Category: Empathy

GET OUT of here racism

On By MILES HIRSHMANIn Comedy/Satire, Empathy, Memory/Past/History2 Comments

Get Out, a movie directed by Jordan Peele, is a satirical experience that intends to display the problems with racism in America. The movie’s main character, Chris Washington, is in a couple with a white lady named Rose Armitage. The movie begins on a very nice note, seeing Chris and Rose planning a trip to go meet Rose’s parents, with Chris portraying the first poke at racial problems in America. He asks Rose if her parents know that he is black, and she tells him that they won’t care, Chris is hesitant of this, but still decides to meet her parents. The movie continues and Chris and Rose finally arrive at her house, and her parents seem extremely excited to see him. Everything seems good on the surface, but it doesn’t take long for Chris to start realizing some of the oddities that occur. Some of these oddities include black “helpers”, who share a resemblance to slaves, to which the family sees no problem with. These “helpers” seem to act very odd when Chris interacts with them, and one even tells Chris to “Get Out” when a picture is taken. A very angry brother who seems to be mad at Chris for no reason, and a hypnotic mother who toys with Chris’ mind. As time goes on, Chris gets more and more fearful of the situation, and so does his friend Rod. Rod brings up the common archetype in movies that the black people always die first, and really begins to worry for his friend. 

This is where the spoiler has to come in, because there is no way to talk about the movie as a whole without a spoiler of what happens. Of course, Chris is right about his fears about everything being too good to be true. The Armitage’s have an annual get together, full of white people, and they all seem very nice to Chris. There is a repetition of Chris getting informed that his physique is nice, and not just his, but physiques of all different types of black athletes. This of course makes Chris uncomfortable, but the caucasian people at the get together see no problem with it. Chris ends up wanting to leave, but Rose tries to convince him otherwise, as this happens, Chris’s friend realizes that one of the helpers is actually a man who was kidnapped a couple of months ago. At this point, Chris tries to leave himself, but unfortunately doesn’t make it out of the house. It turns out that there was something up the whole time, ) what a surprise) and Rose’s family lures black people to their house to make use of the “nice physique. They do this by surgically removing the brain of the african american, and putting the brain of the white person into the black person’s body. The movie ends with Chris killing the family members, escaping the house, and having a final standoff with Rose. In the final moments, with Chris bloodied and on top of Rose, a police car shows up, and Rose tells Chris that she wins, but Rod walks out of the car and brings Chris to safety.

 There are many satirical moments in this book that poke fun at the common problems black people face today. Another form of humor used is hyperbole, which as a whole is displayed when Chris goes to meet his white girlfriend’s family. Normally, there is a fear of being in an interracial relationship, and not having your parents know. This is usually met with disagreement, but nothing of this extent. Another form of satire in this movie is when Rose’s family insists Chris meets all of their neighbors, and they all make the comment that “Black is in fashion again”. Of course they are talking about the clothing, or are they? Another form of satire is on display at the end, when the police car pulls up with Chris on top of Rose. All viewers were immediately filled with sadness as soon as this happened, knowing the situation that will unfold, despite all of Chris’s efforts to make it out alive. Only for Rod to step out of the car and save Chris. 


These scenes are all different ways in which Jordan Peele tries to display the different problems with racism in America in this age. I think that some of the underlying themes of this are 

  1. There is a want for the assets that black people possess, although this movie displays it in an overexaggerated way, this is still true nonetheless. An example of this in real life is the recent exposure that black culture has been getting, and the term “culture vulture” that has been coined to white people.
  2. Another form of satire is one that I touched upon earlier, which is when the police rolled up at the end. Rose tells Chris that he is screwed, and that the police will believe her, only for it to be Rod. Although it was Rod, if it wasn’t Rose would probably be right, and in this situation, no matter what Chris says, he will be the one in trouble for what happens. This occurs in today’s society, the black person is often the first one suspected when it comes to crime, and the one who will be incarcerated.
  3. The problem with interracial relationships today. This was an exaggeration, but in the beginning you see Chris and how tense he is that her parents still don’t know that he is black.

This clip shows Chris’s friend, it is a funny clip, but it does a good job showing the fear that a black man has when it comes to problems like this.

