Tag: government

Politics is Visceral? (always has been) | A response to Tsakiris’ Aeon Article

September 21, 2020

“[…] Next red-flag is Tsakiris claim that how political language “has become saturated with emotion” (paragraph 2) ( (do we really need to reference history to show that even the claiming of this being a new claim is nothing new?), is “hard to square with Aristotle’s claim that human beings are ‘naturally rational’ creatures – ‘political animals’”. Tsakiris never really expands upon this point or looks into whether such a basic understanding of Aristotle is missing nuance that perhaps he would have gone into, and follows after implying Aristotle is wrong, that politics is about organising life for its own sake. But of course, we are doing it wrong says the psychologist naive as a first year political science student- and Tsakiris has the amazing solution which no one has thought of before!” Politics is visceral! … More Politics is Visceral? (always has been) | A response to Tsakiris’ Aeon Article

What does people’s refusal to wear face-masks during a pandemic tell us about the possibility of Kant’s self-governing humans?

June 28, 2020

“In early 2020, the covid-19 pandemic was declared and national governments around the world put in place various levels of restriction […] reduce close-contact with each other so as to reduce transmission of the virus. […]

Does the refusal of so many to follow what seems to so many others as rational rules which benefit us all individually and collectively then disprove the Kantian hope of self-governance? Does Foucault accidentally provide the state with an argument for more disciplinary power, given new evidence of people’s apparent inability to follow their rational self-interest? … More What does people’s refusal to wear face-masks during a pandemic tell us about the possibility of Kant’s self-governing humans?

Perspectives on American Culture: Stigma of Government Assistance | Guest Article by Dylan Yoki

April 10, 2020

“While people who live on government assistance programs are vilified and looked down on, the wealthy who have benefited from corporate welfare are celebrated to the point of cult-like worship. Despite the similar fashion that people on government assistance programs and the wealthy owners of corporations receive government subsidies, the extreme contrast with how the two groups are viewed by society as a whole reflects the extreme contrast in power to control public opinion.” … More Perspectives on American Culture: Stigma of Government Assistance | Guest Article by Dylan Yoki

Macbeth Had a Cleft Habitus, Sometimes Propaganda is Moral, and Social Mobility is Like Killing the King

October 19, 2018

“Macbeth teaches its audience a moral lesson beyond killing is wrong, since it is unquestioningly alright to kill your fellow man at war, nor even regicide is wrong as King Macbeth is justly slain at the end (no spoiler alerts on a four centuries old play), but that it is wrong to disturb the social order. […]

Perhaps Bernays’ concept of propaganda is too broad? Can we consider, for example, Aesop’s fables as propaganda? […]

t is also difficult to examine how much luck was involved in creating my situation because, like Bourdieu who first theorised about habitus, my class mobility is an exception to the rule about how our inherited capitals, our origins, determine our destinations. […]

At what point does doing what modern society requires of one to get ahead, perhaps abandoning the class interests as a whole yet still working towards more justice and opportunities for those like myself that want to move up, equate to killing the king?” … More Macbeth Had a Cleft Habitus, Sometimes Propaganda is Moral, and Social Mobility is Like Killing the King

The indignity of service work | My experiences as a fast-food worker | Part 2

June 14, 2017

“In an article comparing Antonio Gramsci’s ideas about domination being based on a somewhat consensual hegemonic order with Pierre Bourdieu’s ideas about domination being partly resultant from a misrecognition of social domination by the dominated, Michael Burawoy talks about his experiences working on a factory shop floor. Burawoy talks about the types of concessions given by management to the workers in order to legitimise and make more consensual their relationship, which is analogous Burawoy and others like Gramsci could claim, to the class relationship in broader society, between capitalists and proletarians. One of the sources of consent-making identified by Burawoy was the consititution of work as a game.” … More The indignity of service work | My experiences as a fast-food worker | Part 2

Terrorism, Government & Hypocrisy | Guest Article by writer Dylan Yoki

January 7, 2016

“The “War on Terror” has only served to create more terrorists. With this endless supply of enemies to combat and a civilian population ever fearful of the next terrorist attack, Western governments have curtailed civil liberties in the name of “national security”.” … More Terrorism, Government & Hypocrisy | Guest Article by writer Dylan Yoki