"Unity is the Way" Part 1

So I'm in the process of writing a post by the name of the title quotation.  However, I had to write a reflection for a class on the educator's role in accommodating for, and preventing, domestic violence in their students' families.  I felt this was a perfect introduction to the things I will discuss in the forthcoming post.  [As always, names, course codes, and locations stripped for confidentiality]

Adam Hill – [course code] – Reflection #9

            I think the key question regarding educators’ role in accommodating for, and preventing, violence in the home, is one of degree.  I.e. to what degree is the individual educator, within a specific context, responsible for accommodating for, and preventing, such violence?  Further, to what degree can, and should, they do anything about it?  After all, those children only spend a small portion of their time in your class, and in your school; likely even less time in the former if it’s a public high school in Ontario.  Further, the educator, in almost every instance, isn’t the child’s legal guardian, so there are many expectations and assumptions baring or inhibiting any action on the educator’s part, other than reporting abuses when legislated to do so.

I’ve been confronted with these issues myself already, even in my short two months of volunteer educational assisting at [an elementary school].  After the principal decided to employ me upon a co-worker’s recommendation and my word, I was given the responsibility of three “developmentally delayed” 6 year olds from, a recently zoned into the school, low-income housing complex.  
Although the one never confided in me directly, many of their behaviours and attitudes suggested issues outside the school.  However, even though there were rumours constantly circulating about the three, and especially about the parents of the one with serious behavioural and attitudinal issues, I never reported anything, because that student never gave me anything substantial to report.

Regardless, I still thought daily about ways I could further help those kids, even lost a little sleep over it.  As of then, and still now, I know if I had stayed with that school, I would have made deliberate efforts to integrate the families, and their members, of that school community together: to engage them by encouraging their communication with the school, and with each other.

Getting back to that vital question, I still ask myself where professional responsibility ends and altruism begins when you’re an educator.  Would I expect an educator to do the same thing, to make deliberate efforts to build a school community?  And where does that responsibility begin and end?  I honestly don’t know.  But I feel that if the educator is aware of an issue, and more importantly, aware of an honest, respectful, and meaningful, method to ameliorate it, I feel it’s their responsibility to do so.  I know I’m still rather alone when arguing as such, but I believe this will change with time.  At least I hope so.

On the "good life"

The most ironic picture I could find when Googling "the good life"

In my post on the Novus-Genesis, I mentioned that I had "a world view that was already radical in that I seriously desired to protect and maintain life on the planet (a desire with a complex origin that's beyond the scope of this post)."  I'll discuss the origin of that desire here.
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Succinctly, the Novus-Genesis, and all of my aspirations and actions before and beyond it, stem from my will to live a "good life."  In order to understand how and why I live the way I do, you need to grasp my understanding of the former.

Of all philosophic concepts, it seems none has received more discourse, discussion, and criticism, by both ontologists and epistimologists alike, than the "good life."

Like almost every philosopher before myself, I confront the question of what it is to live a "good life," every day.  In fact, a discussion with some close friends about the nature of such a life prompted this post.
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Just what is it?

I don't know exactly.  But I can guess.  Ironically, of all the concepts I've premised with a Wikipedia citation, Wikipedia is almost silent as to the nature of the "good life."  Now, the Aristotelian interpretation receives more attention, but you'd think, of all the pages on Wikipedia, something as important as living well would receive more public conjecture.

But the lack of public documentation reveals something of the nature of the good life: we're not really sure what it is.  The Wikipedia article illustrates that the concept, yet so important to human beings, remains largely outside the public discourse.  It's the meat of philosophers, even though living well applies to, and is in the interest, of everyone.

Since my definition constantly changes, the one I provide here remains tentative.
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Throughout my experiences and reflection, I've found a few ways to define it:

Happiness -  many people define living well by living happy.  Defining the "good life" in this way dilutes its definition, as there are as many means to happiness as there are individuals and contexts.  Defining it exclusively as that which makes an individual happy can legitimize a wide range of entirely interpretive and subjective definitions.

Morality - the traditional method of defining a good life based its goodness on its degree of adherence to a morality: a method used by many faiths and peoples throughout the world and its history.  It has been suggested by philosophers and theologians alike that living a good life involves submitting to a moral code or law.  As with defining such a life exclusively by its happiness, defining it entirely by morality also risks interpretivism and subjectivity.  After all, many immoral people seem to be happy and are said to live good lives, and vice versa: many people follow strict moral codes but remain profoundly dissatisfied with their lives and endure undue suffering.