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=get+out+moments&&view=detail&mid=C171D46CFC6EFB79A873C171D46CFC6EFB79A873&&FORM=VRDGAR&ru=%2Fvideos%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dget%2520out%2520moments%26qs%3Dn%26form%3DQBVR%26sp%3D-1%26pq%3Dget%2520out%2520moment%26sc%3D5-14%26sk%3D%26cvid%3D51325E43BB694A51AC8203A7297632E3

These are only a few reasons that display why Get Out was not only funny, scary, and interesting, but also extremely moving, and capable of showing the many problems with America today

Beloved Sonnet

On By Maximus BIn Beloved, Empathy, PoetryLeave a comment

My rose

In a field of darkness there is one light

Alone I seek to grow this lonely rose

Promise of future petals that are white

My love is dirt from which my flower grows,

Await my rose’s bloom all so fast

My rose’s beauty alike Polaris

With powers to erase my neglected past 

Trauma I hope it will not inherit.

Oh no!–the wicked Devil does arrive

His breath possesses the heart of fire

My rose has become his eye of desire

He shouts, “I need your rose to stay alive,

For I will pay you all your heart desires!”

I slit the stem of my love and she dies…

For my Beloved blog post, I decided to write a sonnet depicting the situation that Sethe is put in when she decides to kill Beloved. Sethe is the speaker, and the object of the poem “the rose” is representative of beloved. The motif I payed close attention to throughout the book was birth and pregnancy, which was meant to portray how the next generation symbolized hope. This is a reason why I was so drawn to Sethe’s incredible dilemma.

I wanted to capture a situation in which someone would kill something that they loved to save it. The image I had in my head was a clearing in a forest that had only one flower growing in it amongst all of the grass. Before the flower ever gets a chance to bloom, fire surrounds it. The only way to “save” that flower so that it can eventually blossom is to cut its stem like slitting a throat.

Cosmic Love

On By Olivia KIn Empathy, Imagination, Music Poetry, Poetry, Power and IdentityLeave a comment

Florence and the Machine’s “Cosmic Love” has been with me for a long time now. From the first time I let this song fill my ears, Florence’s heart-wrenching words and explosive tone have taken me to a completely different world. It is both powerful and sentimental, beautiful and tragic. Out of all the songs I have listened to, this one is the closest to poetry.

The very first lines of the song are:

A falling star fell from your heart and landed in my eyes

I screamed aloud, as it tore through them

And now it’s left me blind

Here, Florence Welch is describing how she was completely blinded by her love for this individual. Using several elegantly crafted metaphors, Welch compares her blindness by love to a star that fell from her love’s heart and right into her eyes. The metaphors help to build an image of not only the experience, but of the feeling. This is one of the fundamental qualities of poetry.

In the second verse, Welch sings:

And in the dark, I can hear your heartbeat

I tried to find the sound

But then it stopped, till I was in the darkness

So darkness I became

In this stanza, Welch is illustrating her feelings of depression and hopelessness that her relationship has led her to. She spent so long in the dark searching for love, that when her love eventually left her, she was still stuck there. The repetition of the word “darkness” emphasises her feelings of despair. The repetition of words in this way is a key characteristic of poetry that I have seen in many other famous works.

In a heart-wrenching bridge, Welch sings:

I took the stars from our eyes, and then I made a map

And knew that somehow I could find my way back

Then I heard your heart beating, you were in the darkness too

So I stayed in the darkness with you

In contrast to Welch’s previous lines that describe feelings of blindness and despair, this stanza holds a spark of hopefulness in it. This is the turning part of the poem, where she decides that she will love this individual, despite the darkness that he has pulled her into. She realizes that he is just as lost as she is, and she will be there with him, in the darkest of times. Like in previous stanzas, this bridge represents the climax of an experience, and tells the story right at its core. That is a key element of poetry.

Finally, in a beautifully powerful chorus, Welch sings:

The stars, the moon, they have all been blown out

You left me in the dark

No dawn, no day, I’m always in this twilight

In the shadow of your heart

This chorus is arguably the most powerful stanza in the entire song. It elegantly describes her feelings of being left in despair and depression from a relationship but wanting to stay in that relationship nevertheless. By comparing her emotions to various interstellar forces all throughout the song, Welch recounts her experience in a way that people will understand. Unlike simple stories, or artless information, experiences and emotions are harder to explain. That is why Welch’s use of understandable analogies is truly helpful to the reader of the poem.

All in all, I feel that this song is a true example of poetry. The stunning diction, rich metaphors, and powerful structure all contribute to the poetic element of this song. “Cosmic Love” illustrates not only a story, but an experience.

