along w/the regular bruising. Yes I'm a martial artist, but only one of those three was because of martial arts. The other two were from basketball. Though my Sensei will continue to say all of them are from the latter. Two out of three injuries not being from my lifestyle of electing to get punched in the face is enough irony for me.
But anyway, I've been thinking about my body and aging as I deal with this succession of injuries which each wind up having effects on my ability to engage in regular physical activities in ways disproportionate to their external appearance. Seriously, the bump on my knee has a circumference about the size of a nickle, but the pain after going to class at the dojo last night and playing basketball tonight was unbelievable. And that's saying something coming from me. I think I have a pretty high pain tolerance, and folks who know me know that I am totally that guy who never admits to being hurt or needing medical assistance (much to the chagrin of a few of my close friends -- sorry!).
Ok, back to my body and aging. I hate being physically unable to train the way I normally do when at the dojo. It makes me angry, upset, and when it lasts longer than one single day, it makes me kind of depressed (in the colloquial sense, not the clinical sense).
But I'm also a martial artist. That should make it obvious that I also identify strongly with my physicality as well as my intellectual inclinations. While training and exercise eclipses a bit during the academic year because of just how time-consuming my academic life is, I still work hard to keep myself active and training.
And you know what? I'm proud of that. I'm proud of the fact that I can keep my everyday resting heart rate hovering down around 45. I'm proud of the fact that, while I am an absolute failure at pretty much every sport I've ever tried, I still pass as an athlete of sorts. And I'm proud (evidently proud enough to tout my own horn in a blog post! hahaha) because I know I work hard (not to disavow luck -- I was blessed with a fast metabolism and other genetic factors that help out, as well as others that don't). Being proud of those kinds of things is part of my sense of identity. Part of me sense of self is my self-knowledge of my body's capabilities and a personality trait of refusing to accept apparent limitations (except for when my fears of heights or deep water factor in!). I relish in my martial arts training for many reasons -- martial arts has influenced literally every dynamic of my persona (that's a future blog bost). But one of those reasons is the pure physicality of it.So that brings me back to the topic of injuries. I get a ton of bumps and bruises and there's always a part of my body that's sore -- to the point where I honestly answer "I don't know" when people ask me where some bruise or bump came from or why my legs or shoulders or whatever hurt. But rarely do these things impede my capacity to train at the level of intensity at which I like to train. When something happens that does impede me, however, I become very upset. And like I said, I become kind of depressed. I know it's not a unique feeling. A ton of people, within and outside the world of martial arts, have felt that kind of depression when you realize your body won't do something it usually has no problem doing. I am lucky beyond belief that I have never had such an injury last permanently and still enjoy the privilege of being able-bodied. But again, I know tons of people have had that temporary state where they can't quite perform the way they usual do.
I don't know about you, but for me, this depression at having my body limited by injury gets me thinking about the prospect of aging. Honestly, I am afraid to age. Not because I'm afraid of living on my own. Not because I'm afraid of trying to find a job. Not because I'm afraid of adult responsibilities. But because I'm afraid of what's going to happen to my body as I age, especially because at some point the effects of aging are outside of our control! (Don't get me started on my control issues!) The day will come when I can't run as fast, fight for as long, or get hit as hard as I can now. I already feel I'm getting older as I wake up each morning knowing whether it will be a "good" day or a "bad" day for my wrists (the difference being measured most accurately by my discomfort in the high plank position). I can tell that I'll have arthritis in my hands at some point (I've broken, sprained, or severely jammed 9 out of 10 fingers).
This stuff scares the crap out of me! Like I said, I'm somewhat mentally prepared (I think) for bills, jobs, and responsibilities. I am not at all mentally prepared for my body to age.
I know this has been a very self-centered post. All about me and my feelings. But I'm curious. How do any of (the two or three of) you who read this feel about your body aging, and more importantly, about the effects of that aging process being at some point outside of your control?
Saturday, July 14, 2012
Planting seeds of change
I haven't written a post in quite a while, I know. It's not like there hasn't been anything happening. Last time I checked, it was still an election year. But...well, I'm not going to go on about why I haven't written in a while. Instead, I'll say that I was going to write a post about the Daniel Tosh rape joke incident. But after writing on quite a few facebook threads and posting a link to this great article, I instead want to turn to a particular retort I heard repeated throughout these conversations, one which I personally hear time and again because of the kind of work I strive to do as a civically engaged academic.
