Cornell West on "Nihilism"

After reading Cornell West's groundbreaking book, Race Matters, I realized that I still have a lot to learn about race issues in America but also that I have more to learn about myself as a politically conscious human being and American citizen. While I do consider myself to be more informed than a vast majority of Americans, I still fall into the same pitfalls that many liberal thinkers fall into. In the first chapter of this book entitled, "nihilism in black america", West addresses liberal structurists and conservative behaviorists ignorance in regards to nihilism.

I would like to start this post by defing nihilism for those who are unsure of the exact meaning or just plain do not know what it means at all (i was a part of the latter prior to reading the chapter, but thats why i read and why everybody should read). Nihilism, according to dictionary.com

1. total rejection of established laws and institutions.

2. anarchy, terrorism, or other revolutionary activity.

3. total and absolute destructiveness, esp. toward the world at large and including oneself: the power-mad nihilism that marked Hitler's last years.

4. Philosophy.
a. an extreme form of skepticism: the denial of all real existence or the possibility of an objective basis for truth.
b. nothingness or nonexistence.

5. (sometimes initial capital letter) the principles of a Russian revolutionary group, active in the latter half of the 19th century, holding that existing social and political institutions must be destroyed in order to clear the way for a new state of society and employing extreme measures, including terrorism and assassination.

6. annihilation of the self, or the individual consciousness, esp. as an aspect of mystical experience.

Of these I think the most applicable would be early part of 3, both a and b of 4 and 6 to describe what Cornell West is referring to. In fact, West defines it as, "Nihilism is to be understood here not as a philosophical doctrine that there are no rational grounds for legitimate standards or authority; it is, far more, the lived experience of coping with a life of horrifying meaningless, hopelessness, and (most important) lovelessness."

The first thing that struck me about this chapter was that West calls out liberal thinkers. He says that, "They hesitate to talk honestly about culture..." What West means by this is that he believes that liberals are afraid to be honest about the meanings and values of black culture, because they think that this plays right into conservatives hands.

On the other side of the same coin, he talks about conservative behavioralists refusal to admit that there are political and economic structures that hold black people back in life and have since the formation of these United States. His specifically says, "They rarely, if ever, examine the innumerable cases in which black people do act on the Protestant ethic and still remain at the bottom of the social ladder. Instead, they highlight the few instances in which blacks ascend to the top, as if such success is available to all blacks, regardless of circumstances." (21)

This excerpt was especially clear to me because I read it a night after arguing with a former colleague of mine. We were having that really stupid conservative liberal debate and I was trying to explain to him that people in an urban setting, particularly black people have it harder than someone like me maybe does/did. He then said that he came from a single mother family and that he paid for everything and earned everything he got. A) This is, as West says just one example of a success story and B) he had white privilege on his side.

In the remainder of the chapter, West talks about how black people do not walk around looking for white handouts, or "wallowing in self-pity" they have been victimized. He also mentions that many conservatives are simply unwilling to look at history and acknowledge that it still has lingering effects. And he says that this ahitorical viewpoint contributes to right wing justification of cutbacks for poor people struggling for decent housing, child care, health care, and education.

Where I really feel that West is strongest in this chapter is when he says, "Life without meaning, hope and love breeds a coldhearted, mean-spirited outlook that destroys both the individual and others." This is the idea of the nihilistic threat.

Where I disagree with West is that he is a pastor and theoligist and I feel that religion is a major crutch in black america. Because many people have a lack of meaning, hope and love in life, they turn to the belief that heaven will be glorious and they will have eternal life, and I think most rational people know that this is not the case.

Love Is...

This is a track off of Common's cd "Be". In a world of flash in the pan rappers and those who simply rap about trash it is nice to have people like Common, Mos Def, and Talib Kweli. For those of you who are unfamiliar with socially conscious rap, you should consider giving it a chance. My African American History teacher in college suggested Common and it took me a while to actually get a cd of his, but have been obsessed with his music since. While anyone who knows me, knows that I do not share his belief in God, but I respect that he is making valuable music and gives young people someone to look up to, especially young black males. Enjoy the lyrics and check him out if you haven't yet.

Love Is...

How beautiful love can be
On the streets love is hard to see
It's a place I got to be
Loving you is loving me
How beautiful love can be
On the streets love is hard to see
Gotta reach that frequency
Loving you is loving me

Yeah, you know what love is
Even found it on the ground where the thugs live
My man had to dig deep to find his
Couldn't sleep 'cause on the real he had five kids
Live nig's, real niggaz express and taste it
At crap games, black dames and big faces
Cases in court, fam' showin' love and support
You and your baby's mom thought that love was a sport
As men we were taught to hold it in
That's why we don't know how 'til we're older men
If love is a place I'ma go again
At least now, now I know to go within
At time it can take ya for a spin
Heartbreak hotel then you're home again
I've seen love make a nigga soul pretend
Like a story that he don't want to end
Yo

It's all love where we come from
In the hood love we was told to run from
That same hood where the guns sung
We holla love, hopin' it would come one
Crack got so many lives undone
From lack of love many hide some run
I knew this girl with a son who dreamt of actin' in plays
Demonstration with her man had her trapped in a maze
Tryin' to find herself again, much of that she'd have gave
Love can free us, to it some of us react as a slave
Funny, we love 'em more when they're relaxed in a grave
Wonder if a thug is raw, is he actin' afraid?
Everybody loves sun, why do I attract shade?
Heard of the love of money, but compassion it pays
Talk about it with my youth so she'd understand
What it is to be loved by a man
Uh

Some say that I'm a dreamer 'cause I talk about it often
Seen the hardest nigga soften wit' his homie in a coffin
We walk and stand in, fall in it
With the right companion we all in it
Mary sang a song about it, having broad limits
In the game of life, it's the scrimage
Reminiscing on letters I wrote in my small days
A letter to the people, love always
Yeah

bell hooks

I have recently been reading bell hooks work, Outlaw Culture: Resisting Representations. For the first ten chapters I would honestly say that at times it has been tedious. She is a strong black woman that has very serious issues that relate to black feminism or the lack of a black feminist voice in the feminist movement. As a result, she tends to bash white, privileged feminists who are not only closed to dissenting views, but also many steal from black feminists without giving them their proper credit. This being said, I have found a lot of the things that she talks about to not only be very true but also very thought provoking. So, I will present you with the two nuggets that I found very interesting early-on in my reading.

