xmca@weber.ucsd.edu writes:
>I wish I could remember the exact quote from Frederick Douglass, where he
>said "Power concedes nothing without a struggle" The point being that
>this
>is a very unequal class society, with the lower classes being oppressed
>on
>a daily basis in almost every aspect of life. (And those in the middle
>don't have it so good either, at least not psychologically, but they
>mostly
>don't get it) Those who don't see this, in my opinion, are either
>oblivious to reality or just don't care.
it is really is honourable the ways the oppressed are being represented
here in contexts of freedom and responsibility, i must say.
the social apathy that you refer to comes from both ignorance (a refusal
to learn) and
mis- or dis-information systems that function on all levels of societies.
the basic premise of freedom and responsibility is about choice, and while
that is easily misplaced in the teaching contexts you refer to = that
children choose to behave or misbehave - there is also a grain of validity
to the observation, in that we are responsible for our actions, and to
assume that some are responsible and some are not is to deny the
possibility of will in activity.
while i agree that the range of choices can be constrained by systemic
oppressions,
what is worse, in terms of progress or change, is the inability to
recognize the choices that we do make, that as much as one may choose to
be a gangster,
another may choose to leave the neighbourhood. as much as one may choose
to be a teacher, another may choose to drop out of school -
that the institutions responsible for controlling the range of choices
available is
obvious to the theoreticians, it is not always obvious to the people who
in the
situations of having to choose.
are you suggesting there is no such thing as human will? or that only some
have a will, or motivation, and others do not?
how is it that you have an understanding of your freedoms and others can
not? by your argument, there seems to be a relation between income and
freedom,
and i think that's somewhat diminishing to the complexity of the social
relations that influence the kinds of perceptions we create about our own
actions.
what of the children who choose to kill themselves rather than endure an
abusive home or a homophobic society?
in these cases, choices are also constrained to kinds of desperate
polarities - the question is not whether or not they have a choice, but
how to
produce a social responsibility that implicates us ALL in the choices that
people make.
diane. clearly spitting into the wind, but spitting anyhow.
**********************************************************************
:point where everything listens.
and i slow down, learning how to
enter - implicate and unspoken (still) heart-of-the-world.
(Daphne Marlatt, "Coming to you")
***********************************************************************
diane celia hodges
university of british columbia, centre for the study of curriculum and
instruction
==================== ==================== =======================
university of colorado, denver, school of education
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