Cosmic Love

Time after Time after Time and Again

On By Micah DIn Beloved, Empathy, Toni Morrison2 Comments

The novel Beloved is a story of an escaped slave and her new twisted reality that is weaved into her even more twisted past. The story of Sethe and her family connects very well to the song Time after Time by Cyndi Lauper.

Time after Time begins with the lyrics:

“Lying in my bed, I hear the clock tick and think of you
Caught up in circles
Confusion is nothing new
Flashback, warm nights
Almost left behind
Suitcase of memories”

Beloved is written in a very interesting and intricate way where different perspectives from the past and present are used to complete a story. The novel goes, quite literally, back and forth between the past and the present which smoothly bridges to Lauper’s song. The part in the first verse which says “suitcase of memories” especially connects to Paul D’s tin box which held his memories.

The second verse stated,

“Sometimes you picture me
I’m walking too far ahead
You’re calling to me, I can’t hear
What you’ve said
Then you say, “go slow”
And I fall behind
The second hand unwinds”

That part strongly reminded me of when Beloved recalled when Sethe left her alone on what we think is the slave ship. The verse obviously differs from the actual event Beloved remembered but it ties into the loneliness and the feeling of being abandoned.

Although the connection is very simple, the theme of the song surrounds the topics of past, present, and love. All of those things are largely important in Beloved as well.

Do Ghosts Have a Place in History?

On By Ella BIn Beloved, Empathy, Toni Morrison9 Comments

Often, when we look for historical fiction books, we look for stories that seem real. We look for stories that make the past seem vivid and tangible.

I didn’t expect to find this in Beloved. One of the most important elements of Morrison’s novel is Beloved, a ghostly presence who haunts Sethe as a constant reminder of the horrors of slavery. I don’t believe in ghosts, and so I thought that the intangible Beloved would serve as a distraction of the real-life horrors the book touches on.

But Beloved is part of Sethe’s story. By writing about Beloved, Morrison managed to write about Sethe as a person, rather than just writing about her experiences. And in writing about a person, Morrison was able to describe the haunting impacts of those experiences.

Toni Morrison story was one with depth. It doesn’t just help us to understand history — it creates empathy.

Tiny Tobacco Box

On By Lauren d.In Beloved, Empathy8 Comments

One of my favorite examples of figurative language used in the novel is when Paul D describes his heart as a “tin tobacco box.” After his traumatizing experiences at Sweet Home and, especially, at the prison camp in Georgia, he locks away his feelings and horrors from his past in this box, which, by the time Paul D arrives at 124, “rusted” over completely.

This is a comment on trauma. This way of dealing with trauma is so different then how Sethe deals with trauma. I thought it was so interesting that Paul D has to completely cut off his past whereas Sethe can’t seem to escape her own past. I thought the metaphor of a box rusted over was a very thought out way to express Paul D’s emotions.

By hiding from his emotions, Paul D hopes to preserve himself from further psychological damage. Paul D sacrifices much of his humanity by letting go of his feelings and gives up much of his self by repressing his memories.

Trauma is unique for every person even when they share some similar situations. Toni Morrison does a wonderful job of representing how trauma is a completely personal experience.

What Is Migration?

On By Micah DIn Empathy, Exit West, MigrationLeave a comment

Exit West showed us a world where people are migrating by the masses. They are moving across the world by literally stepping through a door. Exit West has showed us the struggle of immigration without the journey of immigration. Many who are not so keen on immigration, or specifically illegal immigration, gain more empathy when they put the journey of the immigrants into consideration, but this story has showed a different side. Exit West has showed the commonality between multitudes of people. That even without the long journey of migration, it is still incredibly hard to move through change and leave life as you know, or to witness others move while one seemingly stays stagnant. Exist West has showed its audience that there is truly not such thing as stagnation or true stability.

Exit West has stories of those that physically moved continuously like Nadia and Saeed and stories of those that did not move at all like the elderly man in Amsterdam, or the older woman in Palo Alto. At first glance, it seems like one is moving while the other is not, but the truth is quite the opposite. The elderly man in Amsterdam was a witness to many components in life migrating or changing: his lover leaving, his father dying, the gain of a new love, while he still remained constant in other ways. He stayed in the same place, never stopped smoking cigarettes, he never stopped hanging out on his balcony. In Saeed’s case, it seemed that everything changed. He lost both of his parents, moved into the western world, and watched his relationship with Nadia deteriorate. But he also had things he clung onto that added stability into his life. He prayed, went to sleep next to Nadia every night, and he worked.

