“We may not agree on abortion, but surely we can agree on reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies in this country. The reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio than for those plagued by gang-violence in Cleveland, but don’t tell me we can’t uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s out of the hands of criminals. I know there are differences on same-sex marriage, but surely we can agree that our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters deserve to visit the person they love in the hospital and to live lives free of discrimination. Passions fly on immigration, but I don’t know anyone who benefits when a mother is separated from her infant child or an employer undercuts American wages by hiring illegal workers. This too is part of America’s promise – the promise of a democracy where we can find the strength and grace to bridge divides and unite in common effort.”
This comes as no surprise to anyone who has been following Obama’s rise since the ‘04 acceptance speech: it is the core of his political message, a theme if you will.
“In an overlapping consensus, citizens support the same basic laws for different reasons. In Rawlsian terms, each citizen supports a political conception of justice for reasons internal to her own comprehensive doctrine. A political conception is freestanding: it is a “module” that can fit into any number of worldviews that citizens might have. In an overlapping consensus each reasonable citizen affirms this common “module” from within her own perspective.”
Ironically, Rawls himself thought that an overlapping consensus is almost impossible to achieve, and he was deeply pessimistic that in a value-pluralistic society like America, with deeply conflicting value systems among citizens, political stability as a result of overlapping consensus is likely to be impossible.
We’ll see if such a consensus can develop under a potential Obama administration.
“The Wire reinforced white middle-class stereotypes of inner-city life. The show’s writers, producers, and directors portray most of the characters—clergy and cops, teachers and principals, reporters and editors, union members and leaders, politicians and city employees—as corrupt, cynical, and ineffective. Viewers may have thought they were seeing the whole picture, but the show’s unrelentingly bleak portrayal missed what’s hopeful in Baltimore and, indeed, in other major American cities. In that way, it did the opposite of what its creator, David Simon, said he wanted the show to do: spur our country to end the plight of the poor and minorities who live in America’s inner-cities.”
The main argument of the article is that The Wire paints a picture of inner-city urban life that does not allow room for any positive change through collective action such as community organization or coalition-building. The writers of the article takes David Simon to ask, by concluding:
“He generally views the poor as helpless victims rather than as people with the capacity to act on their own behalf to bring about change. He may think he’s the crusading journalist exposing injustice, but he’s really a cynic who takes pity on the poor, yet can’t imagine a world where things could be different.”
To support their argument, the writers list several examples in which people living in the kind of condition that The Wire portrays were able to form coalitions and affect positive political/economic change in their communities.
But to me, this argument misses the main, and perhaps the most important point in The Wire: namely, that while successes are possible at an individual level, they are rare if the broader institutional environment is itself corrupt. Thus, the show is really about how institutions affect individual behavior and trap its participants in social pathologies such as poverty, drug-abuse/trafficking, gang violence, lackluster education, etc.
The show itself can be seen as a dramatic illustration of institutionalism at work: in the show, the institutions–the political system, the police department, the public school system, the newspaper, the unions, the drug gangs–are really the main actors. It is really the interaction between these various institutions that produce the social pathologies that the show so accurately portrays. To its credit, the show follows good social science research and portrays each institution, as first and foremost, interested in preserving its own survival and entrenchment.
The critique, levelled by the article I linked, that The Wire somehow discounts individual expression, is missing the point: The Wire is full of individual heroes who do act with good intentions and who do try to reform the system. In fact, a couple of them does succeed. But what The Wire shows, correctly I think, is that unless the institutions themselves change, the odds of systemic reform are very low, because institutions, due to their very nature, are self-entrenching and path-dependent. In this way, they tend to outlast and wear down the individual participants acting within them. Thus, even as Avon Barksdale, Stringer Bell, and Marlo all quit the drug game, new actors arise within the INSTITUTION of drug trafficking to take over.
The remarkable thing about The Wire is its insight, almost Weberian in nature, that modern institutions, despite their seemingly divergent contexts, all operate under a similar logic: thus, the show draws explicit analogies between the police department, the drug trafficking cartel, and the political machine at city hall. They all deal with problems of insubordination, bureacratic redtape, self-perpetuation, and so forth. This insight is best illustrated by Omar’s best line in the show: the lawyer’s got his briefcase, and I’ve got my shotty.
But is this institutionalist view cynical, as the writers contend? I would say that it is no more cynical than reality itself is. The reason why so much attention has been paid to institutional reform is the fact that institutions shape individual behavior. In fact, twentieth century political philosophy is almost exclusively concerned with institutions, a la A Theory of Justice. Yes, individuals can break out of the institutions, but it is extremely hard, and it is unreasonable, if not impossible, to demand that any particular individual act completely outside of his institutional environment and still be able to achieve systemic reform.
