On the Verge of Moral Collapse

Out of curiosity, the other day I googled "Glenn Beck fallacies of argument." Few, I am sure, would be surprised by the pages and pages and pages and pages...I retrieved, all of which contained exact matches to the above phrasing along with some quite funny commentaries and analyses. So what?

Well, in a now canonical essay, “Practicing the Arts of Rhetoric: Tradition and Invention,” Thomas Farrell wrote:

Rhetoric is held in the lowest regard when it is identified solely with the product domain: sham enthymemes, slippery slogans, fele-good sound-bites. It is not until we think of the two-sided argument, the running controversy, the ritual that becomes crisis: in other words, not until we admit the liminal elements of struggle, difference and thus reflective judgment that rhetoric itself is redeemed.

After viewing Lewis Black’s lambast of Glenn Beck on The Daily Show a couple weeks back (May 12), Farrell’s sentiments began to percolate a bit and I was moved to consider Beck’s rhetorical style, his respect for rhetorical history, his “inventional” (yes, I use this sarcastically and satirically) methods. It is not news to consider that, as Black indicates, much of our media culture (from news programs themselves to their parodical counterparts) is permeated with exaggerated and overstated accounts of daily happenings. Glenn Beck, too, admits to being a tad hyperbolic, but we can surely discern this without his admission. Consider his frequent equation of political self-interest and democratic patriotism; his likening of gay marriage to bestiality, his invocations of an illusory, near-utopian Founding Period defined by political harmony that was ostensibly bastardized by contemporary politics; his comparison of ACORN to slave-owners; his claim of Obama’s hatred of white people; his condemnation of Justice Sotomayer as a racist; his constant joke about killing both internal and external enemies (from Michael Moore and Nancy Pelosi to muslims); and, of course, his liberal usage of Nazi colloquialisms (or what Black calls his “Nazi tourettes”) and paraphernalia on his show. So what?

Without even illustrating Beck’s lines of thought or his syllogistic reasoning, one can pick out much of the fallaciousness, even the purposively deceptive nature, of his rhetoric. Beck himself has jibed about the pull of his inner demons and his trajectory toward “moral collapse.” Indeed, he seems to thrive upon misleading tactics in order to at once absolve himself of his own misgivings and to drive home the absurdity of contemporary politics that, he claims, calls itself out…and, to some extent, I would have to agree—provisionally.

Yes, Beck himself, but the media more broadly, have increasingly tended more and more toward a sort of rhetorical reductionism. That is, much of our accessible political discourse orients not toward understanding the complexities but rather to simplifying politics to “sham enthymemes, slippery slogans….” The result is a narrow and too often bifurcated depiction of political choice and ideological allegiance, which necessarily leads to arguments of right and wrong (or in Beck’s case, left), good and evil, true and false…really, one may insert his or her binary here. It also leads me to be wary of such rhetorics moving from controversy (sometimes, just for its own sake) to crisis.

The problem I see has much to do with Barry Brummett’s caution about certain trends in both researching and exercising a postmodern rhetoric—namely, that reduction (or what he calls “the simplification of phenomena and the context in which they are observed”) is necessarily the attempt to mechanize, and hence control, an individual’s or group’s experience of only certain parts of a much larger whole. Thus, Beck’s program (as much as Jon Stewart’s, Stephen Colbert’s, Fox News’, CNN’s, MSNBC’s,….) appears as a well crafted rhetoric of reductionism that too often attempts to simplify and narrow the frames within which we make sense of our social and political worlds. So while I agree with Jon Stewart when he quips that Beck “says what people who aren’t thinking are thinking,” I have trouble believing that any diametric opposition is the simple solution to the problem. This is especially the case if we consider that people tend to tune in to only what they agree with and switch off (or more bluntly, silence) those voices that present a different point of view.

No doubt, Black’s lambast is hilarious, and necessary. But we must be careful not to let even humor collapse into a disavowal of the seriousness of even play. Furthermore, I think we could all deal with a questioning of our social and political faiths much more than just time to time—and this, not to live utterly foundationless and thus in a perpetual state of doubt, but rather to remind ourselves of Kenneth Burke’s astute observation: that people reason perfectly well within their own frame of reference; the key is to widen the frame.

Cooling Off (...if you can't swim it is difficult to find a place to bathe)

For those who do not recognize, the parenthetical statement accompanying the title of this post references a line in Roald Dahl’s short story, “Papa and Mama,” which appears in his book, Boy: Tales of Childhood.

