Revolution = Communism

I found it uneasy to construct a communist society in my mind. We as Americans have be structured to think of self and increase ones owns interest. I personally feel my call in life is to be great, be rich, and do what I love. Of course I can still do this without money, but I cannot imagine it. As humans we feel like things belong to us, especially if it’s of our own creation. My question would be at what point is something staling? Would there even be such a word? It is considered a virtue or truly honorable o not hold attached to the things of life, but what can truly be mine if everything is for the taking?

                Furthermore, would there be a true value of occupations? The janitor would be no different than the doctor at a hospital. Jobs that we deem low I’ll assume that people with low work experience will do until they gain more knowledge to do other things. I believe it is somewhat naïve to think that it would be 100% successful. What we currently isn’t either, but it is better than a lot of other methods and capitalism remains on top.

                I thoroughly agree with his theories when it comes to the proletariat, but any other society, I’ll have to see to believe. Perhaps the capitalistic mindset has brainwashed me and a lot of us to think money is success, and the true value of work is dependent upon how much money you make. I can’t recall how many times I was judged on my major because the job market for creative writing students didn’t make much money. Sure, I could benefit from a communist society, but in me is the will to be the 1% or close enough to feel like I have achieved my goals. As long as people are distracted from there sorrows with social media, movies, food, and other means of cheap entertainment, we will live as slaves and live a life of only survival.

               

The Joy of Working

Karl Marx believes that capitalism ultimately falls into two categories: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. The proletarians are the ones that labor to produce the product and the bourgeoisie are the ones that control production. The proletarian’s salary is set so low that they are not able to afford the things they produced thus making the poor poorer and more numerous and the wealthy wealthier and fewer. Marx says these are the reasons that capitalism becomes violent. It is clear how capitalism becomes violent. Because the poor lives a life where they merely survive and it becomes so many of them, eventually they will get tired of the mere survival lifestyle and revolt. In history, we have seen people revolt and demand for better pay and more benefits. However, in modern society, you do not see as many revolts and I believe it is because we have become complacent. I agree with Marx when he said that the worker has become alienated from his or herself. According to Marx, work and labor is free, conscious activity and when that work is no longer free, it causes us to have a feeling of misery. We no longer find happiness in the one distinctly human characteristic. Now because labor becomes a necessity, we find happiness in the animalistic characteristics such as sleeping, eating, and satisfying pleasures and labor leaves us physically and mentally drained. Workers are alienated from themselves because they no longer own their work. Before they even complete the production of a product, the final product is already sold to someone else. The worker is no longer able to pride themselves in their work because their work is not theirs. The workers began to become robotic. The worker began to work solely for wages that will help them survive.

Alienated Labor

In Karl Marx's theory on class struggle violence, he claims that because capitalism is built on the exploitation of labor, it is inevitable that the poor will become poorer and more numerous, whereas the rich will become richer and fewer. A 2014 Oxfam report noted that one percent of the population held 48% of the total global wealth. This does not, however, mean that the other 52% belongs to the rest of the population, because in actuality, it is mostly controlled and owned by the other 20% of the wealthiest people. Ultimately, this means that approximately 5.5% of global wealth belongs to the other 80% of people (i.e., us). For further clarification, the vast majority of the world's population owns less than six percent of the global wealth. As Marx noted, this means that we are all essentially competing with each other for 5.5% of wealth when we, the 80%, likely produce 99% of the labor. Another interesting thing about Marx's theories of labor concerns one of the four reasons that workers are alienated. The one I find most compelling with regards to the previously mentioned statistics is the one that states that under capitalism, workers become alienated from themselves. For example, when work is imposed, it makes the labor a miserable task. In psychology, there is a concept known as the over-justification effect that states that when the compensation for a task is too high or too low, it undermines the intrinsic motivation to do the task. Numerous research studies (See Deci, 1970 for an example) have shown that when people who do not receive compensation for a task tend to report more positive experiences than people who were paid. I think this is a pretty clear example of how putting a price on our labor diminishes the intrinsic gratification we would get from doing something that should be a conscious and free activity.

Spring Valley Cop

I am sure that most of you have seen the video of the Officer at Spring Valley High School throw the student out of the desk, and across the room. And if you haven't I strongly suggest that you all do so.
Here is a link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIvPuIY0JBY&feature=player_detailpage


So many people have different opinions on what happened at Spring Valley High School that day. Some people are appalled that an officer of the law would do anything like that. While others feel like there is more to the story. I myself feel like their is no reason on why an officer would have to remove a student with that much force. However, I have done some research into this story, and have read countless theory's that claim to be the "real truth" on what happened that day. All of the stories claim to have eye witnesses, and first person accounts from students and teachers, but they all have different stories. From what I have read, the most occurring story seems to be that the student was being disruptive on her phone and refused to get off of it. After that, the teacher asked her to leave the classroom more than once, and called the school security to remove her from the class. Now this is where the stories become completely different. Nothing that I have read seems to be the same about the events of that day.
However, from what I could see from the video, no one seemed to be against what was happening to the student. Which goes back to a theory that we went over in class, about us being so used to social injustice that we have become compliant to it. It's something that everyone wants to think that they aren't compliant, that they are the one's that would stand up against the injustice. However their are many social experiment tests that show how compliant we have become. One of witch I want you as a reader to watch, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSsPfbup0ac  
Thank you all for reading this, and cannot wait to see what you think.
 