Therefore, it misses the point to criticize The Wire for merely painting a realistic picture of how institutions behave in real life.
I can understand abstaining, and I can understand hating Obama, but voting for McCain? That one just really confounds me.
Remember, McCain is the same guy who publicly said that he will appoint judges that will overturn Roe v. Wade, the same guy who did not vote for the Ledbetter equal pay bill, and the same guy who said that what women need in the workplace is not more legal power to fight discrimination, but more “education and training.”
The logic of voting for McCain to spite Obama really eludes me: if Hillary supporters are turned off by the sexism in the primaries, then how is voting for a guy with a clear women-unfriendly record any kind of logical move?
Therefore, I can only conclude that those 20 percent of Hillary supporters don’t give a rat’s ass about the women’s movement; they only care about Hillary.
“Say they refrain from having children, but what if they really wanted to? You can adopt, but knowing that you are able to conceive but shouldn’t can be psychologically damaging.
What if the contraceptives fail? You can have an abortion, but I’m sure there is a line somewhere when you are intentionally bringing genetically dysfunctional children to the world. And this coming from a pro-choice guy.
It just seems to me there are too many difficulties one must endure to carry on a relationship that satisfies the moral intuition of others. But even if they could, chances are they wouldn’t be having quite a healthy relationship, even if we get past the fact that they´re brother and sister out of our heads.”
To the first point: I think the state has a legitimate interest in reproductive regulation, especially if the offspring is likely to have genetic defects. As for the claim about the psychological stress, I think that is something any two individuals seeking to enter into a consentual relationship should take into account before actually entering into such a relationship.
Second, if, for some reason, the contraceptives fail, I think the state has also an interest in stepping in. But perhaps more importantly, I think it is really the parents’ moral duty to abort such a child due to the genetic problems.
Finally, I acknowledge that there are many, many practical difficulties that have to be overcome before any particular instance of a consenting incestous relationship between adults can satisfy the moral threshold, but the whole point of the post is a thought experiment. I don’t deny the real possibility that most ACTUAL cases of incestous relationships do not meet this threhold, but this does not rule out a priori, at least not to me, the possibility that no such relationship can possibly exist. Therefore, I don’t think I can make any sort of categorical moral claims.
As Kanye once asked: you know what college does to you? It makes you really smart man. Now when a lady walks up to me and says, “Hey, you know what’s sexy?” I say, “No I don’t know what’s sexy, but I bet I can add up all the change in your purse really fast.”
Woot! Do you see that son? I have rights AND privileges now: the right to be a pedantic, elitist, out-of-touch, pink commie Islamo-facist, and the privilege to work at entry-level political jobs that contribute to the coarsening of the political process.
This will do wonders for my sex life. I guarantee you.
But seriously, let me stop being flippany for a moment (but only for a moment), and let me be quite somber and say this: it took a lot of people to sacrifice a lot of things so that I could hold this piece of paper in my hands. In fact, someone had to die (may my mother, God bless her soul, rest in peace) for me to get here, and despite whatever “irony” I employ as a self-defense mechanism, I cannot take away the sacrifices that people have made on my behalf.
And sometimes, despite my being a very lapsed, non-practicing Catholic, the Catholic guilt inside me threatens to overwhelm, as it is likely to do now. I can never be sure if I ever lived up to the sacrifices that people have made, and I can never be sure that whatever I do, now or later, can ever redeem their suffering and their time.
The moment is passed, so let us return to our scheduled programming: my money is that I will receive a text message at 3AM tonight from Barack Obama, announcing his VP pick.
Incest is just one of those things which you are not supposed to touch or talk about, but since it is a Friday afternoon, and I have some time to kill at work, I decided to touch it and talk about it. We’ll see where this goes, and keep in mind that good manners is definitely not a consideration here.
Scenario: A man and a woman, brother and sister of the same parents, decide that they love each other, and decide to do it. Is this wrong?
Some arguments that might be made against this scenario are: 1) that such an union will produce an offspring that is more likely to have genetic defects that will put its life in jeopardy, and 2) that such an union will lead to a more general moral decline.
Let us then examine each argument. The first argument can easily be refuted if both the brother and sister used contraceptions; or, to completely eradicate the possibility that a child will be produced: suppose that either or both of them are infertile and thus cannot conceive. Would this fact change our moral intuition?
