The Moynihan Report Blamed Black Matriarchy in Part for "...

In essence, the Negro community has been forced into a matriarchal structure which, because it is to [sic] out of line with the rest of the American society, seriously retards the progress of the group as a whole, and imposes a crushing burden on the Negro male and, in consequence, on a great many Negro women as well. There is, presumably, no special reason why a society in which males are dominant in family relationships is to be preferred to a matriarchal arrangement. However, it is clearl...

 The Moynihan Report Characterizes Black Culture as Commun...

Doro is an ideal consumer who is both part of a “race,” “nation,” or “empire” (those terms being as confused and intertwined for Doro as they were for Burroughs) and its predator. This depiction of Doro highlights the ways in which a hyper-extended consumerism and an exceptionalist definition of nation both necessarily bring with them a permanent underclass—without which the empire would collapse—both feeding and being destroyed by those in the dominant position, and who thems...

 The System of Oppression is Still in Place at the End of ...

o, directly opposing Rebekah Simpkins’ assertion that “By removing the control, Neo sets the prisoners free,” the first film ends with those controls still in place.45 At the end of The Matrix, after all, Neo does not awaken everyone to “the real,” but instead exploits the continued functioning of the Matrix, leaving the illusion intact so that he can fly. As Žižek writes, “all these ‘miracles’ are possible only if we remain WITHIN the VR sustained by the Matrix …: our ‘...

 SF Fantasies are in a Mutually Complicating Relationship ...

This general paradigm is offered as a theoretical ground for the specific focus and readings of the rest of this book, which analyses in detail the issues of gender, race, and their representation in American SF. For, while the “cognitive” element of SF may not hold in all or even most cases, still SF, as a specular mode, reminds us that its fantasies are in a mutually complicating relationship with material reality. The categories of gender and race, their mutable histories, and the meta...

 Race in Tolkien is Reality Rather Than Socially Constructed

In Middle Earth, unlike reality, race is objectively real rather than socially constructed. There are species (elves, men, dwarves, etc.), but within those species there are races that conform to 19th-century race theory, in that their physical attributes (hair color, etc.) are associated with non-physical attributes that are both personal and cultural. There is also an explicit racial hierarchy which is, again, real in the world of the story. Middle Earth is literally a racist’s fantasy la...

 How to Prevent Others from Making You Angry

Peace doesn't come by stiffening against life, but by realizing there's no one to stiffen. The waves rise and fall and the ocean never minds. In the same way, anger, irritation, frustration, they come and go, but they are not you. To be unbothered is not to build a wall around yourself, but to see that there was never a separate self to defend in the first place. You see, when something happens, a disrespecting word, a sudden disappointment, a rude interruption, there's a tiny instant before ...

 Locke's Philosophical Criticism Destroyed the Institution...

We must note two aspects of Locke’s method of analysis. One is that it was primarily a method of criticism, a method which by means of analysis subjected to critical scrutiny the many complex ideas which prevail in a society, and which because of their abstruse nature, cause confusion and misunderstanding. Locke proposed that all such ideas be analyzed into their simple components and examined critically so that the degree of their validity might be determined. The other aspect for us to no...

 Chess VS Go

The philosophy behind chess is to win decisively. For the winner, victory is absolute, as is defeat for the loser. In chess, both players have the same clear and overriding objective―capturing the opposing king―and accomplish this objective by decimating whatever opposing forces are standing in the way. In go, total victory usually happens between two mismatched players. That kind of victory, as Sun Tzu puts it, is not the pinnacle of excellence. In a go game between two well-matched play...

 The Three Crises in Western Education

America is, in fact, the leading case in point of what may be thought of as the third great crisis in Western education. The first occurred in the fifth century H.C., when Athens underwent a change from an oral culture to an alphabet-writing culture. To understand what this meant, we must read Plato. The second occurred in the sixteenth century, when Europe underwent a radical transformation as a result of the printing press. To understand what this meant, we must read John Locke. The third i...