Hero to Zero

The summary of the class this week is that WE ARE ALL WEAK. We follow the rules, we do as we are told, we behave, well most of us. I never thought about it as being a slave, but the more you think about it the more you see why you are indeed a slave. We don't go against the "Man," we know not to fight the "Power" and why? Because my momma told me not to. We are good kids, good slaves. The more and more I think about it, it makes me mad. The history books told me that we had abolished slavery, but apparently that was a lie.

The nobel and strong is our government and most of us are the well trained slaves that follow every command because we don't want to get in trouble. 

I am not strong, and sad enough, I will continue to be weak, a slave if you must. I will hide behind the laws and rules that protect me because without them I might not be here.
Nietzsche, this goes out to you!

To Promise or Not to Promise

Let's face it everyone in their lifetime has broken a promise or two. Maybe it was intentional or maybe it was just due to a conflict that occurred. Today in class we discussed how Nietzsche believed that to breed an animal that is entitled to make promises. When a person decides to make a promise they are basically committing themselves to that action. Now if you make a promise to go out with your friend to a party, but you end up getting shot and end up on the operation table; you are still breaking your promise. You did not break the promise intentionally, but technically you still did. If you choose to flake on your friend and come up with some type of BS excuse then you are truly breaking your promise. You are testing your will as a slave because, you chose to lie instead of committing to going to the party with your friend. According to Nietzsche you are weak. Now like Larshay mentioned today in class, if you say " If God is Willing" that is kind of different to me. You are making a promise, but you are not at the same time so it is kind of like a 'maybe.' Nietzsche makes valid points when it comes to breaking promises, but when you break the promise and it is not in your control I disagree with Nietzsche. If a person is intending to make good on their promise and something happens to them, that is out of their control. Like with my previous example, if it was your intention to go to the party with your friend, but you got shot; you were still intending to make good on your promise. Promises are made with the thought that nothing bad will halt your future plans.

Rules are for the Weak!

On Wednesday, we discussed about how moral laws were created to help the weak. I completely agree with that. If there was no moral law, there would nothing to stop the aristocrat from doing whatever they want. Growing up since a baby until our old age we are brought up to follow rules. If we are conditioned to follow the rules then we basically become really weak. We can not even stand up for what we believe in. One example that was given was recently the incident of Spring Valley High School. If you didn’t hear what happened, basically one student was being disruptive and did not want to leave the classroom. So the teacher called the police in an effort to remove her. When the police officer came, the student was still disobedient. That is when the police officer used extra force to remove her. The video shows how the officer was aggressive to a point where he slammed the student on the floor with the desk and dragged her out. The video went viral within a couple of hours. The police office and school went through an investigation. Now when you look at the video, one of the biggest thing you notice is how quiet and motionless the other students in the class is. They didn't not want to get involved. They just wanted to follow the rules and move on their days. That is one thing Nietzche was afraid of. people would be so conditioned to follow rules that they can not stand up for themselves even if they know it is wrong. Following the rules has made us weak. This is another point I completely agree with. Especially in this era, whatever the media shows us or tells us, we just agree with it. There are millions of issues that need our attention but we are too afraid to not follow the rules or do anything about it. We are too weak to do anything about it.

Reading Assignment for next week: Karl Marx on "Alienated Labor"

Here is a link to your reading assignment for next week.

Ya pinky promise?

According to Nietzsche in The Genealogy of Morals, promises are discharging the will that nothing in time or space will stop a person from doing the duty. When people make promises then they are pretty much saying no matter what happens they will do whatever to make the promise happen. For example, if I promise my friend that we will have a movie night at my house but a tornado comes and destroys my house to where we cannot have the movie night then I am still breaking a promise. Even though I could not predict that the tornado was going to come, I still said no matter what we will have it. However, if I text my friend and said that we could not have it because I have to go eat dinner with my family then that is truly breaking a promise. I agree with Nietzsche because I have the freedom to choose to have the movie night but decided not to. That is testing my will as a slave, which shows that I am weak because I did not go through with the promise I made. On the other hand, I do not agree with Nietzsche in that I broke the promise to my friend because the tornado hit my house because I had no control over that. I do not think that people make promises meaning that nothing in time or space with stop them from doing but nothing in their control with stop them from doing it. I feel that breaking a promise due to a person choosing not to do it shows that a person is very weak not only because they did not do what they said but that it made their friend make a moral judgment on them. Therefore, that action will be held against them and could possible cause bad consequences. For example, in the future that friend may not trust you when you make other promises. Promises are to be held in the case that nothing in somebody’s control will stop them.