"There will always be people whose minds you can't change." (or some variation)
This is true. And it can sometimes be depressing. I know I get discouraged when after a 45 minute conversation my interlocutor disparages me for thinking I can change anything when most people aren't rational and consensus is an impossibility. But there are a few things I take refuge in during these moments. For example, there are the facts of history. You probably know this famous quote from Dr. Martin Luther King jr.:
"When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice."
Now, I may have a slightly different interpretation of this passage from King's. Unfortunately, I cannot ask him. But for me, the "creative force" which directs the arc of the moral universe towards justice is human effort. And I believe this is the case whenever I look at the history of my own country. There was a time when people thought it was acceptable to have a legal form of racial slavery. There was a time when people thought it was unacceptable for women to vote. There was a time when people thought it was acceptable for a teacher to inflict corporal punishment* on their students. But we grew up. Or, to be more accurate, people did the necessary work of actively changing others' minds so that laws, customs, social scripts, and norms would change, so that the arc of history would align with arc of the moral universe.
And this happens slowly, gradually. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s was made possible by the work of abolitionists and civil rights advocates (both famous and not so famous) in the nineteenth century, who in turn had at their disposal texts and ideas much older than themselves. We don't always get to see the immediate effects of our efforts, but that doesn't change the fact that we are part of a larger wave of activity reverberating in the arc of history.
That's not to say that those of us who want to see social, political, economic, and cultural conditions change for the better can sit back and rest assured that the arc will bend because there is a force larger than ourselves. The movement initiated by the actions of those who wish to change conditions can be greater than the sum of its parts, but it does not exist without those parts.
So we continue to encourage conversation, register voters, write articles and books, draft and sign petitions, call and write our representatives, and help out in any way we can. Not because we think we can change everyone's mind, but because we think that we can plant a seed in everyone's mind. (Credit goes to a good friend of mine for this metaphor. He in turn got it from someone else, and it actually almost exactly resembles Jesus' parable of the sower in the New Testament). That seed may be nourished and grow, it may remain dormant for years until spurred to growth by a significant event, it may never grow. All we can do is plant seeds and do what we can to create a nourishing environment once those seeds of change are planted. Because some will grow. And once a few start growing, others feed off their strength. Eventually, politicians, teachers, and court justices begin to grow. And then change in cultural attitude becomes change in law. (Note that this linear progression may be a nice image, but obviously over-simplifies things) (Also note: this is why it is in fact a big fucking deal that President Obama voiced his support for same-sex marriage. No, he hasn't actually legalized it on the federal level yet, but his attitude changing is a big, big step)
So I fully acknowledge that as I continue to engage in conversations and write about issues of social justice and cultural scripts I will never be able to change everyone's mind. Such a goal is impossible to achieve. But as a very important professor and mentor said in class one day (and I will NEVER forget this): "Just because a goal is impossible to achieve, that does not excuse one from the responsibility of trying to achieve it."
That quote, along with that repackaging of the parable of the sower and a knowledge of the long process of social change in the United States keeps me focused and keeps me determined to continue the work that I do. I hope to pass these mantras on to others who may feel depressed or discouraged that they'll never be able to change everything they want to change. We may not see it now, or even ever in our lifetime. But so long as people keep doing the work, the arc of history will bend towards Justice.
*Note: When I originally wrote this, I was under the belief that corporal punishment had been outlawed in all 50 states in the US. I thank my friend Steven for bringing my error to my attention. Corporal punishment is in fact still legal in 19 states.
"There will always be people whose minds you can't change." (or some variation)
This is true. And it can sometimes be depressing. I know I get discouraged when after a 45 minute conversation my interlocutor disparages me for thinking I can change anything when most people aren't rational and consensus is an impossibility. But there are a few things I take refuge in during these moments. For example, there are the facts of history. You probably know this famous quote from Dr. Martin Luther King jr.:
"When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice."