Now to the crux of the post….

Take a course in good water and air; and in the eternal youth of Nature you may renew your own. Go quietly, alone; no harm will befall you.

—John Muir

Perhaps it is my sometimes-cynical outlook that goads a gloomy sense of humor, but when I saw this photo I thought two things: (1) these children are swimming in oil and (2) my gosh, how much of the Louisiana coastline has been affected by the leak from the sunken oil rig (a question that has been answer in appalling ways in the last week) and who did not inform these unwitting children that there had been a spill?

I was, of course, relieved to find that the children were not swimming in oil, but no less disconcerted to learn that they were bathing in toxic water—the one keeping his mouth tightly shut so as not to inhale it as it bubbles about him, the other looking on as the stifling sun shines upon his sullied body. For them, dirty water is normal, even mundane. For us, a polluted coast is as aberrant as it is blameworthy. Both, however, are justifiable in giving us reason to pause. The following two political cartoons give us a comic frame through which to do this.

Indeed, the sad truth is that polluted bodies of water are not altogether uncommon in many parts of the world, but particularly here in the Hindon River in Ghaziabad, India, which—as a report by the Janhit Foundation, entitled “Hindon River: Gasping for Breath,” shows—is as much a catchment for the Uttar Pradesh region’s water supply as it is a reservoir of toxins from the refuse of various mills and chemical industries (not to mention the runoff from agricultural pesticides). And the ironies of such a picture emerging on April 20 I am sure are not lost on many: two days before Earth Day, two days before the oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico sank (yes, on Earth Day) and which has now been leaking massive amounts of oil into the ocean for over a month, four days before Senator Lindsey Graham would decide to abandon previously planned talks on climate change legislation and nearly three weeks after President Obama decided to open offshore drilling areas along the Atlantic coastline and in the Gulf of Mexico (which he has just recently reconsidered in light of recent events). The further irony is that, forty years after the very first celebration of Earth Day, America seems to have made as many small steps forward as we have serious strides back.

That is, this photograph and the attendant comics reinforces our own deleterious dependence on oil alongside our all-too-often “so it goes” attitude (which is a perversion of Kurt Vonnegut’s usage, by the way), while depicting a scene that could easily be found in a never-written Vonnegut tale in which oil might have become as abundant as water and, oh, how the Western world rejoiced. What this photograph and these commentaries also reinforce, though, is that both environmental activism and the socio-political exigencies entailing everything from global warming to the creation of renewable energy sources to the acquisition of clean drinking water are no longer local, state or even national issues (and arguably have not been for a long time now). Indeed, the vast and varied social, political, economic, and environmental issues plaguing our world at present are issues that will only continue to impact more and more populations around the globe, and will only continue to exacerbate as we rely on complacency in lifestyles as much as we purport to promote change.

To be sure, some have gone so far as to cite the recent earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and deadly tornadoes as evidence that Mother Nature has had enough. No doubt, if I was Gaia, I would be just as ready to unleash my seismic discontent, to spit fire and retaliate with (other)worldly tumult. Yet this hardly mitigates the real, pressing earthly troubles we face, and does little more to change the fact that for too long our relationship with our natural world has been unclean. Perhaps the real irony, then, is that about which Vonnegut did write shortly before his death in a poem entitled “Requiem,” a snippet of which encapsulates the entire sentiment of the poem and reads like an apology for humankind:

that we know what

we are doing

Indeed, as Paul Wapner pronounces in his new book Living Through the End of Nature: The Future of American Environmentalism, we are well beyond protecting the natural world from the ways of humans. The challenge, then, is to work ever harder in a “postnature age” (first dubbed by Bill McKibben in The End of Nature) to establish and maintain an ecological balance, not between humankind and nature, but between the natural world and humankind’s unending quest to attain mastery over it—and perhaps we could begin with a recognition of the relationship of our lives to nature as what Michael Taussig might dub a “mastery of nonmastery.” The fact of the matter is, though, that when the language of activism does not lead to action (and, truly, what we need is progressive legislation and committed resources toward sweeping policy change), the words remain mere words.

