Kennedy's Korner

Helllllooooo readers, today we went over some Judith Butler, and anytime I read any piece of philosophical writing it really wakes up my mind. It allows me to view problems in ways I haven’t before, and forces me open up my mind to the potential “Real Truths” of the world.

Now I took a lot away from the Butler excerpt that we read, not necessarily a lot of answers (which philosophy has never really given me) but a lot of questions; the main one being, “what does it mean to be human?” Which then in turn makes me wonder “who am I”, “ho are we” and a whole plethora of questions. Butler really opened pandora’s box for me.

I think in this blog post i’m going to try and answer some of those questions. Now this isn’t the “correct” answer, as I’m not sure there is one, but it is what it means to me, as of now, on this Tuesday afternoon. What does it mean to be human? Now theres a big question, your interpretation of this really is a foundation for how you conduct yourself in life.(Whether as an individual, or a country) The area in Butler’s reading that made me consider this question was, “Why the ego? After all, if my survivability depends on a relation to others, to a “you” or a set of “yous” without whom I cannot exist, then my existence is not mine alone, but is to be found outside myself, in this set of relations that precede and exceed the boundaries of who I am.” (44) Now, I’m sure my interpretation of this is up for debate (as it is just an interpretation), but what it means to me was that without everybody else around me, there is no me. That without the other “yous” in the world there is no “I” and that really resonated with me. Butler made it clear to me that humans are only human because of others, and I like to think of it (in political science terms) kind of like the nation-state, vs a globalized world. I think that our current predicament is that we view “each other”, or (maybe how Butler would put it) “ourselves” as our own particular country, and sometimes even less than that. Sort of a me vs the world. That limits our view on who we view as human and who’s lives we deem valuable. Because we can so easily view other countries’ civilians, or even people who just look different than us, as not us (maybe subhuman) that allows us to justify the horrible atrocities that we would typically consider unjustifiable. So what that little excerpt from Butler meant to me was that humanity transcends the nation-state and really we are all one. Just because somebody comes from another place than me, or looks different from me, or even fights against me, does not take away their inalienable right to be considered human. So I think my views would tend to align with what I think Butler is articulating.

As the Declaration of Independance says, “all men are created equal”, to me, that means that, well, at the end of the day everybody is equal, and sometimes it just makes me think about the hypocrisy of the United States government and the people of the United States who believe so vehemently that the constitution is a doctrine that should be treated as the absolute truth, and will defend the 2nd amendment (the right to bear arms) with all their hearts, yet have such a skewed view on what it means to be human. Now I can understand some of the actions committed by the government, and maybe even some of the narrow minded beliefs that some of my fellow Americans hold. The world we live in is scary, but only because of the view that we have of “me vs. the world”. Its that dangerous cyclical style of thought that perpetuates the wars that humanity constantly seems to find themselves in. To break that cycle (I believe) takes some serious thought on the part of every “individual” out there. Not just the United States. I believe that we can and are changing this cycle of war, maybe not tomorrow, but one day sooner than some would like us to think. Theres hope, I hope. Wow, this got a bit preachy, but welcome to my mind readers. Thank you for reading this little glimpse into the deep dark “Korner” that is my mind. Also, don’t think i’m crazy, cause I’m not, i think. Hopefully you’ll come back next week, I promise i’ll be less preachy :). Until then.

-Kennedy

Hey Bloggers! Oh how I’ve missed you. I know you’ve been wondering, and yes, my break was awesome, and yes, I could’ve stayed home for about three weeks longer; but honestly, coming back here isn’t as bad as people make it out to be. Don’t look now, but I think I may enjoy being here. Haha. It’s nice to be back in the swing of things, and I was riding my high horse and happy on life, then I started reading Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, by Jonathan Foer. That happiness quickly turned into sadness. Deep. Deeeep sadness. None the less it was easily one of the best books I’ve ever read. I felt connected to the story in ways that I didn’t think I could. Not having experienced the loss that Oskar has I didn’t think I’d be able to relate, but I consistently found myself tearing up. All in all this is an amazing book and an amazing story.

Our class spent some time reading Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close and it’s a bit of a complicated read if you don’t know what going on. There’s a lot think about when reading this book and when I looked over some of our class’ bloggers a lot of the different themes in the book are illuminated. We talked a bit in class about how this book may be an example of American exceptionalism. I have to say, when reading Erin’s blog, I found myself agreeing. She writes, “Regardless of whether this American exceptionalism is accurate or verifiable, I don’t believe that this novel deals with this topic.” I also found that 9/11, while a big part of the story, isn’t there to show how because a tragedy happened in America is it different, but is instead used because there aren’t many tragedies as highly publicized and understood as 9/11 and Foer uses that tragedy to help the reader better understand Oskar and his family’s plight.

Erin’s blog made me think to myself that really any tragedy could’ve been used in place of 9/11, as long as the reader understood it. Then Ryan’s blog challenged that notion bringing up how Foer uses Dresden as a tragedy that the Grandfather had to live through. Ryan’s blog made me consider the parallels between the trauma’s experienced by Thomas Sr. and Oskar. Both lost loved ones, and really, both tried to cope with those lost ones in very desperate, but different ways. Oskar with his adventure the NYC and Thomas with trying to recreate Anna, his lost lover, with Oskar’s grandmother. We see how different people process these horrific events, and how they try to cope with the loss of loved ones.

In Isaiah’s blog we get to hear about the different methods that people use to cope, “Whether it be coping through silence or by desperately trying to search for closure on a journey that has no finish line”. The line, “no finish line” really rang true to me. Coping after all is dealing with whatever tragedy you have before you. It’s about understanding that there is a new reality and that’s difficult to do. I think that’s why the book was so tragic for me to read, because I, so much like Oskar, wanted there to be a finish line, and wanted to know that tomorrow everything would be back to normal. I think though that the book ends perfectly. It ends perfectly in the sense that coping isn’t necessarily happy or a big weight off your shoulders, it just is. I think the consensus when finishing this book was that of un-satisfaction, not that the book wasn’t a great read or fantastically written, but that there wasn’t this fairy tale ending that I’ve grown so accustomed to.  

Well that’ll about do it for me, honestly this was a bit more difficult to write than I thought it’d be but boy is it good to be back. There’s so many layers to this book and so many different themes that we can dissect and will dissect. It’s good to talk to you all again, and it’s been nice to read everybody’s blogs. Until I write to you again.

Kennedy