What Am I Missing?

BY PROFESSOR STEIN

My free association around our class session leads me back to the many issues that appear, at first, as polarities: the aspirational self versus the self-in-progress, the pragmatic mission versus the ideological one, the “real self” (imagine those as exaggerated air quotes) versus the self we perform for others, the heroic rescuer versus the grassroots reformer. I prefer to think of them all as paradoxes rather than polarities, each side complementing the other. Complementarity refers to the fact that the world is realized in dual ways; everything has a visible and an invisible side. When we perceive red, we can’t perceive green. They are color complements. This doesn’t mean that one color stops existing when you see the other. The principle is most aptly illustrated in figure-ground illusions: here you see a vase, there two profiles meeting. It has been used to great effect in art, such as Dali’s famous painting of Abraham Lincoln. If you view the painting from afar, you see only the face of the former president. If observed up close, the painting details the death of Christ. You can never see both images at once, although they exist simultaneously and, in fact, are mutually constituted. Both skilled art and metaphor: without the lines and shapes and colors that make Christ, there is no Lincoln. In this course, we will keep prodding to ask what you are NOT seeing when you focus on something, what you are NOT thinking about or discussing when you choose a particular issue to highlight.

Our last session focused on the internship experience. I keep picturing all of you being dropped on your heads in the middle of these new cultures. For some, this is stranger in a strange land time. However-as Ruby and Roberto noted-for other Fellows, the faces of the clients or the problems the seminar is addressing are startlingly familiar. Your empathy gets drawn from the well of your own identification; you feel like you know what people are going through because you have been there, done that. When you do not have an immediate simpatico, it may be more difficult to find the right rhythm but easier to find a pinch of objectivity. You see something different than the first person, who is paying attention to how in sync they feel. But you also may miss subtle things that the more naturally attuned person picks up. Same thing with a disciplinary perspective. Professor Reitz is an English professor. Maybe she sees people as walking narratives. I favor psychology so everyone looks nuts to me.

Because we have asked you to reflect on the overlaps and divergences between your personal mission and those of your agency, please take this post to brainstorm how we might bring all of ourselves (and all of our selves) to bear on the internship and seminar experience. So far, in the short a time you have been at your agency and in the seminar, what are you seeing/hearing that you didn’t expect to see/hear? Are there any assumptions you didn’t know you were making (about yourself or others) that you are suddenly questioning? Through which particular lenses have you/we reflexively looked at social justice? What might we all be missing?

And now for a word from a Vera Fellowship alum...

By LENECIA LEWIS (VF '10-'11; Esperanza, Common Justice)

As a VERA Fellow, I spent most of last semester dissecting the idea of a not for profit organization. During that time I focused a lot on philanthropy and was often reminded about the newness of the title social entrepreneur. The term is always loosely defined, but is widely agreed to describe a new kind of philanthropist. One who is thought to consider the business of non-profits as more than just charitable giving. But despite the broad nature of the definition, the term is mostly used to describe a particular type of individual.

Usually a recent college graduate, the social entrepreneur has been inspired by an eye-opening trip to (insert developing country name here). Fired up by the “injustice of it all”, the social entrepreneur gathers and commands a youth advocate army. Weapons of choice include: a Cannon EOS 40D camera, an acoustic guitar, and an active account on all social media outlets. Most often the social entrepreneur will become the creator of a symbolic, yet trendy, line of apparel or jewelry. Their philosophy: “Save the world, look cool doing it”*.

Having spent the past four years entrenched in the world of the social entrepreneur, I know this profile very well. Imagine my surprise when this exact term was used to describe none other than our own Herb Sturz.

In a panel interview about his book A Kind of Genius, Sam Roberts commented that Sturz is the epitome of a social entrepreneur and has been for the past 50 years. Far longer than the term itself has been in use. Naturally this was difficult for me to reconcile. But certainly Sturz’s approach to social injustice was to go way above and beyond charitable giving. So of course Roberts has to be correct. Right? Which must mean that the way in which social entrepreneurs have been popularly categorized is fairly meaningless. Right? If indeed Herb Sturz and the above described character are both of the same breed, then what does this mean about the way we separate and categorize efforts to solve social justice issues?

Initially, I wanted to post about the evolution of the non-profit sector. From charitable giving all the way up to philanthrocapitalism (a neologism that deserves its own post entirely). My intention was to place Herb Sturz somewhere along this evolutionary spectrum. It seems, however, that the spectrum is merely cosmetic. That each form of ‘new and improved philanthropy’ is merely a way to modernize and advertise the efforts of those involved.

