It’s always fun to run across old friends and find out what new adventures they’re up to. It seems as though Mark Amerika has his fingers in a collective called the “US Department of Art & Technology”. The site, “Political Art Creates a Shadow Government,” is a nice little play on our current government agencies, complete with lots of undersecretaries and directors (Mark is the Director of the Office of Freedom of Speech).
I often wonder how my grandfather must have felt knowing he had killed thousands of innocent people in the line of duty. But i know not to ask. I learned that long ago. Not all questions are to be asked. Some are simply to be forgotten. One answer will suffice: for God and country.
These thoughts have been more present in my mind in recent months. I remember being asked how i could be anti-war and pro-soldier, as though these ideas were completely contradictory. My response was always simple: Stanley Milgram. On a listserv today, someone noted that they would never participate in killing others, that they would rather risk jail than participate in the military, that the only justifiable option is conscientious objector. I wish i could live in a world where that option was available to everyone. Instead, i wrote:
This is a privilege that is currently afforded to you, yes. But it is not something that is afforded to all people everywhere, nor does it guarantee that you will never be situated in a kill-or-be-killed environment.
In many places in the world, you are required to serve in the armed forces. In many places, war is on your front step. Sure, you can say that anyone could rebel for moral reasons, but obedience to authority runs very deep. Are you familiar with Stanley Milgram’s work (mostly stemming from Obedience to Authority)?
Of course, the most interesting analysis of how stress will motivate “good” people to do “bad” things is Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment…
One well established perspective is that people’s moral values and practices are highly context-dependent. Put people in a position of fear, stress or anxiety and some of the worst characteristics of humanity are bound to emerge, even if they are the most altruistic and well-demeanored people in everyday life.
This research is very interesting in light of most war-vets PTSD. Needless to say, both Milgram and Zimbardo induced PTSD on their subjects (and they are the reason that we have the IRB today). Anyone who has been to war will articulate the conflicting feelings of not wanting to kill and yet doing so. It’s hard to make sense of and it tears at the fabric of your self-perception.
It’s also really important to note that we live in a very individualistic society. Most societies are more driven by community and family pressures and norms than personal beliefs. Rebellion is an act of dishonoring your family/community, a cultural force that most people don’t overcome. Also (best noted by Milgram), the values of an individual and the values of a group are often very different.
While we have the privilege to sit in (mostly) American cities and voice our dissent towards military participation, the forces that operate in most places would push any (even educated) member of society towards participation. Also, for the most part, we have education, jobs (or job potential), and lack family responsibilities, all of which affords us a lot of mobility and freedom. Most of the US’s military force is comprised of the poorest and least mobile individuals. Most signed up to get out of their home environment and never expected to have to participate. I would guess that most are not motivated by murder, but then put in that context…
I would love to believe that i would never kill. I would love to believe that if i were drafted, i would have the strength to rebel. Yet, i imagine that instinct would kick in and if i weren’t so privileged, so would need to conform.
Given this perspective, my personal view is that it is the responsibility of those of us with privilege to create a worldwide context where the worst in humanity doesn’t need to emerge. How can we reduce the tension so that the instinct to kill out of fear does not need to be considered? How do we increase communication so that the worst-case-scenario is never realized?
Of course, i realize that this is not the perspective that most people have. My grandfather came back from war to a culture that realized that whatever happened in wartime stayed in wartime. It was not to be discussed; simply honor the vets. In Vietnam, vets came back from their harrowing experiences to a country of people who hated them for doing what they didn’t see as representative. Anti-war activists took a stance that any conscientious person would object to the war and thus our own people were criminals. This divided our country unnecessarily and we saw the ramifications very recently. People still cannot separate between anti-war and anti-soldiers. The public sees the two as synonymous and it always saddens me to hear people validate that. To believe that soldiers are evil and immoral people is to be so steeped in privilege that you’ve lost touch of humanity.