Altrusim -   related to the morality definition, defining the good life as the altruistic life has its roots in the Judeo-Christian tradition, and potentially in prehistory.  For example, Jesus is said to have lived a good life because he supposedly lived absolutely altruistically.  To define the good life by its altruism, is to define its goodness by its adherence to a specific morality based on selflessness and self-sacrifice.  Defining it by its degree of altruism highlights how the goodness of your life depends on the goodness of the lives of your community.  To live altruistically is to live in the service of others: to selflessly serve other selves.  There are, of course, problems with defining the good life exclusively by altruism; for example, you can never be sure if your sacrifice will actually serve the lives of others.  (Jesus and his proselytizers seem to have this problem on occasion)

Utilitarianism - a more modern interpretation drawn from hedonism, utilitarians suggest that a good life is one in which individuals "[maximize] happiness and [reduce] suffering." The utilitarian vision extends the "happiness" definition, as a utilitarian version incorporates, like the altruism definition, the collective lives of the community.  Under utilitarianism, the good life is a social concern, in which the sum total lives of a community are good when the collective community maximizes pleasure and minimizes pain.  There are numerous problems with this definition of the good life: more than the scope of this post permits.  In brief, utilitarianism taken to it's exclusive extremist logical conclusions, ends in something like Aldous Huxley's 'Brave New World.'

Which brings me to...

Self-actualization - I "stole" this concept from psychology, but I find it to be one of the better ways of defining what it means to live a good life, because it consolidates all the other definitions I've mentioned.  Self-actualization is the process and act of living your life to its full potential.  I like the use of self-actualization when describing the characteristics of living well because it's more exhaustive and inclusive.  After all, a good life isn't necessarily always a happy one.  I acknowledged this myself, when I cited Mahatma Ghandi, who suggested that enduring personal suffering can be necessary to living a full life. 
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 And here's my unified definition:

A good life aspires to happiness, morality, altruism, utilitarianism, and ultimately, self-actualization. 

It is a happy life, but its happiness is the ends, not the means.  In that, not every moment is a happy one: in fact, in order to live morally, an individual may have to suffer.  For example, experiences, reflection, and self-examination can be agitating and painful, but can be endured for a higher purpose: for a greater happiness.

It is a moral life, but its morality depends on the context in which it takes place.  A good life in south-western Ontario in 2013 looks a lot different than a good life in Rome in 400AD.  Further, a moral life in 400AD Rome is different than a moral life today in London Ontario.  (Whether or not there actually is an objective morality separate from all physical entities is way beyond the scope of this post.)  At best, we can define a moral life as one which aspires to define the, and be, moral.

It is an altruistic life, but its altruism is limited.  After all, you'd probably die in a couple days if you lived absolutely altruistically, because you'd likely give away the resources necessary for your own survival.  In order to maximize your selflessness over a greater length of time, you have to maintain your health.

It is a utilitarian life, but its utilitarianism extends beyond the self, to all living and potentially living entities.  But again, like happiness, utilitarianism is the ends, not the means.  An individual living a good life aspires to maximize the happiness and minimize the suffering of their community; however, the maximization of happiness and minimization of suffering may, and probably will, require some form of pain and suffering.

Finally, it is a self-actualizing life, but its self-actualization is always tentative.  Self-actualization is constantly renegotiated, because like a moral life, the self-actualization of a life depends on the context within which it is lived, and these contexts are constantly changing.  There's only so much you can do with the resources and environment at your disposal.  Further, happiness, morality, altruism, and utilitarianism consolidate in self-actualization, because living a life to it's full potential depends on that individual's happiness, morality, altruism, and utilitarianism.  Self-actualization is the terminus of carpe diem: it is living each moment as if it were your last: or more optimistically, your first.  I've defined self-actualization in the past as living each moment because it needed to be lived that way.
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This post is already way longer than I would have liked, and there's still so much more I could say on this topic, but I'll sum it up as this: the good life is a process, context specific, and tentative.  I'd argue, as with wisdom, that if you're absolutely certain you've got it, you're probably far from it.  I myself aspire to such a life, but I'm always hesitant to say I'm actually living it, because my definition has changed so much, and will likely continue to change.