Curiosity has gotten the best of me. Now that you have read about Sturz’s work in New York, and before you begin your work at your own non-profit agency, I would like to know how you see it: How do you understand the role of the social entrepreneur? Are they truly the new and improved face of philanthropy?

*Point of reference, Blake Mycoskie of “TOMS Shoes”.

Alex's Post

As fate would have it, I have been the first "poster" during the previous semester and am the final poster this year, so I have been lucky enough to start and end this year's blog. I hope I will do it justice.

We discussed in class several ways to minimize the a critical social justice issue from occurring: police brutality. It is unlikely that the problem will ever go away, because it is inherently tied in with someone's temper and hence can never be completely preventable, but we were able to come up with several changes that can help prevent further occurrences of brutality:
-identify under which circumstances instances of brutality most likely occur, allowing the NYPD to try different approaches to policing such as with domestic disturbances
-changing the Compstat system
-creating workshops for the police and the public to teach them how to better interact with one another
-trying to create, or reestablish the respect between police and high-crime neighborhoods
-increasing the relations between the police and high-crime neighborhoods to lessen the stress experienced by police when they go into the neighborhood, hopefully allowing things to not get out of hand due to tempers

Personally, while I understand one very important aspect to solving the problem is fully understanding it, I believe the key to decreasing police brutality is to increase how well an officer knows the neighborhood he or she is policing. If an officer grew up in the area they police, he or she will feel comfortable in the neighborhood, high-crime rate or not, or at least be more comfortable than other unfamiliar officers would be. Such a familiarity would decrease the chances brutality would occur because the officer would not be under excessive stress, the officer is more likely to know the people he or she interacts with--lessening the chances of brutality further--and the people would know the officer increasing the chances of cooperation so long as there is no personal animosity between them.

Has anyone came up with any more solutions?

Nadiya's post

Thank you everyone for the lively discussion! We discussed different ideas regarding genocide during our class, and I would like to address them in this post.

What constitutes genocide is controversial. Even though a legal definition exists, we still debate about its scope, typology, and conditions under which individuals may intervene and who may intervene. What if we include too many things in our definition? Will it dilute its meaning? Is genocide something new or something that has existed even before we gave it a name? For instance, Alex Hinton believes the former. He states that “Genocide… is a product of, not an aberration from, modern social life.”

During our class, we say many types of genocide, ranging from domestic violence to the mass killing of Native Americans. Chad made an excellent point by saying that the killing of the Native Americans is genocide. If this is true, why then do we cherish the perpetrators as our heroes? Andrew Jackson was a President of the United States. In 1812, he was the Hero of the Battle of New Orleans. Mr. Jackson promised the Native Americans to protect them. In fact, he was the one who made them marsh from Georgia to Oklahoma a few years later.

Mass killings are occurring all over the word. The UN Security Council (SC) is responsible for making the decision of intervention in the cases of genocide. But there are five permanent members of the SC (France, China, Russian Federation, the U. S., and the United Kingdom) who can veto this intervention. Why can one country exercise this power and others cannot? What gives them this privilege? Money? We mentioned that in some cases of genocide countries some countries might benefit from mass killings (e.g. France was selling weapons to the African countries when the Rwandan genocide was occurring). Again, is it all about money? If so, what is the price of people’s lives?

The next topic we discussed is how historical narratives are used in modern context, specifically in propaganda. Propaganda is used in order to manipulate collective minds. Politicians use national symbols (e.g. the U. S. flag) and events (e.g. the Ukrainian Famine) to influence the citizens. They use people for achieving their goals. They use symbols in order to cover goals that might be dangerous (e.g. a war). At the Nuremberg trials, Herman Goering, Hitler’s second in command, said

“Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."

Further thoughts on venture philanthropy...

So first. I just want to thank all of you for completing the assignment. I tried to keep it as uncomplicated as I could.

We didn't have the time get to everyone's experience at their internships, and whether or not Pallotta' points held any truth at your organizations. Jessica talked about the compensation factor and how the employees at Job Path go above and beyond what is required of their pay grade. Christina spoke a little bit about the decision between making money or doing good. Her comments beg the question, is this a fair choice? Between doing good or making money? It is one that many of us are facing (VERA fellows and the undergraduate population in America). Consider the following:

1. Making money or doing good

2. Making money while doing good

3. Making money by doing good

The second (2) seems to imply a passive nature. That yes, you can make money and do good things. But that you can make money one way, and donate some of that money to do good things somewhere else (i.e.- any charitable donation by Wallmart).

The third (3), I would argue, implies the nature of a social entrepreneur. The idea that any profit seeking venture should also seek to serve the common good. I am, of course, aware that the third notion is idealist (almost absurdly so) but it is the goal of the social entrepreneur to somehow shift the way of the market economy from the a combination of (1) and (2), to a culmination of (3).

