"The development of an underclass in American society can be linked not only to econmic stratification due to capitalist relations of exploitation but also to racial stratification."
I was sooooo very happy to hear someone say that one of the broad factors for racial stratification is right beneath its surface, economic stratification. And to top it off McLaren even openly convicts the capitalist system as its cause. It ties in Delpit and Macintosh because it not only recognizes the structuralism of the culture of power but calls it and its causes out by name.
"Resistance, then, is a process in which the working-class student further solidifies his or her position in the lowest tier of the class system, helping to confirm the views established by critical theorists that a nations educational system is subservient to its economic system."
I have two things to say about this quote. First is, YES! EXACTLY! when an economic system emphasizes core values as a means of attaining livelihood those values will bleed into every other system under it and human personality as a whole. Second as McLaren continues he goes on to say this emphasize of working-class and manual labor ideals is counter productive. I don't think it this falls into the same pitfall as Delpit in assuming that the way to abolish a culture of power is to first assimilate into it. The working class are still the backbone of society and therefore when they come to see themselves as such in a organized fashion that can thus abolish the system which keeps in the lowest of classes from the outside.
"Because the school system is structured tacitly to reinforce and reward middle-class values, attitudes, and behavior (therefore penalize the "deprived" by omission), educators and the public alike often assume that the failure of schools to educated disadvantaged is really the failure of the girls themselves."
The system is not broken, it isn't failing. In fact it is succeeding brilliantly it keeps the classes were they are and degrades their traditions and ways so as to make children reach for the assertions of the ruling class and imitate them. You can not fix what is not broken, you can only tear it down and rebuild anew.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Sunday, October 24, 2010
some Cheese with your wine?
quote 1: "Despite the claim by the right that race-based scholarships amount to a double-standard (since scholarships for folks of color are considered legitimate, but white scholarships aren't), in truth, the standard is simple, straightforward and singular: persons belonging to groups that have been systematically marginalized in this society, should have opportunities targeted to them, so as to allow for the development of their full potential which otherwise might be restricted by said marginalization."
This extends passed both scholarships and race. When we talk about social services as if their "entitlements" we succumb to the same myth as the one propagated by the young republicans at Boston U. I think that article does a phenomenal job in proving its point through this and similar passages that the logic of the BU GOP doesn't fit. But I also hope that people take it passed that and see that this logic doesn't apply to most of the situations in which it gets brought up (unemployment, affirmative action, immigration, etc)
quote 2:"In effect, these are not scholarships based on race, but rather, scholarships based on a recognition of racism"
I think the one appropriate comment to this is, ZING
Wine:1 Boston U. GOP: 0
quote 3:"Bigotry is defined as "intolerance," and the behavior or attitude of someone who holds "blindly and intolerantly to a particular creed or opinion." Surely scholarships for people of color are not predicated on intolerance for whites, nor are they based on some kind of blind contempt for whites as a group. Rather they are rooted in the quite reasonable belief that people of color have been singled out for mistreatment on the basis of race, and thus, special efforts should be made to provide full opportunity to them "
This is, I think, such a vital clarification. Nothing is more aggravating then hearing middle class white Christians talk about how everyone is really actually racist towards them and biased against them. It does go back to the Delpit reading and the Carlson reading as well,these people have never really known what it is to be held back by their race or orientation and thus are completely ignorant of what it means to have that held against you. So when their privilege is stripped and the playing field at least partially equalized they feel cheated, cheated for their advantage.
