"Sic Semper Tyrannis"

Derailed again, the plans of mice and men
A noble cause, destroyed by tax and fines.
Issues contained? Not five, but now times ten:
This one for all did not return in kind.

And he, aghast by all it crashing down
He hoped "the Good would count for some at all."
Appalled, his lips then formed a bitter frown:
as many said - Pride left before the fall.

And yet, amid the embers of this wreck,
a ray of hope, and then a beam of light;
Not due to him, from head upon his neck -
kind hearted people: brilliance in the night.

Emboldened now, he confronted Hubris
"As to your peers: 'Sic Semper Tyrannis'"

_____________________________

I would really enjoy constructive ideas for where to go with this (or if it sounds finished). I cannot say it was written because of Dune, but it certainly seems to fit the bill.

-Mike

A Note

Happy Birthday Mike!

Reflection upon Class 4

I must say that I also enjoyed the religion discussion as part of today's class. If I might venture that the majority of class opinion seems derisive of religion in general, I feel like that affected/affects all discussions we have about religion. Assuming that being true, I wanted to talk about something pertaining to the discussion completely, but remains outside of it. The fact of the matter is that Americans have totally supported "freedom and liberty" for everyone since the inception of this nation. This follows the author's line, and so does the fact that the popularly held definition of just who "everyone" includes has also changed, quite a bit. This is all elementary, but it poses the interesting issue: our discussion centered around the implicit assumption that we know so much better now. On the outside, this seems reasonable enough. Then, take into account that fact that this campus is at least somewhat athiest/anti-theist in nature. Then recall that the freedom of religion protects both those with and without religion, equally. Even further, this campus prides itself on being the most tolerant and accepting of all opposing views. Isn't it interesting, then, that "we" still seem (read as Americans, or our campus) still manages to find a way to pick who is in the group of protected rights, and who is out? I mean, Heaven (word-choice intended) forbid that anyone on this campus makes fun or attacks the background of someone who is a minority, whether by race, gender, sexuality, or most other criteria.... except religion. It is somehow alright to throw around the ideas presented by religion with little to no respect. No, thats not quite right - it is acceptable to take parts of religion, and villify them, and make them appear to be representative of religion as a whole. That sounds similar..... kind of like something else we have discussed.... OH. Its kind of like attacking the Native Americans for being in the "not liberty and freedom for all" category. Its kind of like denying rights to women for years. Not in and off itself, but it is wrong because a group that prides itself on tolerance and acceptance, it appears as though that has a limit... And for added irony, this is a Methodist school, whose Board of Trustees always includes the Methodist Bishop of Washington DC.

I am not directing this at any one person (nor am I saying that I am always fair or equal in my opinions); I am merely pointing out the inherent flaw in an assumption seemingly made at the beginning of class - that we today clearly know better and would never do anything of the sort as described in the book.

I look forward to dissent, to start some sort of discussion.

-Mike

Links Section

During class today, I added the links section to the side of the blog to post the videos we found in case anyone wanted to watch them later. I figured we could just keep it up and anything anybody likes can go there. I'm also considering adding a section of links for people to post sites dedicated to various sci-fi shows or movies that they feel are fairly iconic and others should enjoy as much as they do. If you guys want this, that is. So, if I can get a straight up or down in comments, that'd be great. Basically 2 links sections: academic-ish, and fun.

Reflection, Class 4

The laptops were fun to play with, I completely agree, and the program was interesting if a little slow. I suppose my feelings toward the book are still the same. If anything I want to talk a bit more about religion. I've taken a few classes in it and as I've stated previously, if you consider being a religious person one who regularly attends services, then I'm religious.
Roman Catholic, actually, so the whole anti-Catholic thing has always been funny to me, but only because we're past it...mostly. I'm not sure what gets Protestants freaked out more, our doctrine or the pope. I'm thinking the latter, based on comments made during Kennedy's campaign and the fears about the pope dictating things, well Kennedy did a nice job in stamping that out, too bad Al Smith couldn't come up with it when he ran. Probably too soon. Anyway, religion.
Not to be ironic, but it can be used to cover all manner of sins, can't it? That depends on whether you consider nationalism a sin, which granted it can be or can't be. We used religion to "civilize" the Native Americans because we wanted their land and one way to do it was turn them around to our point of view through educating them and converting them. In my Sex, Gender and Culture class last semester we read an article about the Montagnais Indians in Canada that were converted by the Jesuits (yes, a Catholic example!). This priest had a four fold plan: permanent settlement and establishment of a central chief, the introduction of corporeal punishment, the education of children, and the introduction of a European family structure. These elements would stop nomadic tendencies, the basis for civilization, once you have punishment you can introduce the idea of suffering, educating the children to European standards would bring them out of their parents' backward ways, and a European family structure would place the man at the head instead of their traditional woman, which would help them to respect a central chief. Once you have a centralized system that has an element of suffering you can show them how it's like the church and how through suffering they can get to heaven.
My point? Religious rhetoric can turn an entire tribe's way of life on it's head used with the right pressure and it's historical welders were very good at using it. So the idea of America is inherently tied to religious language. Could we really expect differently based on our history? I mean we were founded by people who wanted to do things their own way, but mainly the religion thing, they still liked most of England's system just not their decadence in religion. So my point, if I even have a point at this juncture, is that maybe we need to accept that we'll be using religious language for better or worse and as long as we don't shove it down people's throats, we can live with it. And part and parcel of religion is making yours better than the other guy's...so it follows that whatever you're supporting has to be better than anything else. The words simply demand it.

