Cultural Violence (Johan Galtung)

While reading Galtung’s work: Cultural Violence, I felt that Galtung’s writing was strong and that he held a biased and disgust for Western culture. Even so, Galtung’s triangle of violence is very interesting and something that I believe exists in today’s world and will need to be addressed if we ever want to strive for perpetual peace. Through the examples he used, he brought a lot of credibility to his triangle of violence; and has convinced me that all three points of the triangle must be addressed to achieve peace. If not, we risk allowing the forms of violence we neglect to foster and grow stronger – we risk the peace process as a whole.

There were, however, three elements of his cultural violence definition that confused me or where his argument eluded me. The aspect of language, art, and cosmology are three of the six cultural domains “that can be potentially used to legitimize direct or structural violence,” according to Galtung. Possible the way he worded his explanations of language and art made me confused with how they could of legitimized direct or structural violence in Galtung’s explanation. Admittedly, I know that we can use language and art as propaganda tools to convince and legitimize the citizens of a nation to war. For instance, in World War II where we used pictures (art) and slurs (language) to show “who” we were fighting and why – the Germans and Japanese at the time. If this was what Galtung was talking about then I understand, otherwise the points he were trying to make escaped me. Cosmology on the other hand just went way over my head.

Physical Resistance to Attack: The Pacifist's Dilemma, The Feminist's Hope (Pat James)

The main point of this article was somewhat surprising and disappointing. To note, neither of those adjectives are being used to derogate feminism; but my expectations from the title of the article were different than what was actually discussed. What I was expecting was an article discussing heavily on the pacifist’s dilemma and how pacifism as a lifestyle doesn’t work perfectly. Instead, it was an argument for changing women’s perspectives of themselves and how they need to take power, control, etc.

The dilemma that Pat James addresses is: “when does self-defense stop being nonviolent?” However, it is also the question James does not answer. She does draw a line at saying that verbal resistance isn’t violence, but believes it is still unclear whether throwing someone or poking their eyes is also nonviolent if used as self-defense.

The theory Pacifism is something that eludes my ability to comprehend. Comprehend is probably the wrong word because I do understand what Pacifism; but the question of “why?” people follow it, much like religion. I was hoping that this article would have shed some light on the limitations of Pacifism, but it has not.

The Justification of Civil Disobedience (John Rawls)

While I don’t necessarily agree with John Rawls’ theory of justice, I appreciate his theory and see the merits of it. However, I think that his idea of justice may be a little too abstract to achieve. His theory relies on the concept of the veil of ignorance, and while it provides interesting data, to expect people in the real world to think of justice through that framework seems preposterous. But for this reflection, I will accept his notion of justice.

Let’s get straight at the meat of the subject: the justification of civil disobedience. In previous blogs, I have asserted and addressed the risks of civil disobedience and how if we are not careful civil disobedience can and will lead to anarchy. However, Rawls’ theory of civil disobedience is different from the former and more acceptable in my mind. Essentially Rawls was positing a form of civil disobedience much like Gandhi’s concept of Satyagraha. This is much different from the earlier forms of civil disobedience which were much more confrontational and extreme. Rawls believed that civil disobedience should only be used as a last resort when it has become impossible to address your misgivings within the institutions political structures. Furthermore, arguing that the movement should only disobey laws that take away one’s equality of opportunity; but still accept the punishment because you want to create change within the social system instead of trying to create a parallel government. This differs from Thoreau who argued that if you believed a law was unjust you should step out of that government’s rule completely. This is the critical difference between the two forms of civil disobedience.

Along a Tightrope (St. Augustine Movement)

Reading about the St. Augustine movement made me disgusted by MLK because he did not have the best intentions for the black people of St. Augustine in mind nor did he have a strategy. He was just exploiting them for their situation. His primary and only goal was to get the Civil Rights Act passed. And while the Act did get pass, I do not think that this movement had anything to do with it. I like many of the critics of this movement I believe that the Civil Rights Act would have been passed even without this movement. Instead I think that this movement was a political (and a publicity) stunt. Because as soon as the Civil Rights Act becomes passed, MLK wants out of St. Augustine; basically saying that he would accept anything the local government was willing to give as long as it did not make him look like a loser.

While we can give MLK credit in the short-term for bringing the race issue back to the forefront of the public’s mind and bringing to the surface the racial tensions in St. Augustine, I think we can say confidently that this movement was a failure overall. The bi-racial committee that was supposed to be established never met; left local race relations in shambles; and did not create infrastructure for the development of grass root movements to replace the popular movements that King was organizing. I feel that this is the complete opposite of what a leader of social reform should be doing. While yes, you should be thinking about the bigger picture: your vision of why you do what you do; I don’t think that it is acceptable behavior to exploit and sacrifice a small percentage of your followers all for the sake of the vision.