This extends passed both scholarships and race. When we talk about social services as if their "entitlements" we succumb to the same myth as the one propagated by the young republicans at Boston U. I think that article does a phenomenal job in proving its point through this and similar passages that the logic of the BU GOP doesn't fit. But I also hope that people take it passed that and see that this logic doesn't apply to most of the situations in which it gets brought up (unemployment, affirmative action, immigration, etc)
quote 2:"In effect, these are not scholarships based on race, but rather, scholarships based on a recognition of racism"
I think the one appropriate comment to this is, ZING
Wine:1 Boston U. GOP: 0
quote 3:"Bigotry is defined as "intolerance," and the behavior or attitude of someone who holds "blindly and intolerantly to a particular creed or opinion." Surely scholarships for people of color are not predicated on intolerance for whites, nor are they based on some kind of blind contempt for whites as a group. Rather they are rooted in the quite reasonable belief that people of color have been singled out for mistreatment on the basis of race, and thus, special efforts should be made to provide full opportunity to them "
This is, I think, such a vital clarification. Nothing is more aggravating then hearing middle class white Christians talk about how everyone is really actually racist towards them and biased against them. It does go back to the Delpit reading and the Carlson reading as well,these people have never really known what it is to be held back by their race or orientation and thus are completely ignorant of what it means to have that held against you. So when their privilege is stripped and the playing field at least partially equalized they feel cheated, cheated for their advantage.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
"One cannot be too extreme in dealing with social ills; the extreme thing is generally the true thing. " Emma Goldman
The simple fact that this piece criticized the drive towards a reawakening of the Noblesse Oblige would have made it a winner with me already. Add to that the literary style in which a line is drawn so subtly towards the importance of deep and strong analysis of social ills and situations rather then a petite bourgeoisie-like moment of sympathy for the victims of social and institutional crimes make this article a treasure. In the end i feel the article makes a simple and old point, thought without action and action without thought are both equally counter productive and equally egotistical. Back on the subject of noblesse obilge the authors Joseph Kahne and Joel Westheimer compare the classic bourgeoisie sympathy card of Noblesse Oblige to the conservative lobby towards charity based service learning compared to deep analytic social alaysis of change oriented service learning. As both Joel and Joseph say, "The experience was structured to promote giving rather than to provide the kind of understanding needed for the development of caring relationships.As a result, the student's description of the event lacked the perspective and input of those she was helping...The distance between the one caring and the one cared for diminishes.Unfortunately, in many service activities, students view those they serve as clients rather than as a resource." To me all it takes is one more of their quotes speaks for itself, ""Democratic politics," Benjamin Barber writes, "has become something we watch rather than something we do." Citizenship in a democratic community requires more than kindness and decency; it requires engagement in complex social and institutional endeavors. Acts of civic duty cannot replace government programs or forms of collective social action. Citizenship requires that individuals work to create, evaluate, criticize, and change public institutions and programs."
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
"My future has been looted, tonight I take it back." [anynomous graffiti Providence, Rhode Island]
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I'm actually very happy to be writing this a bit late because I get to address some of my personal opinions on some issues that were brought up during the conversation in class. In terms of the two videos above Adbusters and some of the literature is disseminates is I feel some of the most ruthless critics of the modern media human and the mental environment we have been nurtured into. However, one of its strongest points in its entire campaign is that the mental media environment is directly linked to the economic regime we find ourselves in.
Adbusters and other organizations like them (Media Matters to name another) are taking what in Linda Christensen in "Unlearning the Myths That Bind Us" calls the "opportunity for action" and both exposing it in the bluntest of forms and also using it as a call to arms for psycho-social revolution. As when Christensen describes some students saying, "For some the lesson doesn't end in the classroom. Many who watched the cartoons before we started our study say they can no longer enjoy them. Now instead of seeing a bunch of ducks in cloths, they see the racism, sexism, and violence that swim under the stories." Adbusters and Media Matters and the Love Police and other media and class conscious organizations try and provide resources for those who find themselves at this point of regression to synthesis both theory and energy into action.