Manifest Destiny: Post-Class Response

I agree with Tim today’s class was a very useful approach to this book, but I don’t know how it would work with other novels. I did like that we were able to list all our points on the projector screen and that way we were able to tie them together and refer to them again better. Post class my feelings towards the book and its ideas are the same, but they are now more organized and the class let me organize them better. There is still something about the concept that every empire creates a sense of uniqueness and a special role in the world for itself, usually for some reason at the expense of others; and justifies this by giving itself a special high role and placement in the hierarchy of the world. Humanity does seem to be of parasitical nature and either needs to live at the expense of others or its environment.

Class 2/5

Yeah, toys in class. So not only are we in sort of a rebel class we were experimenting with a new program. I enjoyed having the laptops so we could do all of that simultaneous research but the Tiffany system for displaying was absolutely pathetic. I talked with PTJ after class and he said that he had warned the university not to buy that system but instead get some sort of Apple program. He mentioned that the Model Classroom was designed to accommodate Mac equipment, not windows. As the guinea pigs, I believe we may have proved to AU that they need to listen to people who know what they're talking about when buying new programs. I think that our approach today was pretty effective in increasing our discussion. I don't know if it will work for the other books we're reading though. This one was at least vaguely historical so the examples were easy to find. In the more remote reaches of our subject this may lose some of its effect but overall I feel its a good idea.

Manifest Destiny: Pre-Class Response

This was kind of painful for me to read. For many reasons: A.) it made me realize that I had forgotten many details I learned about US History in APUSH (AP US History) and it made me remember why US history isn’t one of my favorite to study B.) Once again made me frustrated with humanity and its tendency to hypocrisy and I saw many examples of how people can twist many things (especially religion) to justify their actions (if you recall my post for the Moon is a Harsh Mistress, I was frustrated for similar reasons concerning colonization) C.) It further frustrates me because it seems that we still haven’t learned. Now I know US isn’t the only country to act this way, but since the book focused America, and it is indeed powerful enough that its actions have a great affect on humanity as a whole, I will now focus on US actions past and present. Mike’s comment concerning “racial purity and ethnic cleansing” is similar to how I felt as I was reading this. And some of the examples Jen highlighted are a good example of instances in which US’s actions just seem unjust despite the fact that they were justified by the American people, like the example she gave on page 36 concerning the incident in Mexico. This book has just reaffirmed my opinion that America has long been a master of manipulation and of covering up dirty or self-interested actions with virtuous words and pretty ideas. And the scary thing is that thousands of people whole heartedly believed this whole concept of manifest destiny and over time it kept morphing but ultimately it was still used to justify aggression or domination towards people who are different or in some cases weaker. As a person who whole heartedly believes in trying to keep an open mind, the importance of studying and finding out about other cultures, communication, understanding, and just in general being more open to peaceful interaction, collaboration and communication among societies that are culturally different, America’s attitude as described in this book and their past (and present) actions towards “others” greatly frustrates me to the point that I had to force myself to finish this book. This book presented in an organized manner information I have encountered before, and provided me with more in depth details and examples. But it just reaffirmed my frustration with how America has acted and how it sometimes still views itself today. Don’t get me wrong, there are many great things about this country and in no way are Americans the only ones who have done this, but there are still people in this country that are just as narrow minded and will proudly proclaim to anyone why US is #1 and is so great for the world. And current world events show that America is still taking the wrong approach and that it is further hurting its reputation. Currently the world and international relations involve sooooo many complex and ever changing factors plus the subjects brought up in this book are not black and white. So I will sum up my rant by saying that in general it aggravates and discourages me that humans can rationalize and justify unjust and horrible actions in some cases and point the finger and accuse another group (or person) of committing atrocities, even though in principle they were doing the same thing.