As for the second argument: what if this union were kept in secret, and that no one else will ever know about it, thus eradicating the possibility that it will encourage other kind of similar behavior? Would this fact change our moral intuition?
I think, all things considered, that there isn’t anything inherently wrong with the hypothetical scenario, provided that all the subsequent facts which I’ve listed are fulfilled. Of course there are genetic arguments to be made against having offsprings in an incestous relationship, but if that possibility is removed, I am having a hard time seeing why two consenting adults should not be able to engage in such a relatioship.
And of course this argument does not AT ALL take into account the emotive aspect of such a possibility: namely, that everyone would be physically revolted by such a prospect. Therefore, I think we don’t need to worry about the policy aspect of the incest question, since it is very unlikely that criminalizing incest will violate any rights which a reasonable number of people would claim.
I know, you are grossed out, but part of the fun in doing philosophy is the intuition pumping and crazy thought experiments. And I think it is possible to talk about taboo subjects without being hysterical about it.
This is only, like, I don’t know, one of the best ballads that Coltrane ever did: in fact, I consider this version of “My One and Only Love” the definitive recording of the song. Just listen to Coltrane as he comes into the song; that shit gives me the fucking chills. And of course, how can I not mention Johnny Hartman’s voice, that rich, baritone voice. It is just inimitable. This is not even mentioning McCoy Tyner on piano; I mean, I can go on and on about this line up, but the best thing would be to simply listen.
I think Coltrane’s ballad playing is often overlooked relative to his more spiritual and free-jazz works. But as Coltrane shows, again and again, that when he wants to, he is a ballad-player of the very first rate. And this album just shows that capability at its best. Is this “smooth jazz?” You damn right it is! But there’s Coltrane’s being smooth, and Kenny G’s being smooth: the difference is that Coltrane is God, while Kenny G sucks donkey balls. It really is that simple.
So here it is, from me to you, for your late-night listening pleasures.
“So why is polygamy illegal? Why don’t Mormons have the right to enter into multiple marriages sanctified by their church, if not the state? There’s a short answer to this question but not a very good one: polygamy is illegal and unprotected by the Constitution because the Supreme Court doesn’t like it. Over one hundred years ago, the Court held in Reynolds v. U.S. that polygamy was “an offence against society.” The Reynolds decision upheld the criminal conviction of a man accused of taking a second wife in the belief that he had a religious duty to practice polygamy, a duty he would violate at risk of damnation. The Court compared polygamy to murders sanctified by religious belief, such as human sacrifice or the burning of women on their husbands’ funeral pyres.”
My interest in the ethical status of polygamy is kindled after I read Martha Nussbaum’s latest book, and she devotes a whole chapter to the treatment of LDS members, including a detailed analysis on Reynolds. I would highly recommend her book to anyone interested in the ethical and legal philosophy of the First Amendment.
I agree with Kaminer’s argument that polygamy should not be categorically prohibited. What I mean by that is that the ethical status of polygamy cannot be determined by virtue of its definition alone. To define it in the simplest and purest form, polygamy is simply the phenomenon of having multiple marriage partners. In my opinion, this definition is insufficient to determine the ethical status of any particular instance of polygamy. For example, is the marriage based on consent? How are the spouses treated? I think different answers to these kind of questions will make the ethical status of any particular instances of polygamy different.
So, does this make me some kind of *gasps* moral relativist? Actually, no, because I consider myself a moral realist at heart. What I mean to suggest is that I cannot make an objective statement about the ethical status of polygamy simply based on its formal definition. But that does not mean that I think such statements cannot be made, say, about slavery: at least I cannot think of a single instance which I can say that slavery should not be categorically prohibited, no matter what the actual circumstances of any of its particular instances.
Kaminer goes on to list an argument often marshalled against polygamy, and she shows that they do not justify a categorical ban:
“‘Polygamy encourages child abuse,’ people say, citing instances involving the marriage of older men to underage girls. Assuming for the sake of argument that this is true, it still doesn’t justify categorical prohibitions on polygamy. Alcohol consumption may encourage sexual violence; it’s often blamed for date rape. Should we prohibit its use, as members of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union demanded over one hundred years ago? Or should we prosecute alcohol-fueled violence whenever we find it?
We rightly prohibit violence, not drunkenness, even though some drunks are violent; we should prohibit child abuse, not polygamy, even though some polygamists are abusers.”