I'd love to hear other interpretations and understandings of the "good life" in the comments; I'm still learning too.

"Steal" this blog!

This post will serve as a terms and conditions for this blog, in that I encourage any- and every- one to "steal" "my" ideas: to share them, spread them, whatever, just please don't sell them.
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I thought I'd take some time to explain the irony of the opening quotation of this blog and its purpose.

If your platform or browser can't format it, then know that I've deliberately noted that “an absolutely new idea is one of the rarest things known to man.” - Thomas More

I quote More because I acknowledge that none of the information posted here is "my" property. (Even More probably "stole" that quotation from someone else).  Everything I've stated (and most of what I will argue next) has probably already been said before in some form or another in writing or otherwise.  As such, I fully acknowledge that these are not my ideas nor should they be credited to me.  I am, after all, a creature of experientialism.  To even suggest that I own these ideas is an arrogance and an egotism of a high order.

I personally loathe the way information is currently handled, and I'm not alone in this regard, as SoaD's album demonstrated.  Like them, I want to contribute to conscientization, not impede it, or worse: restrict it to some, marginalizing others.

Two years ago, when I was in the process of formulating the method by which I could do the most good in this life, in a fit of incendiary fury, I posted to Facebook "[politically correct] it, M Ed. then march on high school; the greatest tragedy of modern civilization is that we put a price tag on edification."  As of now, I'm still living those words to the best of my ability.  I firmly believe that the marketization of education and of edification contributes to the repression of information and impedes the development of critical consciousnesses.

But, the professional intellectuals that stumble across this blog will undoubtedly argue that education costs resources to produce.  And I absolutely agree; there's an economics behind the institutionalized creation and proliferation of information.  But those economics should not inhibit the welfare of the planet and/or of its denizens, which it tends to do currently through restricting or constraining consciousnesses.  People can be uninformed because information isn't readily, equally, and equitably accessible.  Even the internet is restricted to the privileged with the resources, infrastructures, and capacities to acquire, maintain, understand, and interpret a computer.

As such, let this blog serve as evidence that I will never charge people to see, share, or "steal" "my" ideas.  But please don't sell them, because that will just exacerbate already institutionalized intellectual and social inequalities.  Please share information the same way that you'd want it shared with you.

The Importance of Empathy: or more specifically, Love

I'm struck with something of a premonition, regarding my future, as I spend Valentine's Day night at home alone eating peanuts while writing about empathy and love.  "Forever alone" comments notwithstanding, given the commercial holy-day, I thought this was ironic a time as ever to write to publish this post.

Empathy's a reoccurring theme in this blog and I thought it deserved a post of its own, if for no other reason than to highlight its singular importance.

First, what do I mean by "empathy"?

Well, Wikipedia currently has empathy pegged as "the capacity to recognize emotions that are being experienced by another sentient or fictional being."  I actually like their definition; it's almost identical to my own.  In experiential terms, empathy is the capacity to understand a person's values: where they come from and how they affect the person.

In other words, empathy is the crystallization of experientialism: it's the end result of an education of how we experience things and how these experiences affect us.  Empathy is a product of increased self-awareness; it's a tool to help understand human behaviour,

And it's incredibly important to changing the world, especially putting an end to violence in all its forms and manifestations.  After all, as I've stated before, it's the essence and logic of the Golden Rule: "do unto others as you'd have done to you." Without empathy there's no reason to follow the rule, because if you can't perceive how and why other people feel things, you have no reason to treat them kindly.  The Wikipedia article actually covers this point as it suggests, immediately following the previously cited quotation, that "one may need to have a certain amount of empathy before being able to experience compassion."

And here's some of my gushiest writing yet.  Love depends on empathy.  A healthy relationship is founded on empathy.  Our potential for intimacy as a species lay in our capacity to feel others' feelings: to share them.

Empathy's the reason people can delight in other people's happiness.  Empathy is the reason I write this blog and fight for critical consciousnesses.  Whenever I cite the lives of the future, I'm empathizing with their existences.  Without empathy, I would not be writing this.