I believe the true thesis of Exit West is best said in the quote from the elderly woman in Palo Alto. She said, “… everyone migrates, even if we stay in the same houses our whole lives, because we can’t help it. We are all migrants through time.” Mohsin Hamid beautifully detailed that we are far more similar than we think, although our differences are still prime parts our identities as well. But if we see ourselves in the migrants we hear of everyday and keep in mind our own migrations, although they may not be as intense or life altering, then we would be so much closer to universal understanding.

Schrodinger’s Jew: Exit West and Jewish Migration

On By Connor DIn Empathy, Exit West, Migration, Power and Identity4 Comments

I’ve spent a lot of time contemplating exactly how Jewish I am. I promise, I am bringing this up for a reason.

I contemplate how Jewish I am because it’s not exactly a clear cut answer, as it it for most people. My mother is Catholic and my father is Jewish, so I would be 50% Jewish, right? Except Judaism traditionally is passed down through the mother’s line. So I’m 0% Jewish. Except that alongside Christmas and Easter, my family celebrates Hanukkah and Passover. My last name is very Jewish; it roughly means “date branch” in Hebrew. The vast majority of my family migrated to the United States long before the Holocaust, but not all. I will never know who those distant relatives were, or if I would have ever gotten the chance to meet them. They would have been so, so distant, but I still wonder.

My family, both sides of it, is frequently obsessed with genealogy. We can trace my mother’s family all the way back to the United Kingdom and Ireland. In fact, a fun anecdote I was told as a child is that not only were my ancestors on the Mayflower, my great-great-great-however-many-greats grandfather fell off the Mayflower and had to be rescued. With my father’s side, however, it’s not so easy.

We can trace my father’s family back decently far for a Jewish family. Inevitably though, as many Jewish families do, we end up hitting a dead end: we simply have no idea what country we are actually from. Not only that, those places we would be from have changed throughout the years. Depending on when you look, I could be Russian, Polish, Lithuanian, or Latvian. With my mother’s side, we know most of my relatives were from Scotland and Ireland. We can trace exactly where they were and where they went. With my father’s side, however, all I know is that I am vaguely Eastern European. That’s it. I have no more information.

Towards the end of Exit West, friction between Saeed and Nadia starts up as to exactly how much they want to stay connected to their homeland. As Nadia becomes more and more separated, Saeed in turn yearns for connection with other Middle Eastern migrants. This friction is a part of their inevitable conclusion, which I won’t say because we’re not supposed to have finished the book yet. Despite their different reactions to migration, however, one thing is clear: their home is not their home anymore, no matter how much they may or may not want it to be.

I never got to choose how much I wanted to connect with my roots. I wear green for St. Patrick’s Day. My parents went and visited the place in Scotland my mother’s family comes from. I even chose a Celtic name for myself. But I don’t get those same things on my father’s side.

For all it matters, I’m a practicing Unitarian Universalist who is an active and passionate member of Unity Temple’s youth group. UUism is neither Christian nor Jewish; indeed, it was chosen by my family because it is a religion where my parents can still exist in the faiths of their childhood while still attending the same church.

I don’t know how Jewish I am. I’m not even sure it’s my decision to make. I’m stuck in a strange limbo between Jew and goy. I’m both and neither at the same time. I’m less Jewish than my Jewish friends, but more Jewish than my friends of other faiths. I’m not not Jewish, but what does that really do for me? At the end of the day, though, it’s not really a question of how Jewish I am. It’s about this sense of home that I don’t get to have. It’s about the fact that I more-or-less get to choose whether I am affected by anti-Semitism. It’s about me playing three-way tug-of-war with religion while not believing in a God. I can see it Saeed and I can see it in Nadia, being pulled every which way, not knowing which direction is right for you, endlessly straining to stay in the middle and always, always failing.

The Love Formula

On By Emily IIn Drama/Theater, Empathy3 Comments

The film Trust written and directed by Hal Hartley portrays the romance between two troubled misfits who feel disowned by their parents. 

Maria, who is pregnant and a high school dropout, supposedly kills her father because of disgust and disappointment. But in reality, he died of heart failure. Her mother immediately disowns her, forcing her to move out of the house. While Maria wanders town looking for a place to stay, she comes across Mathew, an educated and moody electronics repairman. 