I’m going to take this moment of procrastination to articulate how deadly technology is for aiding procrastination. In the last year, i’ve been pretty responsible to no one. My one responsibilty has been to V-Day. I’m expected to work 20 hours a week, but i often easily work 30, partially because that job is attuned to my best procrastination habits and thus work feels like procrastinating. An old friend of mine used to wimper about TV being a deadly reason for his prolonged PhD stay. Of course, this sounds like a typical “back when i was your age…” and of course i want to respond to how it is sooo much different now. But it is! Really!
I’ve managed to rid myself of the traditional procrastination tools. Solitaire has been removed from my computer and there is no TV to be found. Plus, i’ve never mastered the clean to procrastinate technique.
But there’s email… well, i have justified that email has work purposes (V-Day only validates this by having the focus of my work day spent on dealing with emails for tech support). Thus, i check email obsessively. *Obsessively.* There are two different accounts. One account has 6 different folders in which email may arrive. The idea was that all list email goes far far away from my INBOX. But what do i do? I check those other boxes in rote rotation. To top it off, i always have my INBOX displayed so that i can see a new little “N” pop up next to a new message. ::sigh::
Of course, IM is just as bad as email, only the relationship between productivity and work is much weaker. Luckily, a simple “i’m working, interrupt if necessary” message often keeps that procrastination tool in line.
Then there are blogs. Reading blogs, writing in blogs, surfing blogs, surfing the links in blogs. Blogs are truly a distraction. You can justify them as learning, or keeping tabs on people’s social behavior or the digital memes. Direct web surfing feels like procrastination; blog surfing feels like you are doing your mind a service. Which you are. You are helping it avoid the task at hand.
Next comes the myriad of sites out there intended for you to come back and surf them out of curiousity, particularly those targeted at making you feel socially relevant. Friendster, neopets, … Cruel. Evil.
Of course, so much of this centers around my Internet Explorer window. In theory, i should not be allowed to open it. But, you know, when you’re writing a paper, well, you *need* Google don’t you??
Next comes my small obsession with any form of data. I fill out surveys to procrastinate. I check my web logs (y’know – the ones that tell you how many visitors you have). I re-analyze any data i’m collecting in databases. (No, no new signups for the conference; yes, organizers are still procrastinating their Follow-ups…) I make certain that all of my book purchases are entered into the DB and that proper, and kind, feedback is left for the seller. Of course, if i haven’t purchased a book in 4 days, i probably surf my wishlist at half.com to see which books are relevant to the currently procrastinated paper. I even redo my finances and try to figure out how i can spend less than i make each month (which is brutally hard in San Francisco, particularly with my half.com habit).
Finally, when all else fails, i remember why procrastination is an essential feature of grad school by reading phdcomics. [Conveniently, this week’s comic is on the sale of research to the military…]
I realized that i did not announce that registration for Altered States and the Spiritual Awakening is now live.
For those who don’t know, i’ve been helping organize this conference. The idea is that most conferences that give people access to the psychological perspective on altered states and spirituality are obscenely expensive. Of course, putting on a conference is expensive, but still. Well, a friend of mine decided that he wanted to create a conference that was more accessible to young researchers, students and other poor, but motivated folks. When i first heard about the conference, i had to get involved.
At Brown, i was introduced to both psychedelics and Zen, all wrapped up together in a nice neat package. My early psychonautics helped structure who i am and how i perceive the world. As someone once said, psychedelics let you know that the top of the mountain exists, while Zen teaches you to climb it. After leaving Brown, i was stunned by how many Zen practicioners were both dismissive of and horrified by my experiences with psychedelics. This was tremendously disappointing and made me believe that i was not on the right path afterall. Over time, i found some of the older psychonauts and found that they were able to validate some of my experiences (partially wrapped into a book called Zig Zag Zen).
My interest has come to a head in the last year – how do i take it further so that it can be more personal and more meaningful? What can i learn about myself and about the world? How do i integrate my life experiences, ideas and values into a religious form?
Of course, these questions are far from answered, but the idea of meeting some legendaries in this quest is so exciting i can hardly wait!
I really like the Creative Commons project because it approaches the notion of copyright from the perspective that i believe it was originally intended. Copyright was to protect individuals so that they could keep producing more of whatever they produced. It was intended to go into the public domain after a set period of time so that it could be expanded and furthered. Likewise, original copyright laws protected those who wanted to comment on and build upon copyright, since it was for the good of all. With new copyright laws (most notably the Sonny Bono act), it seems as though the public good part of copyright is completely gone.