I write this post, because as of yet the majority of the people in my life take empathy for granted, or lack the capacities to even exercise it in the first place.  If you want people to care about any and all causes and individuals you have to teach them empathy, because otherwise they have no reason to care.  I was extremely fortunate to stumble upon the skill myself, but so many flounder in self-flagellation and victimization because they don't yet have it.

For teaching empathy is to teach love.  If you want a world of love, teach empathy.

On "the New World Order"

There's a grand narrative proliferating in more and more circles these days, especially those of conspiracy theorists.  It goes something like this: corporate, government, and more generally: power interests, are conspiring, colluding, and consolidating to establish one world government: and depending on who you talk to and where and when you talk to them, some kind of global fascist totalitarian dictatorship.  Individuals, mostly conspiracy theorists, attempt to substantiate this reality citing everything from the clandestine operations of the Bilderberg Group, to the consolidation of the European Union (EU), the United Nations, to the implied yet overly sensationalized North American Union (NAU).

As demonstrated by the last paragraph, I have a tentative, yet dated, knowledge of the literature and media peddled by conspiracy theorists who make a profit off the fear generated by such thoughts and potentialities.  I have this knowledge because I myself could temporarily claim to have been among their ranks.  Now, I never really believed their vision to be the true case, but I was, and still am, suspicious and cynical of the power invested in certain positions and individuals.

I set this post aside to discuss "the New World Order."  If you have never come across the term, I invite you to Google it.  Although often lacking credibility and good conscience, there's a significant literature and media surrounding the term.  While briefly researching for this post, I found the Wikipedia page for the concept greatly updated and expanded; it's actually pretty good.

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First off, have we as a global society made progress towards "the New World Order"?

In some ways, yes.  Economically, the globe operates as one messy, yet consolidated bloc.  Information is basically universally available if you have the privilege and resources to access it.  Politically, superpower countries including the United States have a limited imperial stranglehold over much of the planet.

But in many ways, no.  Religiously, ethnically, and culturally we as a global society remain greatly divided.  Our values on a global scale are heterogeneous to such a degree that a man can freely behave hyper-sexually with another man in public in some geographies and get punished capitally for the same behavior, in the same public contexts, in others.  As such, politically the globe remains largely conflicted.

However, although there's much diversity preventing political assimilation, conspiracy theorists often argue that economic interests will establish governance.  They have argued, and continue to argue, that political consolidation can and will occur by force.  To which, I am compelled to contend that people aren't that stupid, nor that cowardly to let that happen lying down.

But I readily admit that I still believe in one world government; that it will happen, eventually.  However, I strongly contend the average conspiracy theorist's vision of this society.  Most conspiracy theorists make a taken for granted assumption that such a society would be fundamentally "bad."  After reviewing a good chunk of their literature in public circulation, I concluded that it just wouldn't happen that way.  In order to establish the fascist society they envision there would have to be a near complete control and regulation of the creation and circulation of information.  I just don't see anyone or group accomplishing this feat.  There's some precedence for such an occurrence, like North Korea and to some extent China, but there's too many institutions and infrastructures that would have to be transformed, sometimes to their destruction, in order to have that control over the planet.  A global fascist dictatorship or kyriarchy/aristocracy would require a control over societal consciousness, and that's nearly impossible for any individual or group at this juncture.

However, I honestly believe that we're approaching the consolidation and terminus of a united planet: a cosmopolitic consisting of a citizenry of the world.  Based on my current knowledge and understanding, the coming society will be some kind of global republican democracy, with former nations serving as districts under a mostly decentralized government, similar to the United States but on a global scale.  I note my own objections to the development of such a cosmopolitic, especially the current global diversity of values.  However, everywhere there are signs of value assimilation, especially the development of fundamentally human morals, such as those I've discussed before.  The ongoing secularization of Islam serving as a shining example.

As such, I welcome "the New World Order."  One world government would put an end to numberless systemic problems.  And could provide humanity with numberless benefits including universal recognition of the dignity of life, universally protected human rights, and, more or less, an end to violent conflict.  I know this may sound madly idealistic, but these are the potentialities of such a society.  For them.

On women's violence against women

So I had a class on young girls' violence against other girls today.  We have to write reflections for this class, and at some point while writing the reflection I basically had an instance of "fuck it, I'm going to write what I actually think."  As basically all the posts on this blog are some semblance of the former, I felt it was well suited to be posted here.  As I submitted it to my professor: [with names and class number eliminated for confidentiality]

Adam Hill – Reflection #4 –[class number]

            Reflecting on the readings and on the class presentation and discussion, I’ve concluded several ways to reduce young girls’ violence against other girls.  Change hinges on their ability to deconstruct their gender, visual culture, and most importantly, their values.