They develop a strong connection to each other in which they are accepting and understanding of one another. They understand the hardships one another faces as they continue to live with their insulting parents.

Throughout the film, Maria and Mathew build a sense of mutual admiration and trust. When Mathew asks her to marry him, Maria constructs a formula: respect + admiration + trust = love

I believe that this formula represents their relationship because they are essential factors in what makes them happy. In addition, I think that Maria and Mathew’s relationship solves the problems they face because it allows them to comfort each other. Maria helps Mathew stay sane as he struggles to keep the same job for a long period of time. Mathew cares for Maria by making her feel loved. He helped her become more confident in wearing her glasses, which ultimately allowed Maria to accept herself. Both Maria’s mother and Mathew’s father are emotionally abusive, and Mathew’s father is physically abusive too. By getting married, they have the opportunity to start a new life without any constraints such as their parents.

Where in the World Are Nadia and Saeed?

On By Josephine DIn Empathy, Exit West, Migration3 Comments

When I began to read Exit West, I wondered about the setting of the book, as it is never stated. It clearly is our world, or at least an alternate version of it, because there are references to places such as Australia, Japan, and the United States. However, the city that the two main characters, Nadia and Saeed, call home is never named, nor is their country or even general region of the world. Although it is never specified what religion the characters practice or what is predominant where they live, as I read I began to assume they live in a majority-Muslim area, primarily because their names can be Arabic in origin and because they reference evening prayers and Friday religious services (someone please correct me if I’m wrong, because I’m not Muslim, but I believe traditionally Muslims pray multiple times per day and observe the sabbath on Fridays). However, I wondered why the author, Mohsin Hamid, chose not to specify what place that might be. Obviously, it was a very deliberate choice and a very noticeable one. 

In a video we watched in class, Hamid mentioned that Nadia and Saeed’s city is based off his home city of Lahore, Pakistan, but that the situation that is occurring there is more based on the situations occurring in certain places in Syria, such as Aleppo. This made me wonder why he didn’t just set the book in Aleppo. It does not seem like it would cause any major plot issues if he adjusted the events in the book to be historically accurate to what has been occurring there over the past few years. However, this may just be my ignorance; it is possible that things have occurred in Aleppo that I don’t know about and that would have been impossible to include in the book. 

But since I didn’t know for certain that Exit West’s plot required it to not be set in a specific city, I began to wonder about other motives Hamid might have had for leaving its setting unnamed. So I looked online, and found that Exit West was first published in Great Britain and the United States, not Pakistan. This made me wonder—was Exit West meant to provide a view of migration that was palatable to a Western audience? By this I mean, did Hamid purposefully avoid giving the characters in his novel a nationality so that all readers, but especially people in Great Britain and the United States who would make up the majority of his readership, would be able to better identify with them? And if he did this, was that the right choice?

Watching the clip of Hamid’s talk that we did in class, I saw clearly that a major goal of his was to humanize and “de-other” refugees. He said this was why he decided to include magical doors that his characters travelled through to a different place in the world rather than having them undergo a long and arduous journey to get there: he wanted to focus more on what made them the same as non-refugee readers rather than on what made them different, and a dangerous journey would have made them different as it is something many people who have never been refugees could never imagine experiencing. 

I realized the same logic would apply to not giving his characters a nationality or religion. Making them say, Syrian, or even mentioning outright that they are Muslim would put up another divide between them and Western or non-Muslim readers, make those readers come in with all kinds of preconceived notions and even more of a reason to say “Those characters are not like me at all.”

However, I question Hamid’s decision to leave the nationality and religion of Nadia and Saeed ambiguous. While I understand the appeal of making them more relatable to Western and non-Muslim readers, I wonder if by not giving them a clear nationality or religion, Hamid fails to challenge those readers’ tendencies to “other” and refuse to relate to Muslims and people from places such as Syria. In my opinion, Nadia and Saeed are extremely likeable characters. I mean, Nadia is a total queen. She’s a strong, independent woman who is surviving on her own against all the odds. And Saeed is sweet and charming; he’s a respectable family man and always a perfect gentleman toward Nadia. I, and I imagine other readers as well, immediately feel attached to them and root for them just because of their personalities. If Hamid were to make them from an actual place, such as Syria, I believe it would have a powerful impact and lead Western readers to better humanize people from that place rather than pitying or fearing them. And I believe if he specifically mentioned they were Muslim rather than just hinting at it, it would have the same effect: non-Muslim readers would grow in empathy for Muslims.