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress: Post-class reaction

Sorry for another late reflection, half the school got sick and I was one of the unlucky, and have been battling illness the past few days. But concerning our class discussion on The Moon is a Harsh Mistress I think our discussion went in an interesting direction. The whole issue of morality is a delicate question, when you throw in artificial intelligence it gets even more muddled. I still believe that an important part of any discussion concerning morality is the situation, because the ways humans have constructed society it’s ok in some cases to do some things or it’s ok for one group but not for another, and often when looking at morality one can see many cases of hypocrisy. So I found it hard to make up my mind completely concerning Mike’s morality especially since we only got one perspective in the book and we don’t know what happened exactly. And I can see that all of you have contemplated on the morality question as well. And I feel like with humanity morality will never be black and white, for example in any conflict the winner writes the history and their actions are justified by the morals and standards of their society. And I think in the future with all new technologies and inventions (cloning, artificial intelligence, etc.) The morality issue is going to get even more confusing, it’s already changing and it doesn’t seem like that will change any time soon.

Manifest Destiny

I would like to be able to talk primarily about Stephanson's work, but since we watched those few episodes of Star Trek, all I can focus on when I try to think about the book is the examples in the show.
I feel the need to place a disclaimer here: I have not watched much Star Trek, really none other than those three episodes on Sunday, so the points I make here are based upon analysis of these individual episodes only and not on larger themes throughout the series.

I'll begin with "I, Borg." In this episode we see the Federation happening upon a crashed Borg ship and they find one survivor on board. The Borg have no concept of self, they identify themselves as numbers and always as "we". The crew bring the Borg on board the Enterprise and they decide to use the Borg to destroy the entire Borg civilization because the Borg war with the Federation and are thus evil. This mirrors the concepts in Manifest Destiny in which two conflicting cultures make war on each other due to the lack of cultural understanding. Later, when the Borg becomes more human-like taking on the name of Hugh, standing up for his friend, and identifying himself as an individual the crew feels that they must take him in to protect him from the harsh savages of Borg life. The same is true in history where Indians that conformed to American customs typically were viewed as civilized whereas those continuing in the traditional customs were seen as savages.

Next we have "Ensign Ro." Here the Federation believes that they can use a Bajorian who is loyal to the Federation to catch a group of Bajorian terrorists. Again, Americans often used Indians who had become Americanized to assist them in their conquest over the Indians.

Finally, "First Contact." This is the best example from our selection. In this episode the Enterprise is conducting a program of making contact with the Arkonians, a comparatively primitive society that is only now about to develop warp capabilities. The Federation normally takes these developing planets and guides them as they eventually join the Federation. Chancellor Durken believes that the Federation will attempt to seize control over his planet and lead them down a path that they do not wish to go. Minister Krola thinks that the Federation will simply attack them. These are exactly the sorts of things that the Americans did to the Indians.

Granted this was based mostly on Star Trek, but these episodes were heavily influenced by the sorts of concepts Stephanson outlined in Manifest Destiny.

American Empire: Fun for the Whole World

First and foremost, this book makes the following point quite clearly: regardless of how we learned American history, Americans had the ideas of racial purity and ethnic cleansing down to a science centuries before the Nazis were even an idea, much less a reality. This is oversimplification, perhaps, but the book goes through and catalogs the crimes committed in the expansion of America, but merely as facts and not as condemnation. I feel like this history, as laid out in the book, of America being the hope for the world; the Other, free from the Old Ways of corruption and despotism, and so forth - only we as Americans can save the world, either by being the example for all or by direct intervention. This trend is clearly still an active force in our national psyche today: we are always going in to liberate people, implicitly stating that their government and leadership are inferior to ours and need to be corrected. While this is something we have done for most of our history, I feel like it is short-sighted and arrogant of us to continue in this manner. Even in seemingly simple cases, like giving aid to poor nations - we should not see it as we are helping them since they cannot help themselves because of implicit inferiority - instead, we as a nation should refocus our aid domestically and internationally to work towards development in a sustained fashion: feeding a family for 6 months is good, but helping that same family start producing their own food (thereby adding to the local economy) is far better. I am by no means saying that giving aid is a bad thing - I just feel as though our motives (when drawn out to their final conclusions) should reflect a desire to help other human beings of equal worth, something that has historically (and in many cases, currently) tarnishes the aid this nation provides to others.

Secondly, I wanted to speak to the author's discussion of religion playing a role in manifest destiny. While throughout the book he mentions the importance of Christian religion (which was the dominant religion of this nation for quite some time), he misses a vital point. The religious wars in England and Europe (which he does discuss) spawned the huge chasm between Catholics and Protestants, and later between the individual denominations therein. Many of the religious intellectuals of Europe disliked this intensely, and made speculative Masonry, or the Freemasons (something he does not discuss) in order to combat this religious hatred. Many of these individuals came to America, being against the status quo of Europe. Many of these same immigrants played vital roles in the foundation of this nation, and their aims have forever guided the path America has taken. Masonry, being an institution of civil religion, aimed to make religiously-grounded, pro-America, pro-fellow-man citizens. Therefore, many individual Christian denominations were swept up by this idea of America's importance in offering aid to other nations, there was also the more generalized religious Masons who forwarded this aim as well. This is not speaking to the rampant pro-Anglo-Saxon thoughts that prevailed, merely a statement that the author may have missed some important evidence in the cohesive, American motives of "helping" other nations and people (whatever that meant in a given time period).