            As with pornography, the violence and cruelty enacted by, and against, women, depends on the gendered constructs of femininity and masculinity.  Most girls take these constructs for granted, and, as a result, are often subject to, and manipulated, by them.  As [anonymous] and [anonymous]’s presentation demonstrated, young girls have a wide range of diverse medias influencing how they think they should look and feel.  As such, in order to deconstruct the gendered paradigm of femininity, educators need to critically disassemble visual culture.

            Women assimilate the morality of weighing under 110 pounds and having a Victoria Secret stomach because there’s nothing stopping this assimilation.  They often have no reason, nor the tools, to critically assess the origins and implications of such suggestive media.  That’s why not a single woman in my North American Women’s History class last year ever mentioned women’s relationship with visual culture, because it’s almost universally taken for granted by women.  The earlier we provide young girls with the capacity to understand and criticize how institutions and the media act upon them, the better.

            And this deconstruction of gender and visual culture ultimately amounts to a deconstruction of values.  We need to ask young girls, “why do you need to look like that?”  “Why do you need to be sexualized?”  Women’s need to feel and look a certain way almost always rests on accumulated and consolidated values.  Therefore, if you truly want to eliminate the motivation and justification for women to abuse other women, they need to understand how these values affect how they feel and act.  Specifically, educators need to help young women identify the connection between what they see, think, hear and feel.  Women are currently awash in a superficial culture that values impossible ideals; their angst and feelings of inadequacy are completely justified given the circumstances.  In order to eliminate that angst and feeling of inadequacy, educators need to make it clear to those girls that these values and ideals are often truly impossible, and that therefore there’s nothing wrong if they can’t obtain them.

            As the readings demonstrated, young girls’ aggression against other girls is most often covert and indirect.  But as with bullying, if you conquer the motivations and justifications to enact harm, then there’s no reason to create complicated legislation and programs to punish bullying because it won’t happen.  If we as a society truly want to eliminate violence of women against women, it starts with the deconstruction of gender, visual culture, and values.

P.S.  Out of space, but to keep the Third Wave feminists happy, race [and class are] important too.

On Research

Today my new boss at the university told me that I should focus my research topic on something specific that I could build a career on.  I took those words with an affirming smile, but deep down I shook my head.

I recently became a research assistant for this professor, and to this date I've mostly transcribed for her and helped a bit with the technical know how regarding online data sharing.  I took the position because I valued the experience of working in research and I didn't want to betray the recommendation from the professor that essentially handed me the job in the first place.

The whole situation is rather ironic, because I'm notorious in the faculty of education for speaking of research pejoratively, even to the professor that recommended me for the job.  Succinctly, I feel, and have felt for many years, that at this juncture society needs great teachers far more than it needs great researchers.  What value is any research if next to no one cares to know about it?  In a disengaged society that largely hates to learn, research is basically futile.

However, my contempt for professional research lay mostly in the motivations of certain researchers.  On the first day of my compulsory research methodology course, I argued that research should always be a means, and never an ends in itself.  Numerous authors, philosophers, and professional researchers have argued, and continue to argue, that research should serve the common welfare of humanity.  However, the welfare of humanity remains a low, to no, priority for many researchers.  For many professionals, research is nothing more than a means of livelihood.  At worst, it merely serves to boost egos.

After all, contemporary professional research is first and foremost a business.  Believe it or not, many researchers have a bottom line, and scrutiny of their ethics as researchers often doesn't extend much further than Ethics Review Boards whose primary responsibility is to the research participants, not the general public.

Of course, I'm not condemning all research, just that which doesn't immediately serve the public welfare.  Every area of research "could" be valuable, but some areas are definitely more pertinent to our well being than others, at this time.  I myself am confronted with the issue of whether or not my own research will be a means to serve the public immediately.  I'm interested in the value of dialogical methods of teaching.  It seems contradictory to spend so much time writing about dialogue when I could just do it, through Students Teaching Students, and the like.  Here's hoping if and when I do a PhD, I don't rue the day I published this post.