1. "Significantly, I learned that any progressive political movement grows and matures only to the degree that it passionately welcomes and encourages, in theory and practice, diversity of opinion, new ideas, critical exchange and dissent."

What really caught me about this was the portion "in theory and practice". It is and has been throughout the past common practice for Americans to talk the good talk (theory) but never to back up this talk (practice). And hooks mentions this in reference to the feminist movement but also in the civil rights movement. She mentions that it was expected that people within these movements should "support the party line" and not introduce their dissenting ideas.

In the political atmosphere today I think this is especially true. Just four months from now we are all going to be asked to go to the polls and vote for the next president. We have essentially two possible choices (to win). If there was ever a time that the government was telling us that dissent is not going to be tolerated it is in politics. I talk with a friend of mine on a regular basis about how we are unable to vote for someone that actually represents what we want for our country. The reason for this is that there will never be a presidential candidate bold enough to admit that they are an atheist, or an agnostic. That would be committing electoral suicide. Additionally, right now we have a candidate like Barack Obama who is apparently the most liberal candidate ever to run for president. I sure as shit can't tell because he cannot say what he truly feels or again he would be committing electoral suicide. Without the moderate vote in states like Ohio, in the midwest and some of the swing states along the east coast he has no chance of winning. And deep down inside he knows that the far left liberals will fall in line because they all fear another four years of republican politics.

The next excerpt from hooks' book I will just let you think about, because it relates to my life and I imagine most of my friends lives as we are all well to do, for the most part.

"Then, as now, I was findamentally anti-burgeois. To me this does not mean that I do not like beautiful things or desire material well-being. It means that I do not sit around longing to be rich, and that I believe hedonistic materialism to be a central aspect of an imperialist colonialism that perpetuates and maintains white supremacist capitalist patriarchy."

Charles Sykes/The War

Anyways, I think that is how you spell his name. First of all, let me get the positives for Mr. Sykes out of the way quick. One, he is not O' Reilly in the sense that he allows his callers to speak. However rare it is that a liberal (anyone with a dissenting view) call in and talk to him he does allow them to get their point across. Once the person is done sharing their viewpoint he thanks them for their opinion and says goodbye, at which point he then verbally berates them for having a different opinion. Also, he seems to be an honest person. He speaks his mind (even though it often comes off as racist/sexist) he does appear to be genuine when he talks. For example the other day, he was talking about the way girls dress, he said, "so I look at this woman and she is looking real good, but then wait she's 14. I mean we have all done that before, haven't we?" And finally, to end the good things I have to say about Sykes, he has a great radio voice. So now that you know a little about Sykes and how his show is set up I can get to what the topic was for this morning. As many know Summerfest is going on right now, which means that around 100,000 people will make their way to the fair grounds throughout the course of each day for almost 2 weeks. The issue addressed was why a military video game or simulator (set-up by the U.S. Army) was removed from the fair grounds due to complaints about the presence of guns within it.

Conservatives and Sykes, immediately went on the offensive saying that the video game/simulator was simply there to show people a day in the life of a serviceman/woman. When I heard this I could not understand what the problem was. I agreed that there should be no reason to not have this U.S. Army video game thing at Summerfest. So I continued to listen for about the next hour or hour and a half and it was really amazing what some of the callers said. One man said that he could not believe that this army game was banned when there was a place where you could play GTA (Grand Theft Auto), which "condones" the merciless slaughter of innocent citizens and police officers. See this is why it is difficult to listen to conservative talk radio. I am sure that Rockstar Games (the producer of GTA) does not condone killing, let alone the killing of police officers (or the use of cheat codes). Another caller said that it didn't bother him because he was boycotting Summerfest due to minorities. I mean even if you were this racist is that something you would say while you are calling in to a radio program. And of course Sykes helped the guy out by saying irresponsible minorities. The final caller was the one that really bothered me though. She called in saying that her son was back from a tour in Iraq and that he would be going for his second in the near future. She said that it was an insult to him, for people to not be allowed to utilize this game and see what a servivepersons life was like.

What I am about to say would surely get me called unpatriotic by any conservative, so its a good thing no one reads these anyways. I am sick of parents and people using their children, spouse or friends who are serving as a justification for their cause. Do I thank the people who serve in our military for their service, yes I do. However, that does not mean I have to agree with what they are doing. We lost 2792 people to 9/11 and now in response we have lost 4,100 (estimate) people in the War on Iraq not to mention the fact that we have spent 533 billion dollars and counting on this war that was almost entirely unjustified. These same people who use their relative who is serving to justify the war can only see the life of their son/daughter or the people in the army that they are serving with. Well, I would ask those same people to think about the 45 million people without healthcare or those who work two or three jobs to stay off of welfare and keep food on the table for their children. So, it is my opinion that instead of funding a war that has now killed more people than 9/11 maybe we should spend the next 533 billion dollars on people who need help inside this country. And no telling them to get a job at 5.75 an hour is not a sufficient answer.