Now, I may have a slightly different interpretation of this passage from King's. Unfortunately, I cannot ask him. But for me, the "creative force" which directs the arc of the moral universe towards justice is human effort. And I believe this is the case whenever I look at the history of my own country. There was a time when people thought it was acceptable to have a legal form of racial slavery. There was a time when people thought it was unacceptable for women to vote. There was a time when people thought it was acceptable for a teacher to inflict corporal punishment* on their students. But we grew up. Or, to be more accurate, people did the necessary work of actively changing others' minds so that laws, customs, social scripts, and norms would change, so that the arc of history would align with arc of the moral universe.
And this happens slowly, gradually. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s was made possible by the work of abolitionists and civil rights advocates (both famous and not so famous) in the nineteenth century, who in turn had at their disposal texts and ideas much older than themselves. We don't always get to see the immediate effects of our efforts, but that doesn't change the fact that we are part of a larger wave of activity reverberating in the arc of history.
That's not to say that those of us who want to see social, political, economic, and cultural conditions change for the better can sit back and rest assured that the arc will bend because there is a force larger than ourselves. The movement initiated by the actions of those who wish to change conditions can be greater than the sum of its parts, but it does not exist without those parts.
So we continue to encourage conversation, register voters, write articles and books, draft and sign petitions, call and write our representatives, and help out in any way we can. Not because we think we can change everyone's mind, but because we think that we can plant a seed in everyone's mind. (Credit goes to a good friend of mine for this metaphor. He in turn got it from someone else, and it actually almost exactly resembles Jesus' parable of the sower in the New Testament). That seed may be nourished and grow, it may remain dormant for years until spurred to growth by a significant event, it may never grow. All we can do is plant seeds and do what we can to create a nourishing environment once those seeds of change are planted. Because some will grow. And once a few start growing, others feed off their strength. Eventually, politicians, teachers, and court justices begin to grow. And then change in cultural attitude becomes change in law. (Note that this linear progression may be a nice image, but obviously over-simplifies things) (Also note: this is why it is in fact a big fucking deal that President Obama voiced his support for same-sex marriage. No, he hasn't actually legalized it on the federal level yet, but his attitude changing is a big, big step)
So I fully acknowledge that as I continue to engage in conversations and write about issues of social justice and cultural scripts I will never be able to change everyone's mind. Such a goal is impossible to achieve. But as a very important professor and mentor said in class one day (and I will NEVER forget this): "Just because a goal is impossible to achieve, that does not excuse one from the responsibility of trying to achieve it."
That quote, along with that repackaging of the parable of the sower and a knowledge of the long process of social change in the United States keeps me focused and keeps me determined to continue the work that I do. I hope to pass these mantras on to others who may feel depressed or discouraged that they'll never be able to change everything they want to change. We may not see it now, or even ever in our lifetime. But so long as people keep doing the work, the arc of history will bend towards Justice.
*Note: When I originally wrote this, I was under the belief that corporal punishment had been outlawed in all 50 states in the US. I thank my friend Steven for bringing my error to my attention. Corporal punishment is in fact still legal in 19 states.
Monday, June 25, 2012
When some folks get more votes than others, that's not democracy
As expected, the Supreme Court declined to take another look at its 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. You can (and should) read about the decision here to get some information on why this case is back in the news today.
I've already written on the case in an op-ed in The Lamron (I swear I didn't write it as one long paragraph! For some reason it shows up with a couple of kinks online...) when the decision was first made two years ago, so I won't re-hash that. Rather, I want to make one small, quick point.
In a country where how one spends one's money is equal to an expression of free speech, economic inequality is in fact antithetical to the very core of democracy itself. And by extension, I believe we can see that capitalism and democracy do not in fact conceptually fit together as nicely as they seem to.
Let's consider. As citizens of a democratic republic, we each have the right to have our voice heard and opinion counted, and no one of us has a voice that counts more than another voice. Since we are all equal citizens, we all ought to have equal say in political discourse. One citizen, one vote. Right?
But what happens when we consider influential political speech other than votes? What happens when we consider the fact that monetary contributions to campaigns and advertisements are forms of political "speech" insofar as each dollar sent to a political campaign is an expression of support for that campaign? I think we get a picture where a dollar spent on politics is a kind of vote.