There is much talk and much joking about who will “pay” for the clean-up of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. I think it should be painfully clear by now that we all end up paying, just not necessarily out of our wallets. So until wide-ranging change—and really, action—occurs, however, many of us will enact small modes of activism in our everyday purchases and practices, and others still will whisper in protest about political inaction; and all the while the children of Ghaziabad will continue to “cool off” (amidst 107 degree heat), the globe will continue to warm up, and more and more we will find that the effects of our environmental degradation creeping closer and closer to home. What is more, we just might have to come to terms with the fact that, if none of us can find a clean place to breath, it will be difficult for any of us to either swim or bathe or…. Either way, it will take more than a magical act of either science or smarts to reverse much of the damage we are doing to our Earthly home. Kidding aside, though, is anyone any good at magic? (Check out this article from The Atlantic for a touch of seriousness to be dashed upon this dish of play)

Photo Credits: Parivartan Sharma/AP; Michael Rodriguez; Universal Press Syndicate.

Comfortable Illusion

If we choose, we can live in a world of comforting illusion. —Noam Chomsky

Appearing on the "front page" of the May 10, 2010 issue of satirical newspaper, The Onion, was the following story: "Exhausted Noam Chomsky Just Going To Try And Enjoy The Day For Once" (read the article here). And here he sits....

At first glance, you might be thinking that he is imitating Congress: arms folded, silent, a look of utter disdain toward whatever it is that transfixes his gaze. Nay. On the contrary, the man is depicted searching (and searching hard) for some momentary tranquility.

The idea of Noam Chomsky coupled with the notion of a willing intellectual moratorium is oxymoronic indeed. And I have to admit that, when I saw Chomsky’s photo beneath the headline, part of me anticipated a lampooning about the pejorative S-word (sociali—I won’t say it) that has been thrown around in the popular media as of late, what with Obama’s health care plan, the ailing economy, and especially Chomsky’s longstanding advocacy of voluntary sociali—. The media, however, will need to tire of that one before Chomsky ever does. That, and they are certainly more occupied with the oil spill as of late.

My first encounter with Chomsky’s work came in my undergraduate years in a class on advertising and socio-political communication in the never-flagging mass media. While I did not (and still don’t) fully ascribe to many of his seemingly fatalistic views about power relations and their effects on citizen-subjects (and the individual’s apparent lack of agency against corporate/state manipulation), I was and since have been impressed by the force of his public intellectualism. To be sure, regardless of whether or not one agrees with his or any public intellectual’s views, it is difficult to overstate the importance of such criticism in the popular discourse. So when I finished laughing at the thought of Chomsky calling it quits—even for just a day—I had a slight sense of disappointment coupled with an internal monologue that consisted of another, far less tainted S-word.

After all, many of us are still saddened by the recent loss of Howard Zinn; and, let’s face it, figures like Chomsky are not getting any younger, so one wonders who will be in the next class of public intellectuals (there was recently published a "Top 100" list that contains some noteables and some promising hopefuls). Political dissidents or not, public intellectuals serve a vital function in tempering everyday discourse—especially today’s, which is “filtered” by huge conglomerates, centralized and oftentimes uni-vocal news outlets, political agenda-setters, and capitalist motives. Yet public intellectualism has a long history, stretching from Socrates through Dante to Emerson to more recent figures like Edward Said, Cornel West, Judith Butler, etc., all of whom have confronted real, pressing problems in everyday life.

The paradox, of course, is that Chomsky himself is somewhat of an anti-intellectual. That is, he has long been critical of esoteric, unintelligible philosophy that makes it even more difficult to look outside of an existing hegemonic structure that already has enough safeguards of its power built within. There are resonances of Gramsci here, who did not think counter-hegemonic discourses could emerge from either “traditional” or “organic” intellectuals, but rather intellectuals of/for the working class. What is more, as Chomsky would attest, there is a fine line between deception and self-deception.