However, by leaving their nationality and religion ambiguous, Hamid does not challenge Western and non-Muslim readers to put aside their preconceived notions. Readers get comfortable with Nadia and Saeed because they, by nature of the fact that those characters are not stated to be from any particular country or religious group, do not connect too closely to our world. My fear is that Western and non-Muslim readers’ comfort with Nadia and Saeed might not translate to real people from real places, because Nadia and Saeed are simply not real enough without a real country or religious group to be from. Therefore, Exit West might not go far enough to challenge xenophobia and Islamophobia. 

What do you think? Why do you think Hamid chose to leave Nadia and Saeed’s nationality and religion ambiguous, and how does that impact the story he’s telling? Or, am I just dumb and there’s a really obvious plot reason that I’m missing for why Exit West is not set in a specific place? If the last one is the case, someone please let me know!

Woman at War and Maternity

On By MEENAH HIn Course Stuff, Empathy, Power and Identity1 Comment

The movie Woman at War tells the story of a woman named Halla, who is a social activist fighting to end climate change in Iceland. Halla’s strong passion for protecting the environment has led her to extreme actions, as she has repeatedly turned off and even completely destroyed power lines that power the city.

In the midst of Halla’s extreme political activism, she received a call that her application for adoption has been approved, and there is a young girl from the Ukraine named Nika who is in need of a new home.

This news did not stop Halla from continuing to fight for the environment, and she was eventually arrested for her crimes.

After her arrest, Halla’s sister had agreed to be the new mother of Nika, and had planned to go to the Ukraine and bring her back to Iceland.

But, during a prison visit, Halla’s sister was telling her about her plan to move to the Ukraine when she gets Nika. Halla’s sister chooses to switch places with Halla in order for her to become the mother of Nika, which is something she has always wanted.

Halla then makes the journey to the Ukraine, and is able to adopt Nika and start her new life in the Ukraine.

Halla is depicted as an independent, resilient and determined woman, and is a strong, influential female protagonist.

In society, women who become mothers are often told to “settle down” and only focus on raising their children in the home. For Halla, this reality of motherhood is quite the opposite.

Even immediately after she leaves the orphanage with Nika, the bus they are on breaks down and they are forced to walk through extremely high levels of water.

Halla’s strength and aspirations will most certainly not “slow down” as she begins to parent Nika. Halla represents an independent woman who will be both a loving mother towards her child, as well as an activist that will keep on working persistently to change the world they live in.

Why Do I Empathize With Meursault?

On By Rachel MIn Empathy, StrangerLeave a comment

When I began this novella, I had an eerie feeling in my stomach. I could tell that something was disconnected about Meursault, but I was starting to wonder if there was something off with me. The problem was, I felt bad for Meursault. Even after his heinous murder, I felt a twinge of remorse for him. In his sun saturated state, I recognized the isolation of his character. After finishing part one, I was ready for a dynamic class conversation. I found it frightening that I kept coming to the aid of Meursault. I blatantly was defending him. How could I be so defensive of a character who had vouched for someone who had physically abused their partner? How could I defend someone who took the life of another without a second thought? How could I like a character who was more alarmed by the beads of sweat on his forehead rather than the passing of his own mother? I believe this sympathetic view didn’t stem from being an internalized sociopath, but instead emerged from something much different. At least I hope…

I honestly was jealous of Meursault’s carefree attitude. I began to empathize with him. Meursault was not confined by any social systems. He acted on his own pure will. High school students specifically are controlled by an array of power systems. Students have to conform to social standards that have been created by some unnamed force. At the same time, we are expected to pursue secondary education and find steady employment. We are expected to make all of these major life decisions as mere teenagers. Though only a few years ago, we weren’t allowed to operate a vehicle or even see a rated R movie on our own. The Stranger is such an impactful book to read in high school, because the absurdity of life that Camus recognized, seems to be bursting from the seems here. I will never concede that Meursault is a hero, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that we can’t learn from Camus’ message. My sympathy for Meursault is due to his understanding of life’s absurdity. Part of me believes his death represents the death of the greater population of individuals who died as outcasts of society. The other part of me recognizes the literal reasons for his death. Needless to say, I find my emotions toward Meursault frustrating and conflicting. Who knows, maybe I’m just a borderline sociopath.

