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Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Royal baby...
In the face of this, do I really give a rat's ass about the birth of a royal baby?
While the world was awaiting the royal baby, 15 babies were born at a single Syrian refugee camp. Zaatari camp in Jordan was built to hold 60,000. It currently shelters 160,000. Little Prince George Alexander Louis will grow up in a palace; these kids start out homeless, in a tent in a refugee camp, while the grownups try to figure out how to fix the inequality between the Haves and the Have Nots--and all these constant wars. Stay tuned. News at 11.
I will ask an obvious question which has as many ethical implications as you choose to give to it.
What obligations do we have to the populations of other nations around the world?
Obviously we have to draw limits to our own concern for the expanding human family.
As world population spins out of control, is there any sense in facilitating this explosion by "saving" the world from its own reproductive irresponsibility?
The pity and indignation we feel at pictures like this is purely vicarious and ephemeral. You and I go right back to our poetry and good coffee, while the world burns.
Some people feel a crusading calling, and spend their lives in missions or foreign aid programs. Many return disillusioned or frustrated by overwhelming chaotic circumstances.
I think our main duty at this point is to abbreviate uncontrolled population growth, and to live each day with as much passion and grace as we may summon, realizing that the privilege or freedom to do so is not bought at the expense of something for which any one of us can be personally held accountable.
Beyond that, what? There's even a kind of complacence about our discussing it on blogs. Unless you make a personal campaign out of your sense of responsibility towards those in need, everywhere, or even somewhat specific, I question the nature of the gesture.
Royal privilege is a vestige of Medieval life, just as most religion. In the age of reason in which we purport to live, such traditions beg obvious questions. How were Diana's trips to Africa any different than Audrey Hepburn's? "Oh, the starving children of Somalia" with flies sucking the mucous from their eyes! It's pathetic false charity masquerading as concern.
As I sit here drinking my coffee and preparing my papers for a morning of researching/writing, the last thing on my mind is any "crusading calling";
as I read the call to "abbreviate uncontrolled population growth", I feel no compulsion to take up any 'Pro Choice' or responsible reproductive rights causes;
as I take in the accusation of a simple blog post as amounting really to "pathetic false charity masquerading as concern", I don't feel like spoiling for a verbal fight and am not, as suggested, going to drop what I'm doing and join UNESCO-like groups;
true, as I post one more "intolerable image" (Jacques Rancière) and decry the innate stupidity of what literary critic Chris Gutkind recently calls "candy-coated god-baby all over our screens", I won't get really any angrier than I have been;
and as we pose the question (as you and I both are doing today), "Is it appropriate to post the image and ask the question?" I don't expect the real outrage I feel at one more assault on human dignity to be in the least bit assuaged.
Don't underestimate the power of images, wherever they appear. and don't assume that real fires don't burn inside the people who post them. Recall the fate of the photographer (Gary Carter) who found and published the equally "intolerable" image of the dying Sudanese child being stalked by the vulture.
I don't count your blog post, or the photo, as being examples of "false charity."
I do question the implied provocation that we all must bear a burden of guilt, no matter what our commitments or accomplishments or experience may be.
I spent 27 years in a government bureaucracy of social service, helping people directly every workday, and occasionally getting thanked for it.
That's not romantic--I didn't go the Congo to fight leprosy--but it's a very practical contribution to the effort to improve the lot of mankind.
As academics--or former academics (as I once was)--I think it's incumbent on each of us not to become complacent in our hand-wringing public indignation. True humility acknowledges the limits on our empathy. The toughest love we can offer the world may be that understood by doctors: There are some things beyond one's reach to help. You do what you can.
I'm not looking for an argument either--or at least not a contentious one. It's a comment.
5 comments:
While the world was awaiting the royal baby, 15 babies were born at a single Syrian refugee camp. Zaatari camp in Jordan was built to hold 60,000. It currently shelters 160,000. Little Prince George Alexander Louis will grow up in a palace; these kids start out homeless, in a tent in a refugee camp, while the grownups try to figure out how to fix the inequality between the Haves and the Have Nots--and all these constant wars. Stay tuned. News at 11.
(Photos & article here).
Thank you!
I will ask an obvious question which has as many ethical implications as you choose to give to it.
What obligations do we have to the populations of other nations around the world?
Obviously we have to draw limits to our own concern for the expanding human family.
As world population spins out of control, is there any sense in facilitating this explosion by "saving" the world from its own reproductive irresponsibility?
The pity and indignation we feel at pictures like this is purely vicarious and ephemeral. You and I go right back to our poetry and good coffee, while the world burns.
Some people feel a crusading calling, and spend their lives in missions or foreign aid programs. Many return disillusioned or frustrated by overwhelming chaotic circumstances.
I think our main duty at this point is to abbreviate uncontrolled population growth, and to live each day with as much passion and grace as we may summon, realizing that the privilege or freedom to do so is not bought at the expense of something for which any one of us can be personally held accountable.
Beyond that, what? There's even a kind of complacence about our discussing it on blogs. Unless you make a personal campaign out of your sense of responsibility towards those in need, everywhere, or even somewhat specific, I question the nature of the gesture.
Royal privilege is a vestige of Medieval life, just as most religion. In the age of reason in which we purport to live, such traditions beg obvious questions. How were Diana's trips to Africa any different than Audrey Hepburn's? "Oh, the starving children of Somalia" with flies sucking the mucous from their eyes! It's pathetic false charity masquerading as concern.
Curtis,
fair enough.
As I sit here drinking my coffee and preparing my papers for a morning of researching/writing, the last thing on my mind is any "crusading calling";
as I read the call to "abbreviate uncontrolled population growth", I feel no compulsion to take up any 'Pro Choice' or responsible reproductive rights causes;
as I take in the accusation of a simple blog post as amounting really to "pathetic false charity masquerading as concern", I don't feel like spoiling for a verbal fight and am not, as suggested, going to drop what I'm doing and join UNESCO-like groups;
true, as I post one more "intolerable image" (Jacques Rancière) and decry the innate stupidity of what literary critic Chris Gutkind recently calls "candy-coated god-baby all over our screens", I won't get really any angrier than I have been;
and as we pose the question (as you and I both are doing today), "Is it appropriate to post the image and ask the question?" I don't expect the real outrage I feel at one more assault on human dignity to be in the least bit assuaged.
Don't underestimate the power of images, wherever they appear. and don't assume that real fires don't burn inside the people who post them. Recall the fate of the photographer (Gary Carter) who found and published the equally "intolerable" image of the dying Sudanese child being stalked by the vulture.
Conrad:
I don't count your blog post, or the photo, as being examples of "false charity."
I do question the implied provocation that we all must bear a burden of guilt, no matter what our commitments or accomplishments or experience may be.
I spent 27 years in a government bureaucracy of social service, helping people directly every workday, and occasionally getting thanked for it.
That's not romantic--I didn't go the Congo to fight leprosy--but it's a very practical contribution to the effort to improve the lot of mankind.
As academics--or former academics (as I once was)--I think it's incumbent on each of us not to become complacent in our hand-wringing public indignation. True humility acknowledges the limits on our empathy. The toughest love we can offer the world may be that understood by doctors: There are some things beyond one's reach to help. You do what you can.
I'm not looking for an argument either--or at least not a contentious one. It's a comment.
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