Viable? Ridiculous? Questions?

Also, I have forwarded two videos to be added to the 'check it out' section. One is the on the MEND program of Invisible Children inc., and the other is for an organization called Falling Whistles. Feel free to comment on both, I would love to hear your thoughts and relay them back to the founders of each organization (because they need to hear them too).

Finally, and I know some of you were disappointed that it didn't happen, in the event of radio silence I would have (seriously would have) recited Macbeth's opening lines in the following scene:

http://www.online-literature.com/shakespeare/macbeth/8/

How do we reform Higher Education?

Thank you to those who attended today's class, I really enjoyed the discussions shared and the various avenues explored in the realm of higher education.

First and foremost, I strongly feel it is important to bring the topic of Higher Education up since it has been a topic that has been swept under the rug for too long. While many believe speaking about this topic goes no where, I believe otherwise. Having a group of people understand the difficulties of getting a college education, or just an education period isn’t an easy thing to acquire. To become educated is to have the resources available to teach students how to write, read, speak, and just develop as a human being. It is stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) that one of the many rights man has, is to be educated, in order to develop and progress in the world around him. However, to provide individuals with an education one has to understand who is funding it. The answer to this is the government.

The government funds education programs and they decide how things should be, what will be taught, and the materials used. The issue with this is, when governments, specifically the US government, ignores education and sets it priorities to allocating resources, in order to be further their economic gain. This is an issue that needs to be recognized to prevent long term damages they are placing on education. In order to make the necessary changes needed to improve education reform, it is crucial that the people stand up and protest the irresponsibility that will negatively impact the future generation of this nation. As the saying goes, to make change is to work on it every day and sacrifice, in order to get results. Yet, the problem with protesting this issue is, who cares. Who are the people out there willing to take time to inform society about the importance of higher education and making sure that it is well funded? For those who are aware of the problem and stay silent to either preserve their elite status or for those that ignore the issue in entirety, how do we persuade them to become the opposite of by standards? The answer lies in morals, values, and the desire to create a society that isn’t gaped between those who are advantaged and those that are disadvantaged.

In class, Professor Waterston spoke about a community she went to where everyone was given equal pay no matter what their job was and were given different tasks to do every 6 weeks. Although, the community was very close and hardworking, parents found themselves able to spend more time with their kids and families were able to communicate and interact with families more. While some may say, “whoa this is too communist for my taste”, I believe that this type of community in a sense is a depiction of utopia that we hope to one day achieve. If you ask a college or high school student how many hours in a week do you see your mom or dad, I am sure many of them wouldn’t say a high number. The reason for this is that we live in a society where everyone works to make a living and works to get the nice life they dreamed of. However, think to yourself, would you rather work and work to live the “life” or would you rather live a life where everyone around you is equal and has the ability to spend more time with their families? This question ties into higher education because, if politically and culturally we have taught society that college is the entrance to having a better life with better pay, and don’t live up to these standards; then the government needs to come together and come up with ways to better the education system, so that student are truly paying for what they are getting.

Even more, if the US is taking in math and science students from other countries because of their ability to do more, compared to the average American, then this should be a massive wake up call for society. It is shocking enough that the Chancellor of CUNY wants to raise tuition to those in the math and science fields; but if we are taking in the “brains” of math and science from foreign countries to compensate for our lack of experts in these fields, it is time that we all stand up and remind the government where their priorities should be. If the government can not live up to its responsibility, (the people) then it is vital that we come together and bring recognition to this issue, before all is gone.

Let us Express Ourselves: The Arts.

I want to thank everyone today for engaging in the activities and the discussion in class.

I want to continue on the line of discussion raised by professor Reitz. How do we interpret concepts of divide and conquer. We discussed how art can allow for a connection of people who are different, but another important discussion is how art is meant to be interpreted within a particular group of people. What is the message being sent from one rapper to the other? What are the internal discussions going on among individuals within a particular group and why is that internal discussion important?

Professor Reitz expressed some disagreement and discontent with the Northland Poster Collective and it’s, as she phrases it, “white liberalism.” We did not have enough time to go into an in depth discussion about the Northland Poster Collective, but I would like to know what are the views everyone might have on that reading.

And last but not least I wanted to talk about decolonization. Why is decolonization important? Why is decolonization important to juvenile justice and justice in general? What role does artistic expression play in the processes of decolonization? What can we learn from the messages of the three songs and the two videos we watched for H.W. in relation to the process of decolonization?

Chad Out!