And the more I think about it, this analogy between dollars spent and votes cast isn't so strange. I mean, we live in a kind of capitalist economic structure in which consumers vote on which products they want to survive and which ones they want to let die out with their dollars that they spend or don't spend. This is the theory behind boycotts. If a business makes use of practices which consumers find unacceptable, consumers can elect to stop spending money on that business, thus putting pressure on the business to change its policies or die out. That's voting. Consumers are saying that "We don't approve of you, so we're going to vote for your competitor by spending our money there/on their product instead."
But another fact of a capitalist economic structure is economic inequality among all of the members of the society which it organizes. So some people have more dollars than others. But if dollars are in very real ways equivalent to votes when it comes to both the commercial market and the political arena, then one result of capitalism is that some folks get more votes than others. But a central tenet of democracy is equal citizenship merits equal voting efficacy. That seems like a bit of a contradiction to me. How can some people get more votes than others and we still call it a democracy? How can the opinion of a huge corporation matter more than the opinions of thousands of individual citizens insofar as its opinion carries more weight because it's expressed by more money contributed to political campaigns and we still call that a democracy?
I don't think we can unless we admit that the tenet that in a democracy all people are equal citizens deserving of equal say in their government is a sham. Unless we admit that some people/organizations matter more than others -- not because they're more educated, intelligent, or informed, but simply because they have more money -- we cannot continue to call this a true democracy.
Either we admit our hypocrisy or we admit our mistake and SCOTUS reconsiders and reverses the Citizens United decision. But right now, we exist as a country of conceptual contradictions so long as this decision remains validated.
I've already written on the case in an op-ed in The Lamron (I swear I didn't write it as one long paragraph! For some reason it shows up with a couple of kinks online...) when the decision was first made two years ago, so I won't re-hash that. Rather, I want to make one small, quick point.
In a country where how one spends one's money is equal to an expression of free speech, economic inequality is in fact antithetical to the very core of democracy itself. And by extension, I believe we can see that capitalism and democracy do not in fact conceptually fit together as nicely as they seem to.
Let's consider. As citizens of a democratic republic, we each have the right to have our voice heard and opinion counted, and no one of us has a voice that counts more than another voice. Since we are all equal citizens, we all ought to have equal say in political discourse. One citizen, one vote. Right?
But what happens when we consider influential political speech other than votes? What happens when we consider the fact that monetary contributions to campaigns and advertisements are forms of political "speech" insofar as each dollar sent to a political campaign is an expression of support for that campaign? I think we get a picture where a dollar spent on politics is a kind of vote.
And the more I think about it, this analogy between dollars spent and votes cast isn't so strange. I mean, we live in a kind of capitalist economic structure in which consumers vote on which products they want to survive and which ones they want to let die out with their dollars that they spend or don't spend. This is the theory behind boycotts. If a business makes use of practices which consumers find unacceptable, consumers can elect to stop spending money on that business, thus putting pressure on the business to change its policies or die out. That's voting. Consumers are saying that "We don't approve of you, so we're going to vote for your competitor by spending our money there/on their product instead."
But another fact of a capitalist economic structure is economic inequality among all of the members of the society which it organizes. So some people have more dollars than others. But if dollars are in very real ways equivalent to votes when it comes to both the commercial market and the political arena, then one result of capitalism is that some folks get more votes than others. But a central tenet of democracy is equal citizenship merits equal voting efficacy. That seems like a bit of a contradiction to me. How can some people get more votes than others and we still call it a democracy? How can the opinion of a huge corporation matter more than the opinions of thousands of individual citizens insofar as its opinion carries more weight because it's expressed by more money contributed to political campaigns and we still call that a democracy?
I don't think we can unless we admit that the tenet that in a democracy all people are equal citizens deserving of equal say in their government is a sham. Unless we admit that some people/organizations matter more than others -- not because they're more educated, intelligent, or informed, but simply because they have more money -- we cannot continue to call this a true democracy.
Either we admit our hypocrisy or we admit our mistake and SCOTUS reconsiders and reverses the Citizens United decision. But right now, we exist as a country of conceptual contradictions so long as this decision remains validated.
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