Again, I think Kaminer’s argument is sound: what is wrong with particular instances of polygamy isn’t polygamy itself, but rather something else, like child abuse or coercion. Polygamy isn’t a necessary cause of either child abuse or coercion, as both of those happen frequently outside of a polygamous context. Don’t get me wrong, I think child abuse is a morally horrific thing to do, but that doesn’t mean that a polygamous relationship involving consenting adults who do not abuse each other should be treated equally as a polygamous relationship involving minors who did not consent to the arrangement.
Notice, however, that this is purely an ethical argument, not a legal one. The state may find that, despite the neutral ethical status of polygamy by its definition, it still has a legitimate interest in prohibiting the practice. How can such a case be made plausibly? Well, if there is good empirical evidence that most polygamous relationships do in fact involve non-consenting minors or spousal abuse, the state, I think, has a legitimate interest in addressing coercion and abuse. This, however, still does not impinge upon the ethical status of polygamy, but at least there is a policy case to be made against it. Of course, I’m assuming that law and ethics are not identical here.
But on the other hand, if the state has no such evidence, then it really has no business in interfering in the relationships between consenting adults. Therefore, the policy/legal case against or for non-intervention in polygamy can only be deteremined empirically, not a priori by virtue of polygamy’s conceptual definition.
Again, this is not a morally relativistic claim, because, to use the slavery example again, the state ought to interfere in EVERY instance of slavery, no matter what the empirical circumstances are, simply because the fact that it is slavery. In fact, the slave could have willingly given himself up to his master, and his master could treat him with the utmost lavishness, and yet the state should still intervene.
The distinction that I’m making is one of adequacy. In the case of slavery, it is adequate to make a claim about its ethical status (that it is morally unacceptable) by virtue of its definition alone. Whereas in the case of polygamy, the definition alone is inadequate to make any kind of ethical statement about it, without relying on the actual facts of the matter.
I want to emphasize that the scope of my claim is rather limited: it is solely concerned with the ethical status of polygamy, and not even that really. To state it even more precisely: I’m solely concerned with whether one can justifiably make a claim about polygamy’s ethical status based on its conceptual definition alone. I have made no meaningful claims either way about how polygamy ought to be treated as a POLICY issue, but Kaminer does:
“Nontheists who favor civil unions for everyone—taking the state out of the business of approving or disapproving religious matrimonial rites—should be especially supportive of the First Amendment right to engage in polygamous marriages sanctified by any faith. Whether or not polygamy should be legalized so that people in polygamous marriages enjoy equal rights and entitlements (like Social Security benefits), it should at least be decriminalized. Why should we care about other people’s private religious ceremonies? How dare we criminalize them?”
My intuition is that the conclusion is correct, but a more developed response would take too much time. Again, questions of policy ought to be separated from questions of morality, because the two are driven by different considerations: sometimes they converge, but sometimes they don’t.
“The underlying problem is that Democrats care about means as well as ends, while Republicans care almost exclusively about ends and will use any means to get there. The paradox lies deeper. For most Democrats, the means are part of the ends. We want an electoral process that eschews the lying and cheating we’ve witnessed since Richard Nixon’s dirty tricks. If we use their tactics, we undermine our own goal, violating one of the very things that distinguishes us from them. Yet if we don’t stoop to their level, how can we prevail in a system that allows – even rewards – such lying and cheating?”
I think Reich oversimplifies a bit: it is simply a Democrats-vs-Republicans thing; it’s really about what kind of behavior institutions reward and the kind of incentives that it creates. And on this point I wholeheartedly agree with him: our electoral institutions create incentives for the kind fo vulgar campaigning that eschews serious, evidence-based discussion of policy for the kind of trivial, hysterical shouting match that we have seen for the past two three or four election cycles.
The question that Reich posts at the end is this:
“Those who are willing to do anything to achieve their ends will always have a tactical advantage over those who regard the means as ends in themselves. The question posed in this election, and, one hopes, by an Obama administration, is whether the moral authority generated by the latter position is itself enough to overcome these odds.”
The answer, I’m afraid, is no. Unless the institutions change, then it is not reasonable to expect actors within the institutional framework to change their behavior. Am I being too deterministic in reaching this conclusion? Perhaps: I don’t deny that an individual can, through force of will and/or luck, fundamentally change an institution, but such occurrences are rare. And instead of depending on these rare contingencies, we should be focused on the institution itself. If institutions do affect individual behavior the way that it does now, then surely a more productive way of getting change would be to change the institution.
Or, to play the devil’s advocate, which Reich does not seem to want to do, let me suggest that our electoral politics work the way they do because we, as voters, have allowed them. That is to say, the responsibility for the kind of shitty campaigning that we’ve all come to “hate” is really on our own shoulders. Is this not a case of wanting to have it both ways?