Hence why Chomsky argues that neither science nor philosophy (either a critique thereof or a reliance upon) is not enough to break through the “institutional racism,” “colonialist ideologies,” or “state-sanctioned propaganda.” As he said in a recent interview: “Advocacy requires more than just a proposal.” I could give you an example (to borrow one of Chomsky’s favorite phrases), but I am limited here by space and time. But I will propose that we follow Chomsky’s lead, even how it is portrayed in the Onion article: to be ever-cognizant of the power of human language to impact how we behave, how we organize, what we believe, what motivates us. Further, that part of the challenge of the twenty-first century has to be finding ways to accept divisions humanely, and then to look for solutions beyond the presumption that all problems are first and foremost economic (or what Chomsky would call "state-capitalist"). That Chomsky is a relentless critic is no doubt important. Yet even he could use a break, as there certainly is more to life than seeking out examples of human turpitude. I think, however, that we would all do well to err more often on the side of active and human criticism, even self-criticism, as we balance our political and personal lives. After all, the two are not nearly as distinct as we might think, which is indicated by the anti-intellectual himself, Chomsky, who cannot truly break away. Still, it is quite productive to, from time to time, step back and laugh at the moments in which we take ourselves too seriously.

As Oscar Wilde put it: “Life is far too important to be taken seriously.” Perhaps this is sentiment is more on the way to life understood as the comfortable illusion....

For a more "serious" account of but one of Chomsky's recent exploits, though, see the following article on Chomsky being denied entry into Israel. As disappointing as it is, we must find a way to realize that at least one response is laughter.

Photo credit: The Onion.

Tipping Point

This blog finds its inception amidst turbulent times, so I find it a propos that a "critical angle" be my starting point....

This blog finds its inception amidst turbulent times, so I find it a propos that a "critical angle" be my starting point....

For too long, it seems, we have knowingly lied to ourselves about the genuine potential (and, truly, the increasing immanence) of either an environmental or human-made catastrophe. What is more, it is a glaring characteristic of our culture to put problems off—to wait until political interests align correctly with economic interests, economic interests with scientific interests,…. All the while, we have seen in less than a year’s time a combination of natural disasters (choose your earthquake) and human-made calamities (avoid seafood from the Gulf of Mexico). So whether or not one believes in the veracity of global warming (straight script cannot capture the irony in this statement) or the legitimate threat of widespread nuclear proliferation, one certainly does not suffer from a dearth of indicators that we are nearing a wide array of social, political, economic and environmental tipping points. Now, I am not an alarmist, but I think I would have to live by bluff to be unaware of their prominence.

Broadly, a tipping point is a displacement of equilibrium. It is a concept that has been around for quite some time, and we recognize it both for its roots in physics and its expression as a colloquialism in times of turmoil or utter frustration. Malcolm Gladwell, in his recent book The Tipping Point, perhaps cemented it as a sociological term and identified it as a critical moment at which fundamental changes occur in human relations. On the human-to-human level, such changes can come in the form of conflict or concord. On the human-to-world level, they can manifest as anything from climate change to the extinction of species. The one is reversible; the other is, in many cases, not.

In September 2009, artist and satirist Ralph Steadman wrote a letter to the magazine, Architecture Week. In it he echoes a sentiment that was sounded off in an article in The Onion that appeared just after the 9/11 attacks: that we are long overdue to renew and reciprocate a sweeping recognition of one another’s humanity—and this whether or not one has divine faith. The call comes after the construction of a shopping mall in Maidstone, U.K., which stands as a metonymic monument for a “world [that] is riven with strife and decimation caused by religious bigotry, including political extremism, ideological cant and economic domination, specifically Capitalism, which in itself is the fervent religion worshipped with far more zeal than most other religions put together.” Steadman’s solution, of course, would be to build in its place a new kind of mall—a “Cathedragogue,” which would provide “new and varied ‘pick n mix’ spiritual values” that, rather than foster a univocal and unidirectional vision of earthly progress or transcendental good, would “engender harmony and understanding as a genuine attempt to sow the seeds of a new perception of how our world can learn to live in Peace.” Here is the mockup:

An idealistic vision and “gargantuan task,” indeed, but perhaps just what is needed alongside “swift, radical and creative action” toward salvaging not only our collective humanity but also the very eco-systems in which it subsists. This is, after all, what the U.N. has recently called for in yet another report which delivers the “bad news” that our earthly existence is nearing a tipping point. Consider:

In the photo we see a deceptively tranquil image. Yet what appears lush and green (Trees? Money?) at the surface is countered by a barren array of coral (Health. Wealth.) beneath. The green, of course, is often all that shows up on the front page, on an accountant’s ledger....