"There goes my herooooo"

Today in lecture, we started to discuss a key idea which is fundamental in Nietzsche’s philosophy – the Ubermensch. In this blog, I will give an example (or what I think is an example) of an Ubermensch. However before I do, I will discuss what exactly an Ubermensch is. Ubermensch has several translations such as superman, superhuman, ultraman (my favorite translation; it just sounds cool), and above-man; nevertheless, the literal translation is overman. An Ubermensch is a being or a “creature” which is considered to be the next level up from normal humans and sees him/herself as superior (not necessarily in a physical manner). Unlike slaves, an Ubermensch has the freedom of being able to learn to command himself due to being dissatisfied with what he is and/or has been. In this, he is not only able to command himself but others as well in that the Ubermensch sets values that goes beyond the realm of morality. What is characteristic of the Ubermensch is the will to power; the power to set his/her own values and goals due to the obedience to the self. The will to power can be characterized with having a strong and enduring self-determination. Further, the reason why the will to power is characteristic of the Ubermensch is that it is devoid of weakness (or in other words moral values). The Ubermensch is equilivant to a modern day hero in that the being is ready for hardships and struggles and has no pity or other weakness. This being discharge their will into action; if he/she wants to seek revenge, then revenge they will seek!

Now to my example of an Ubermensch. There were a few I initially had in mind, such as Ghandi; however, when thinking about it, he clearly was “working” within morality. Next I thought of the example of religious cult leaders (such as Jim Jones and Marshall Applewhite of Heaven’s Gate), or just cult leaders in general. 

  The Ubermensch =)

Also, here is a video clip of the Heaven's Gate initiation for those interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqSZhwu1Rwo

The Basics of Moral Values

This week, we discussed Nietzsche. His idea is that moral values were only invented to protect the weak and slavish. He describes the slavish as being most ordinary people. For example, he would think that everyone in our class was slavish. He also asserts that the slaves believed the statement “God loves me, therefore I am wonderful.” They also supported the notion that moral values are about good and evil, not good and bad. I thought the idea that all moral values are around to protect the week was rather jarring, but insightful. It definitely made me think about why we do what we do and where the values came from. I support protecting the weak wholeheartedly, as I believe everyone deserves to have the chance to live their lives as fully as possible. Eliminating them because they are below intelligence, ugly, or weak would not be fair to their individual rights as a person. It’s also interesting that, as far as we know, we are the only species of animal that thinks rationally and has moral values. Most other species would not hesitate to leave behind a weaker individual in their group for the sake of making the population stronger. This makes humans unique. I think this week was very insightful and made me think about the grounding of morals.

"Weak" Summary

Okay so, for those who may have missed a day of class this week or for those who need a fresh recap, here is a summary of what has gone down in Dr. J’s class this week.

          We’ve been discussing a philosopher named Friedrich Nietzsche. Nietzsche believes that genealogy relates to morality. What does that exactly mean? Well he has split his philosophy in to two categories: the aristocratic or nobles vs. the slaves. The aristocratic, preferably known as the nobles, are the good. The slaves are the bad. But what determines why the nobles are considered good and what determines that the slaves are bad? The noble believe they are good because they are beloved by God. Because they are loved by God, they are wise, beautiful, wealthy, strong, and etc. They are also the ”yes-sayers”. The slaves on the other hand, are not loved by God. Therefore, they are not wise, beautiful, wealthy, strong and etc. The slaves are unable to discharge their will and cannot do the things that the “good” can.

          Nietzsche also discusses the slave revolt in morality. This is where it can get a little confusing to understand. What he makes clear is that the slaves are weak people. They are not just weak because they are not strong, but because the slaves have a mentality that their weakness is strength; AKA: the slaves believe in morals to try to hide their weakness. The slaves see the nobles as evil, because they have the power and strength that the slaves don’t. Nietzsche explains that the slaves came up with morals to try to make up for their lack of strength. If you’re still confused, think about this scenario: A kid is being beat up at school by another student for lunch money, and the kid being beat up does nothing. He doesn’t fight back, he stays passive. What did the kid who was beat up do? He did nothing. Therefore, he is weak. If the kid had fought back and showed his strength, he would be considered noble. Some opinions might be that the kid did right by not fighting back, by refraining from violence. They say that is the right thing to do because that is what their morals have taught them. But that is exactly what Nietzsche would consider a slave-like mentality.

