MLK: On Moderates’ Response To Direct Action

“First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.”

Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.”

Letter from Birmingham Jail

By Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., 16 April 1963

Source

During my time in politics, the issue that MLK talks about here was probably the most frequent issue seen in response to political actions, especially from TV and print news. Whenever there is a union strike, the news is overwhelmingly focusing on the ‘inconvenience’ it causes, instead of the issues at hand. There is barely any coverage of why they are striking except for a small message running across the bottom of the screen.

This issue I think is still at the very heart of our societies now. Constant criticism of actions, by people who are unwilling to take action, and complain only when it affects them. Standard armchair politics, who talk of justice but would do nothing to see it through, and then vocally oppose it when direct action inconveniences them.

Monstrous Thinking and Arendt’s Banality of Evil

In ‘Eichmann in Jerusalem’ by Hannah Arendt, Arendt gives an account of the trial of Adolf Eichmann, a man responsible for the handling and transportation of Jewish people during world war 2, from the beginning of Jewish emigration to the ‘final solution’. In this account of the trial, Arendt analyses the psychology of Eichmann, and in doing so lays out the ground work for her idea of the banality of evil, that someone doesn’t have to be evil to participate in evil behaviour. I will relate this to the concept of monstrous thinking, and how Arendt’s understanding is a good example of a psychological framework that can overcome and challenge monstrous thinking and other dogmatic ethical views.

Sartre: Criticism of Existence Precedes Essence and of Choice

I’d been listening to a popular Philosophy podcast recently called Partially Examined Life. It’s quite good and I’d recommend for all who read this!

When listening to one of their podcasts on Sartre, some criticisms against him I found quite off base.

Choice

A main theme in Sartre’s body of works is that of radical freedom, that one always has a choice so to speak. It does get complicated, given Sartre also acknowledges facticity, or the factual components of a human being.

A criticism that came up was on considering a person drowning with no way to survive. Is it true that this person has no choice but to drown? Yes (lets assume that’s true in any case). Does that then provide criticism of Sartre’s conception of choice? No. That does not mean that you do not have a choice. What you may have is nothing but bad choices. That does not leave you without choice though, nothing about the idea of radical freedom suggests that you have good and bad choices, it simply means that your actions are your own, regardless of what those actions may be.

You could be completely incapacitated and have no ability to move your body except for your eyelids, and you still have a choice between blinking and not blinking. It may not be meaningful choice, but it’s still choice.

Existence Precedes Essence

Sartre’s argument is that if there was a god, humans essence would be pre-ordained. When we examine our lives however we find that we are ultimately free in our actions, we have no ‘likeness’ to anything in particular, no innate or inbuilt purpose or nature that we must pursue, unless we will it ourselves. Because we have no predetermined essence, we exist first, encounter ourselves, and are then free to define ourselves however we like, and pursue what ever projects we see fit.

Sartre’s example of something whose essence does actually precede its existence is that of a knife. A knife was a concept first, it’s project defined by our need to cut things. In realising that concept we create the object second. A knife does not come into existence without its essence being first created in our minds, in the same way a god would create us for a specific purpose (or to create us in his image).

In any case, the major criticism against this position is pretty clear. It’s clear that Sartre’s task here is merely to establish human freedom, and not actually provide a metaphysical account of the nature of things, because if we take this reasoning further, we find that there really isn’t anything whose essence precedes existence except for human artefacts.

If it is true that humans are free because our existence precedes our essence, why is that not then true of plants? It would seem to us that plants and rocks and other natural things are incapable of making action, but for Sartre’s theory there is no accounting for this.

I think Sartre’s position is redeemable (though not a particularly strong position) by assuming Sartre means that it is true only for humans that if our existence precedes our essence then we are free. That it is not necessarily true that this means other things are free, and because Sartre’s task is an existential one, he simply disregards theorising about the nature of other things, because he simply doesn’t care. It might not impact his theory at all…

Existentialism is among my favourite topics, though Sartre’s arguments are perhaps the weakest at the best of times, and the most infuriatingly unclear arguments at the worst. Let me know what you think in the comments down below!

Animation of Chomsky’s Propaganda Model

It is kind of funny that this was published on Al Jazeera… In any case, some bite sized philosophy to be consumed here. For further reading on the topic consider reading Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, where Chomsky and Herman lay out the idea in detail. It doesn’t require any prior reading or understanding of any other topics, and is fairly easy to read.

Video below.

Existentialism: The Other and The Look

The concept of the Other can be found in various other disciplines, most notably sociology and psychology, but in existentialism (and phenomenology, where the concept originates for the existentialists), the concept is utilized somewhat differently. In this article, I will talk about the concept of the Other within the frameworks of Jean Paul Sartre’s existentialism, and the Look.

What is the ‘Other’?

The Other is the concept of another person like yourself, in no way other than they are just another person. It sounds pretty simple, but the idea needs to be expanded on and detailed quite a bit if we are to provide any reasonable metaphysical or phenomenological account of the world.

So what exactly is the big deal, let’s say there are two people in the room, one is me, and one is not. What’s the difference? What makes one the Other and one me?

Intersubjectivity

For one, we share an objective world. We both experience the world in the exact same way, because we are both human. We both strive toward things (in existentialism this is referred to as projects, or projections), we have the same needs and desires, even if the content is different, the format and structure of life and reality is the same.

This concept is referred to as inter-subjectivity in phenomenology and is the cornerstone of the philosophy. We have different subjective experiences of the same objective thing. We both see the same thing, but they see it from ‘over there’.

The difficulty comes down to the internal aspects of the Other. Unlike myself, I do not have access to the inner workings of that other person. I do have that access to myself, I can think and feel my own thoughts and feelings, not someone elses, and nobody else has access to it. From my perpective, I am subjective first, I am that inner content, and in my perception is the Other, an objective thing first. It is in this moment that one recognizes that though I do not have access to their inner content, they are a person like me and must therefore have it (This is an oversimplification of the existentialism argument, but to elaborate would take up too much time).

What is the ‘Look’?

Also called the Gaze, is the action of you literally being looked at by the Other. This has the effect of objectifying what ever the Other sees. Consider the following example that Sartre gives.

Imagine attempting to peer through the lock of a door, on the other side, something you know you probably shouldn’t be looking at. While you’re attempting to look through, you hear footsteps behind you.

Your mind is immediately drawn to yourself as an object. You are aware of yourself kneeling down, about to be caught in a position that you would rather like not to be caught in. You can literally see yourself in your mind as well as you start to think how another may see you metaphorically, as in what they may or may not think about you if they discover you.

The interesting part about the Look is it doesn’t actually require an Other. In the example nobody ever actually shows up, you just think they will. You could easily have been mistaken. The effect however is the same, the Look draws you to yourself objectively, in a literal sense because you start to contemplate your objective parts (being in the world, kneeling down, all of the parts an Other can comprehend about you through perception).

For those familiar with Sartre’s philosophy, you may notice that the Look has a secondary affect of forcing oneself to see yourself as something, instead of the ‘blank slate’ that Sartre proposes.