The web takes issues of copyright and IP to a new level. In particular, i’m fascinated by the impact of persistent data and archivability of data on the social quality of the web. The US Constitution guarantees the right of free speech, but it does not guarantee that you own your own speech. What happens when you post your opinion to another site? Do you own your words or does the site owner (or the collector of public discourse)? Deja made lots of money off of selling its archive of Usenet posts. What control do you have over your persistent presence on others’ sites? Do you own your Friendster profile? What about information about you that you did not authorize (such as videos of you going into Planned Parenthood)? Issues of databases and persistent data bring up new issues in data control.
Of course, this is where i’m fascinated by Creative Commons. Is it possible for sites to create an equivalent stating that anything that you post to this site is your property? Would this type of action be protected by law? Could it help build trust and safety (furthering TRUSTe)? Should they vow not to sell your data in any form (including in aggregate)? How would such a system work and be effective?
Eric Schlosser (author of “Fast Food Nation”) just released a new book: “Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market.” As i was absolutely in love with his critique of America through the perspective of migrant workers in the US food market, i’m very excited to hear about “Reefer Madness.” According to the book description:
In “Reefer Madness,” Schlosser investigates America’s black market and its far-reaching influence on our society through three of its mainstays — pot, porn, and illegal immigrants. The underground economy is vast; it comprises perhaps 10 percent — perhaps more — of America’s overall economy, and it’s on the rise. Eric Schlosser charts this growth, and finds its roots in the nexus of ingenuity, greed, idealism, and hypocrisy that is American culture. He reveals the fascinating workings of the shadow economy by focusing on marijuana, one of the nation’s largest cash crops; pornography, whose greatest beneficiaries include Fortune 100 companies; and illegal migrant workers, whose lot often resembles that of medieval serfs.
For those who have not read “Fast Food Nation,” do so immediately. Schlosser is one of the few contemporary authors who’ve convinced many people that i know to change their behaviors (surrounding food in this case). My excitement over his new book is that this may allow America to more deeply reflect upon and deal with its relationship with the “immoral vices” that it so loves and hates.
Shortly following the WTC attacks, i remember reading about a young girl who turned to her mother and pointed to the TV and remarked at how pretty the images were. This was a reminder of how attuned we are to seeing the TV as fiction and disassociating from the images we see there. Stories become fiction easily, and we have to mentally work at making them real.
Of course, we have learned to treat the web in the same fashion. If you read something really moving online, you are to assume that it is a hoax. It was with this vantage point that i read Jason Halperin’s (Doctors Without Borders) account of life inside the Patriot Act. Of course, this is absolutely horrifying and of course i desperately want this to be true, to magnify my frustration with our current system. Yet, i had these intense doubts; conveniently, they were relieved by source checking with Doctors Without Borders (via email from the webmaster).
This experience makes me think strongly about my motivations. I actively want reasons to hate our system because i see it as oppressive and colonialist. Yet, how much are the lens through which i am observing and experiencing clouding the magnitude in which i disagree with our system?
Secondly, why do we live in a system where we cannot trust what we read or hear? How easily is it to get swept up in social movements? At the same time, it frustrates me that anti-governmental rhetoric can be easily invalidated by those in power, yet the public has no way of checking the facts that the government presents. This lack of equality is my primary source of frustration – power begets power and marginalizes those who disagree. This immediately brings out my childish tendencies to scream “it’s not fair!”
The lack of equality is why i crave systemic transparency. I just simply cannot believe that universal transparency is desireable (unless you are libertarian and have lots of privilege). Universal transparency disempowers individuals while not actually requiring checks upon the government. How can transparency be used to more actively even the playing fields? And how can it be used to allow me to build trust in humanity? ::sigh::
In “The Moral Animal,” Wright argues that feminist anti-polygyny is misplaced. Feminists often argue that polygyny is misogynistic because it places women in a subservient and oppressive system that does not consider their well-being. Wright counters this argument from a Darwinian perspective, noting that women are statistically more economically stable and better cared for when the wealthiest members of society take on multiple wives. Excessive resources get more evenly distributed, benefiting both the traditional wife and children. This is not to say that polygyny is not harmful to society. When the poorest men have no access to wives, there is a drastic increase in violence within a society.