My biggest point of contention in our discussion was this idea of "drawing a line." I think we make two mistakes in this. First we make the mistake of confusing media, advertisement, and propaganda with social influence and peer pressure. the latter is a social instrument meant to synthesis culture and maintain some cultural equilibrium the former is an entirely synthetic perverse form of pressure derived wholly and entirely by a select group with a special interest in mind that roots itself on control. When we say media the fact of the matter is that what is meant is in fact corporate media; Democracy Now! isn't the one convincing people that moccasins are back in style. Secondly, we assume that there is no drastic alternative to the current stream of society only amendments and reform can be made. Well, the current has only existed for what would be considered a blink of history, not more then 60 years ago the television was no source of catharsis. Yes, social control still existed, mainly through the right hand of the church and government, however it was a more organic control, one that could only squeeze so hard in fear of the push back, one that one felt could be changed or abolished (the Republic days of Spain or the French Revolution for example) This new form however, is synthetically modified and sanitized to be easy to swallow and numbing. WE DON'T NEED DISNEY FAIRY TALES OR MARVELS SUPER HEROS! what we want is the comfort of simpler days rather then the effort required to better our situations. Marx had said "religion is the opiate of the masses." well, he had no idea what MTV had in store for the masses.
This is beyond Disney and cartoons, this is about the fact that corporate advertising has infected every ounce of what should be organic human culture and ingrained its brand and labels.And the reasoning and theory behind it all rests on an economic system that values profit above all else and sees the dictatorship of capital as the driving force in human existence. I think of a song by the Krishna band 108, "I dream of a world were a smile isn't a rare gift, where feelings and desires mean more than quotas, expectations and disappointed stares. where we have a right to hurt, scream, cry, live, die and sit in silence just because we can. I dream of a world where I can love you in spite of what keeps us apart and where second best is as good as first or a millionth. where we don't over analyze every breathe or under appreciate what our words mean to another. where we find comfort in silence and a place of peace in all of the noise and where everything that is thrown at us makes us better, stronger and more appreciative. where we celebrate life, death and all that comes in between. where songs sing to us and a loved ones words make us dance." We should no longer have to dream these dreams, this is the world that is natural to us, the world we originially come from, what we see instead is a facade an imaginary world of things and products were emotions don't exist and life is measured rather than lived. It is a world resting on the shoulders of immigrants crushed by the power of culture that denied them person hood, a world held up by the blood and sweat of workers who daily make the sacrifice to the alter of a false "meritocracy" and return home to there children who have more and more in-common with sheep then adolescents because thy Shepperd Mickey Mouse is the parents last resort when overtime must be worked to pay for the genetically modified food on the table. And when the education system indoctrinates not love compassion and autonomy but competition jingosim and social darwanism and we consider a re-imaganing of Booker T. Washington race theory and extend it to other classes as the solution we perpetuate the crisis such as suggested in Mcintosh's "Unpacking White Privilege." The class struggle, the gender and orientation struggle, the environmental struggle, and the mental autonomy struggle are all interlocking, it is why this si a revolution that both we must fight and we can win because it will come to a tipping point where it is no longer an option when environmental and psychological collapse are at the flood gates do face the tide or hope for a new Noah and a GE constructed arch?
sorry for the ranting.....just take back your humanity and mental autonomy. Life shouldn't come pre-packaged or pre-sweetened. depression isn't a medical condition its the sane reaction to an insane environment. weed out consumption and harvest life and the memories that come with it.
https://www.adbusters.org/
http://mediamatters.org/
http://www.cveitch.org/
http://www.democracynow.org/
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I'm actually very happy to be writing this a bit late because I get to address some of my personal opinions on some issues that were brought up during the conversation in class. In terms of the two videos above Adbusters and some of the literature is disseminates is I feel some of the most ruthless critics of the modern media human and the mental environment we have been nurtured into. However, one of its strongest points in its entire campaign is that the mental media environment is directly linked to the economic regime we find ourselves in.