Fare thee well

-Mike

Visions of the Past, Courtesy of Stephanson

I had to change my usual title this week, because we aren't exactly dealing with science fiction or the future, but our history. So maybe I should have called it America: Reinterpreted, or something. Or something witty from the Complete History of America (abridged) that Tim and I went to (albeit coincidentally at the same time). But I didn't.
Instead of focusing on themes this time around, I think I'll point out some things I found interesting. Or maybe just one theme.
Religion. I've thought a bit about it, being person who goes to church on a weekly basis and is fairly active in my community, but I didn't really make all the connections Stephanson did. I mean, I caught the bit about the Puritans using religion as a reason for doing stuff and the whole city on a hill thing, but I'm not sure I connected Manifest Destiny itself to religion. I just connected it to "hey, we're here and no one else is so all of this should be ours anyway and not yours. Or yours. Or that guy's over there. So back off." Oops. But I see it now, and I think Stephanson makes a lot of sense.
Okay, now to interesting bits.
Pg. 17-18: Pointing to Madison for turning the vastness quandary around to a good thing and the Jackson era for making expansion a necessity. I bet the European powers used this same argument a bit later on/around the same time for the whole imperialism/colonialism thing with adding the idea that they've done pretty well so far so everyone should follow their model of doing things and the best way to do that is by becoming part of them. Eventually this turned from exerting real control into an umbrella or spheres of influence once they got over the whole control thing. But we beat them to that too: the Monroe Doctrine.
Pg. 23: The Louisiana Purchase and buying the land becoming the proper way of expanding. I liked the part about how we'd insist on paying something even when we'd gotten it fair and square in a war, like most other countries do it. Aren't we nice? Also, we seem to have dropped the ball on the whole Cuba thing very early in the game and have yet to recover from it.
Pg. 36-37: The whole Santa Anna/setting up the Mexican American War. I didn't know that about that war, that Polk sort of made it happen. Not something we covered in AP US History...I think. No, I'm pretty sure. Anyway, this is why you don't try to trick the country into going along with something by using members of foreign governments, they usually try to renege on the deal to do better for themselves like Santa Anna rallying his country. You'd think he'd be in such awe of the power of America he wouldn't dare cross it. Go figure.
Pg. 55: Phrenology and blacks "fading away" as a race. First off, let me say I've always found phrenology hilarious. That respectable (although an argument could be made that by believing in this they could hardly be so) scientists believed that measuring the skull and interpreting the bumps led to insights into character. Not exactly an exact science, like astrology. Second, the idea that a race could fade away just by wishing or deciding it would happen is ludicrous. Look at the Native Americans, they tried pretty hard to wipe them out and it didn't work then either. Nor should it. Diversity is good. Like Stephanson said earlier on in the book, a multitude of groups prevents one from taking over and keeps people on their toes.
Pg. 65: Civil War revitalizing confidence in the American mission. In my American Philosophy class we discussed how James, Peirce, and Dewey (nicely mentioned on pg. 83) likened America to an experiment, with the Civil War proving that America was nice and strong idea-wise, it just got shaken up a bit by the whole slavery/North-South debacle. Since none of them were really gung-ho on religion, though they accepted it, we didn't talk about the religious context but it certainly makes sense for Northern ministers to spin the war as a divine thing and those pesky Southerners were trying to ruin the chosen land. If a war's not about religion in the first place, it'll certainly come in as being on our side and not their's, no matter the side.
Pg. 82: Social-Darwinism and how it's not really Darwinian. True. Darwin was hardly the first evolutionary theorist (and I should know, this philosophy class had us research ideas prior to Darwin to give context to the pragmatists and how evolutionary theory influenced their thinking, turns out it did- a lot) and he sort of cobbled everything together without the whole religion thing that people like Comte de Buffon had to deal with. But Darwin did have the natural selection thing and anything open-ended tends to scare people so Darwin gets the blame. At least we know who he was, the other guys weren't so lucky, or were depending on how you look at it. But who wants to call it Social-Spencerism? The alliteration's a bit much.
Pg. 115-117: Wilson and the League of Nations. I feel sort of bad for Wilson. He put all that effort into the League only to have America let him down and thus let down the rest of the world. Now, if America had been as responsive as Wilson would have liked to the idea would World War 2 still have happened? Good question but most likely. The mistakes made regarding Germany would still have happened, especially since Germany didn't qualify for the League.

Altogether I liked this book and look forward to our discussion on Tuesday. And yes, I was feeling a bit snarky as I wrote this.