          We’ve also briefly discussed what an “ubermensch” is. An Ubermensch is someone who can say “yes” to their life. They are the ones who are content with everything they have experienced in life and who would not go back and change a thing about it. Basically someone who legit lives by “no regrets.”

          Overall, Nietzsche’s mentality about morals is that they are useless for nobles and vital for slaves. Morals pretty much only preserve the weak.

Robotic Nation

This week in class we discussed Nietzsche. He may came off as brutal to most, but I agree with him. He stated that there was a time period where there were no morals. He called it the pre-moral mode of valuation. The two modes are aristocratic and slave. Then, we were taught morals. Plenty of people in society today are slaves. We were taught certain things, so we believe it or do it. These things are embedded in our heads so much that we have become domesticated. A society full of robots. We were taught to be respectful at all times to police, so we do it. We were taught that if we don’t have anything nice to say then don’t say it at all, so that’s what we do. All of these things and more Nietzsche considered weak. I agree with him. Society has become so weak today that a person can be terrified to express their opinion. For example, Bruce Jenner caused an uproar in the media when he became Caitlyn. Many celebrities expressed their opinions about the situation. A formal rapper stated how he didn’t agree with it and many people became upset at him. Was he wrong? Nobody has that say. He simply stated his opinion, but because society has been taught to follow the status quo or agree with the majority, many people were livid that the rapper didn’t agree. This goes into Nietzsche’s other statements about slaves being only able to react, but not act. Slaves can’t take action or voice their own opinion. They rather just keep the morals that they were taught and play it safe. Morals give people a safe haven. Killing a person is considered morally wrong, so most don’t do it. But what if there wasn’t any morals? The strong/aristocratic and weak/slave will definitely be determined.    

Post-Fall Break Reading Assignment: Nietzsche

Here is a link to Nietzsche's essay from The Genealogy of Morals, which you should have read before returning to class on Monday, October 26.

A Kantian in every movie

In almost every dramatic or horror movie I've come across (a lot), there's always been a "Kantian" in it. Every time something goes wrong, there's always that one person who goes against everyone else's plan in order to sustain humanity or morality. Movies like Saw exemplify this in many cases; in order for everyone to live, one person has to die (or something like that), yet most refuse to do it, even to save themselves. An even better example is the show The Walking Dead where at every turn, there's a moral delima, and the most rational choice involves the inhuman or unmoral act, or sacrifice, upon one person in order to save everyone else. In almost every case, the "Kantian" is depicted as the irrational or delusional person. In some cases it is virtually impossible to make a rational decision that ensures the well being of people without carrying out an inhumane duty. The question bothering me is: is the philosophy of Kant generally rational? Is it possible to treat every person as free, rational, and autonomous, and perform all necessary duties for the good of all without sacrificing humanity?

Lets just not.

This situation is literally just like the Batman movie where the joker had two boats and told them the button on the wall blew up the other ship. We should have faith in each other because if they all know that if they wait both side would live, they should have the moral to chose life of everyone rather than the few. According to Mill, the best decision would be one that causes the greatest amount of happiness and the greatest amount of happiness would be everyone living from both buildings. And that is also what happened in Batman, neither ship pushed the button and both the citizens and the inmates lived. Kant would also say that killing others is wrong and so neither Kant nor Mill would push the button. The only reason the people would push the button is out of fear that the other people would push the button. Which, to restate my first point, just means that everyone just needs to keep their faith in peoples humanity.

Would you kill your son?

Imagine you and your family being hopelessly trapped in a concentration camp. Your son, exhausted from all the tourture, tries to escape, but fails. The guard catches him and sentences him to be hung, but there's a catch. You have to pull the chair from beneath him. If you don't pull the chair, your son, along with three others, will die. Now,I believe that Kant would agree to pull the chair, but not Mill? For what reason you may ask? For Kant, whatever will provide the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people, the categorical imperative, would be his reasoning for pulling the chair. In this case, if you didn't pull the chair, three other innocent individuals lives would be at risk for the consequences of someone else's actions. Not to say that your son's intentions weren't good, but we must consider the lives of the other three people as well. In the case of Mill, I believe that he would not have pulled the chair because I don't think he could stand to live with himself afterwards. The thought of having to kill your own son would be devastating to him. And I wouldn't say he doesn't care about the other people, but he believes that he should be trying to achieve his own happiness. To lose someone close to you is hard enough but to have to kill them with your own hands? Mill would also not want to pull the chair because the consequences of his actions would be be bad and to him, the results of your actions play a great part in utilitarianism. So now it's your turn to decide. Would you rather kill your son, or have your son and three others killed by the hands of someone else?