Adbusters and other organizations like them (Media Matters to name another) are taking what in Linda Christensen in "Unlearning the Myths That Bind Us" calls the "opportunity for action" and both exposing it in the bluntest of forms and also using it as a call to arms for psycho-social revolution. As when Christensen describes some students saying, "For some the lesson doesn't end in the classroom. Many who watched the cartoons before we started our study say they can no longer enjoy them. Now instead of seeing a bunch of ducks in cloths, they see the racism, sexism, and violence that swim under the stories." Adbusters and Media Matters and the Love Police and other media and class conscious organizations try and provide resources for those who find themselves at this point of regression to synthesis both theory and energy into action.
My biggest point of contention in our discussion was this idea of "drawing a line." I think we make two mistakes in this. First we make the mistake of confusing media, advertisement, and propaganda with social influence and peer pressure. the latter is a social instrument meant to synthesis culture and maintain some cultural equilibrium the former is an entirely synthetic perverse form of pressure derived wholly and entirely by a select group with a special interest in mind that roots itself on control. When we say media the fact of the matter is that what is meant is in fact corporate media; Democracy Now! isn't the one convincing people that moccasins are back in style. Secondly, we assume that there is no drastic alternative to the current stream of society only amendments and reform can be made. Well, the current has only existed for what would be considered a blink of history, not more then 60 years ago the television was no source of catharsis. Yes, social control still existed, mainly through the right hand of the church and government, however it was a more organic control, one that could only squeeze so hard in fear of the push back, one that one felt could be changed or abolished (the Republic days of Spain or the French Revolution for example) This new form however, is synthetically modified and sanitized to be easy to swallow and numbing. WE DON'T NEED DISNEY FAIRY TALES OR MARVELS SUPER HEROS! what we want is the comfort of simpler days rather then the effort required to better our situations. Marx had said "religion is the opiate of the masses." well, he had no idea what MTV had in store for the masses.
This is beyond Disney and cartoons, this is about the fact that corporate advertising has infected every ounce of what should be organic human culture and ingrained its brand and labels.And the reasoning and theory behind it all rests on an economic system that values profit above all else and sees the dictatorship of capital as the driving force in human existence. I think of a song by the Krishna band 108, "I dream of a world were a smile isn't a rare gift, where feelings and desires mean more than quotas, expectations and disappointed stares. where we have a right to hurt, scream, cry, live, die and sit in silence just because we can. I dream of a world where I can love you in spite of what keeps us apart and where second best is as good as first or a millionth. where we don't over analyze every breathe or under appreciate what our words mean to another. where we find comfort in silence and a place of peace in all of the noise and where everything that is thrown at us makes us better, stronger and more appreciative. where we celebrate life, death and all that comes in between. where songs sing to us and a loved ones words make us dance." We should no longer have to dream these dreams, this is the world that is natural to us, the world we originially come from, what we see instead is a facade an imaginary world of things and products were emotions don't exist and life is measured rather than lived. It is a world resting on the shoulders of immigrants crushed by the power of culture that denied them person hood, a world held up by the blood and sweat of workers who daily make the sacrifice to the alter of a false "meritocracy" and return home to there children who have more and more in-common with sheep then adolescents because thy Shepperd Mickey Mouse is the parents last resort when overtime must be worked to pay for the genetically modified food on the table. And when the education system indoctrinates not love compassion and autonomy but competition jingosim and social darwanism and we consider a re-imaganing of Booker T. Washington race theory and extend it to other classes as the solution we perpetuate the crisis such as suggested in Mcintosh's "Unpacking White Privilege." The class struggle, the gender and orientation struggle, the environmental struggle, and the mental autonomy struggle are all interlocking, it is why this si a revolution that both we must fight and we can win because it will come to a tipping point where it is no longer an option when environmental and psychological collapse are at the flood gates do face the tide or hope for a new Noah and a GE constructed arch?
sorry for the ranting.....just take back your humanity and mental autonomy. Life shouldn't come pre-packaged or pre-sweetened. depression isn't a medical condition its the sane reaction to an insane environment. weed out consumption and harvest life and the memories that come with it.
https://www.adbusters.org/
http://mediamatters.org/
http://www.cveitch.org/
http://www.democracynow.org/
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