And so—once again—we are reminded of our confrontation with the ultimate irony: that the very same technological prowess that serves to "save" us and support our subsistence could eventually kill us. Environmental degradation by way of rampant industrialization, worldwide climate catastrophe in the wake of global warming, nuclear winter following the detonation of an atomic bomb—we might quip: “Take your pick.” Of course, we might do well to consider drawing up our own plans for a better reality than the one in which we currently live. For a revaluation of our own goals as a species seems as necessary as it is within the realm of possibility, and regaining/maintaining balance is always easier before something or someone begins to tip. The fact remains, however, that neither “God” nor political/economic/scientific quibbling can any longer be the scapegoat for inertia.

Note: If you would like a fantastic, satirical take on the issue, check out this article from The Onion.

Image Credits: “Cathedragogue,” appears on Ralphsteadman.com; Getty Images.

It Begins With Perspective

How to begin? A recollection of John Lennon’s quip, “sometimes I play the fool,” along with an imagined dialogue between two unnamed social actors about The Beatles’ song, “The Fool on the Hill”….

1: “It’s not about the fool on the hill.”

2: “Oh, but it is.”

1: “It’s not. It’s about the fools below, the fools beyond, who don’t want to listen, don’t want to see.”

2: “…and yet it’s the fool who listens, who sees, who speaks.”

1: “So?”

2: “So can’t it be about both…?”

The notion of “playing the fool” is not new. Indeed, it has deep folkloric (and, I would argue, rhetorical) roots, perhaps most typified in the figure of the trickster. Hermes—the deified messenger of the Greek gods—is an archetype of such a figure, but his heirs span the breadth of oratorical and literary histories, from the shape-shifter Loki, to the divine mediator of Yoruba Mythology Esu-Elegbara, to the mythos of the cunning fox, to the Shakespearian fool, and, certainly, to the fool on the hill. (Some have even cited Aang of Avatar as a most contemporary trickster.)

Yet far from perpetuating mere tricks, idle jokes or showy displays of wit, a trickster deliberately plays with social and political conventions in order to both expose and interpret a situation, to perform (i.e. rhetorically, dramaturgically, pictorially, etc.) while performing a critique, and thus to proffer alternative perspectives to what is otherwise provided. So while a fool might very well be one who lacks good judgment or sense, one who fools often times embodies what Mikhail Bakhtin dubs “intelligent deception,” a skill for the art (techne) of toying with “official” discourse in order to perturb the uncritical and challenge the norm. Consider, for example, William Hogarth’s piece, “Satire on False Perspective,” the epigraph of which alone (which reads: “Whoever makes design without the knowledge of perspective will be liable to such absurdities as are shewn [sic] in this frontispiece”) speaks to the importance of gaining, evaluating, and challenging particular perspectives.

As such, that which performs a rhetorical trick—be it oral, written, visual, etc.—might be said to “fool” by way of critique. The forms in which it appears are many: humor, comedy, irony, parody, satire, chiasmus, burlesque, punning, buffoonery, paraprosdokian, witticism, joke, lampoon, spoof, and the list could go on. However, as I see it, it is not necessarily a solely humorous enterprise. It also does not necessarily need to be foolish in order to fool the prevailing discourse, to perform a judgment. Though my point of entry is oftentimes humor, the critical enterprise is much in line with Kenneth Burke’s understanding of “comic criticism” within a “comic frame” amidst the drama of human relations. That is, it is observation inward as much as it is observation outward, admonitory as much as it is diagnostic, and hopefully charitable however hopelessly tragic is its vision. Comic critique can be comic, therefore, without being funny.

It is from this standpoint that I attempt to engage the play in politics as well as the politics in play. After all, if politics itself is indeed a “theater” as Mikhail Bakhtin, Harold Pinter, and others have suggested, it is as much a game to be played as it is a drama to be (en)acted. That it is no less serious stuff is likewise taken as a given. Nevertheless, as Oscar Wilde once quipped, “seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow,” and our own present state of democracy (along with humankind’s broader and current place in the world) is far too deep—that is profound, severe, rich, and yet also saturnine, almost unfathomable—to be without a comic praxis that is complemented by serious social and political action. I therefore see a productive act of fooling, a comic critique (funny or not), as serving a fundamentally (incoming double entendre) critical political function. What follows in this blog will seek to be an equally critical engagement with examples in like kind and an exercise of criticism itself with the end goal of widening frames of reference.

So with this, the first post, I welcome you to Fooling the Play and thank you in advance for your interest.

Image Credit: Appalachian State University, Psychology 3203: Perception, Spring 2010 Online Syllabus