What is interesting is how this relates to contemporary Western society. We do not actually live in a society built on monogamy, but on serial monogamy. In polygamous communities, a man must have the proper resources to take on extra wives. In serial monogamy, men are welcomed to leave their first wives (and children) and move on to a second set with little or no requirement to support the first set. Not only are economic resources withdrawn in divorce, but also so are the social advantages to having a present father. Wright suggests that our current state is actually the worst of all possible worlds. Women have limited (and not guaranteed) access to economic resources and there is a high probability that they will be the sole parent as stepparents are often more problematic to households and estranged fathers rarely provide the social support necessary for the well-being of children. To make matters worse, the poorest and least desirable men have little access to women (as the most powerful men *** multiple women), increasing the violence in society.
Of course, Wright fleshes out these theories in full detail and recognizes that social practice is not explicitly theory realized. Yet, in reading this, what struck me was the placement of these theories in relation to feminism. Access to divorce and freedom from non-monogamous husbands was all thought to be beneficial for women. Opening up the job market to women was going to provide equality and opportunities for social dominance. Yet, a half a century into these massive changes, Western women face a whole new set of challenges, and it is hard to say whether they are better off. There are less social structures in place to provide for emotionally enriching child support, making raising children a much more daunting practice. Since women bear the brunt of this work even when they have jobs, careers are an added struggle as opposed to an alternative. Even in marriages, women practically need to maintain job capabilities so that in the case of divorce, they are not left stranded and destitute.
Of course, Wright does not argue for a return to Victorian times, but a reflection on what has changed and its impact. Regardless of warped Republican rhetoric, instituting family values requires more of a social change than a legal one, as parental involvement must be genuine, not simply economic. But i have to wonder – in turning our social structure topsy-turvy, what have we lost? Perhaps i have the freedom and privilege to be a doctorate student, but what new challenges am i facing? And in instituting Judeo-Christian values on other cultures, are we actually causing the women more harm? Are my arguments for eliminating gender-based oppression improperly structured? Or more interestingly, can culture help evolve away from the Darwinian perspective?
My relationship to journaling and blogging online has had regular shifts. In 1997, i recorded my daily reflections for my Zen teacher. Over time, this shifted to a series of entries intended for friends who were curious as to what was going on in my head and in my life. These early versions were simply intended for a small collection of people, not for the masses. At some point, i started maintaining a collection of interesting things that i was reading and recording those online. As blogging emerged, i was annoyed at having two separate recordings and shifted to a public, semi-personal (but with very little detail) archive of random segments of my life. The purpose was never particularly clear, but the usefulness of it was. Regardless of who else used my ramblings, their searchability made them a great resource for me to regularly access bits of interest.
Well, it’s time for a new version to emerge. In part, this is intentional. For the last nine months, i’ve been living a fairly hedonistic lifestyle (and loving every moment of it). But in conversation yesterday with one of my favorite people, i realized how mushy my brain has become and how i rarely exercise its usefulness. In addition, my ability to articulate thoughts on paper is sorely unpracticed and i’m finding writing utterly painful. Thus, a new mid-year resolve: in addition to random useful links, i will attempt to record my reflections on the various ideas that pass through my head. The purpose is primarily theraputic. I need to get more accustomed to writing and more comfortable in generating organized thoughts. Like any of my online ramblings, i don’t care if anyone reads them or comments on them, but i always welcome challenging thoughts in return.
Last night, i remembered why i value psychedelic trance music as a mechanism for producing a trance-like experience. I went into the evening anxious to hear Peter Didjital because it was the first time that a Scando DJ had spun since i moved here. And boy was i not disappointed. I danced almost the entire night, getting deep into my mind about my relationships with others, particularly powerful women, and my problems with communication. It was an utterly intense evening, full of wonders and reminders and i walked out exhausted and smiling from ear to ear.
The world looks perfect from this perspective.