Ironically, it took Alex Ross, a white person, to get me curious about Chinese classical music (a music which is supposedly part of my culture, since I was born and raised in China for some 11 odd years). Of course, there are many things that a discerning mind can point out: for one, besides the obvious irony, this is such a desperate attempt on my part to “reconnect” with my culture, a quest for “authenticity” that reeks of “multi-culti” which I’ve mocked to no end before.
But enough about that! Onwards and forwards—to the music itself.
That song is from this album, which I guess is a collection of songs primarily played with the jinghu (the instrument with the highest pitch), and the songs themselves are representative of music you would hear in a typical Beijing opera.
Structurally, the song is pretty simple, it’s basically the jinghu leading two other stringed instruments on the same melody, although the other two stringed instruments each have successfully lower pitches. On a side note, it is kind of sad that after having heard this kind of music while growing up, I can no longer even identify what the two other stringed instruments are. The percussion is in turn provided by the guban.
For those of you who are interested in knowing about the musical aesthetics of a Beijing opera, read the Wiki page, and if it is to be trusted, the aesthetics are fairly standardized and structured.
The Proustian moment, which I speak of in the title of this post, came when I first this music, because my aunt in China used to (I don’t know if she still does) be an amateur Beijing opera singer of some renown in my town where I grew up. She would receive regular invitations to sing at amateur productions staged by the city or by other hobbyists, and she took genuine joy in singing too. I remember, who knows how long ago, that I’d sit in the park and watch her sing at one of those amateur productions. These things were usually staged in a little pavilion in the park by the river. You can see the exact location of the river that I’m talking about (courtesty of Google Maps), and look, there is even a picture of the very same park!
And yes, that park looks exactly like it does in the picture: willow trees lining both sides of the river, sometimes so full that they are bending nearly into the river itself. And during summertime, all the locals would come out and sit on their little stools by the river, talking, telling stories, and in this case, staing amateur Beijing operas. And there I would sit, watching my aunt put on these ridiculous costumes and sing to her heart’s content. My aunt was a fairly big woman, not quite Aretha Franklin big, but fairly close, but man, she had some fucking lungs and could belt the words out.
Like I was saying, I would just probably spend most of the day at the park, if not watching one of her amateur productions, then just messing around the park, like all little kids do, riding the slides, climbing the children-sized obstacle courses, and otherwise just running around. When I was thirsty, I would buy some cheap junk soda (the first time I had Coke in a bottle, it was an eye-opening experience; remember, this was in fucking 1992), or use my allowance to buy popsicles. And my aunt has finished singing, she would take me, my cousin, and my uncle, and we would all go to one of the countless street food vendors and eat.
Listening to this music just suddenly brought all these memories back: and although it is extremely cliched to say it, but I do feel like I was transported back into another time and place. It was quite a rush, but the coming out of it inevitably made me feel melancholy to some extent, due to my realization that everything that I had just experienced exists only in my mind. And it reminded me of the fact that I haven’t seen my aunt, uncle, and cousin since the last time I went back to China in ‘99, forever ago. I mean, I talk to them on the phone about once a month, but I wonder how they have changed; whether my aunt is still singing as a hobby, or how my cousin have turned out.
But this Proustian moment also made me glad of the fact that I do some good memories, that if triggered, can still bring back some wonderful feelings. And although I cannot even come close, I mean not even fucking remotely close in a thousand years, of putting how I felt on paper in the same way that Proust could, I think it just demonstrates how good of a writer Proust really was—to be able to adequately describe something that seems ineffable, and have that description truly resonate with some Chinese kid nearly a hundred years later.
To end with a side note: I fucking love technology. I was able to piece together the geography of my childhood using nothing than Wikipedia and Google maps. I spent an hour just playing around with Google maps to figure out where all my childhood places were, and I must say, it is a lot of fun and brought back some long-forgotten memories.
But ah, I can already hear it from the peanut gallery, and most of the time, I would have been right there with it: What an incredibly self-indulgent exercise in shameless nostalgia! This is after all nothing but a mental masturbatory trip for Mike to go on and on about his childhood, which no one gives a shit about and which no one else can possibly understand! This is the type of bullshit, in its attempt to mix personal narrative, musical criticism, and technological commentary, is exactly the type of stuff that any third-rate Columbia MFA drop-out would churn out on toilet paper while interning at some niche publishing house.
Well, I’d have to agree with that: but don’t knock masturbation—it’s sex with someone you love.