Marie in Meursault’s Mind

On By Annie WIn Empathy, Stranger2 Comments

Much of the meaning taken away from The Stranger is dependent on the character Meursault’s existentialist mindset, yet this mindset is broken down in many different scenarios as the book goes on. One aspect of Meursault that I struggled to grasp was his relationship with his girlfriend, Marie.

When reading quickly, it seems that Marie is a perfect example of Meursault’s existentialism, in that he seems very detached from her while they are together. When Marie asks if she loves him or if she wants to marry him, he says things like “it doesn’t make any difference” or “it doesn’t really matter” (page 41.) Similarly, when he is fantasizing about women in jail, he does not focus specifically on Marie but instead on “all the women he had known” (page 77.)

However, there are many times when he seems to break off from these thoughts. When she visits him in jail, he mentions how he “thought she looked very beautiful, but didn’t know how to tell her.” This is one of the few times Meursault doesn’t say what he is thinking in a blatant or logical way. Additionally, when he hears Marie laugh, he reacts differently and once even said after hearing that sound, “for the first time maybe, I really thought I was going to get married.” He doesn’t call it love, but it is a big change in his normal thoughts and tendencies.

I am not sure if these glimpses of emotion outweigh his existentialist-mindset, but there is definitely some part of Meursault that has not been consumed by existentialism.

Joy from Struggle

On By Lauren d.In Empathy, Existentialism2 Comments

Sisyphus’s punishment in hell is to push up a rock to the top of a hill for the rest of time. However, no matter what the rock will fall back down. Despite this, Camus explains Sisyphus is not being tortured. He argues that the rock becomes Sisyphus’s way to happiness. The struggle itself is giving Sisyphus meaning. The struggle in the myth showcases the reliance in the human condition. Camus explains that human struggle is the only way that people can find meaning and independence in life. Humans need to face the absurdness of the situation head-on in order to overcome it.

Does that mean for human beings to be truly happy they need to discover what their “rock” is and overcome it?

Part of me thinks this task sounds incredibly daunting but also overly simplistic. Who only has one “rock” in their life? Life is a serious of “rocks” that we are faced with and how are supposed to decide what is this “rock”? I do agree that our struggles do give our lives meaning. I do not know if you can call what Sisyphus has true happiness more so contentment in his situation. I do like the idea of though our struggles there are moments of joy and only though struggle are we able to recognize this joy. It is a concept that proves humans are truly resilient.

Existentialism: Not an Excuse to Be a Jerk

On By Josephine DIn Empathy, Existentialism, Jessica Benjamin3 Comments

I don’t know about other class periods, but my class has been having a lot of debates about whether Meursault is a perfect existentialist who has achieved radical subjectivity and is free from society’s oppressive power structures or is just a bad person. I would like to suggest that the answer is, well, both. Meursault is undoubtedly an existentialist. He has accepted that nothing in life has meaning. However, the answer to the question of what sort of person he is, morally, lies in how he deals with that knowledge. 

As a result of the realization that life is meaningless, Meursault is sort of a jerk. He does things that hurt others, such as writing a letter to Raymond’s ex-girlfriend that he knows is going to get her into a bad situation and murdering a guy, under the premise that “nothing matters” and these actions are “meaningless.” However, that’s just wrong. His actions do matter. They matter to the people they affect. Even if Meursault is enlightened and knows that none of our suffering matters in the long run, that doesn’t give him the right to inflict unnecessary suffering upon other people, because that is infringing upon their freedom and subjectivity. 

Some might say that Meursault’s complete apathy and disregard for the things and people around him is the only natural response to existentialism. But I disagree. I believe that there is another way to respond: the idea that because there is nothing but this life, we have to spend it making the most positive impact on the world that we can, reducing the small fraction of the suffering of others that it is actually in our control to reduce. We have to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, fight for the rights of the marginalized, et cetera. 

While this idea may initially seem counter to existentialism, it actually fits with it perfectly. Because there is no afterlife that people who suffered on earth will get to enjoy after death, we should make sure that they suffer on earth as little as possible so that the entirety of their existence is not miserable. Sure, it’s ultimately meaningless, but it’s nice to do anyway. After all, nobody likes to suffer, and it’s kind of a jerk move to say to someone, “Well, suffering is inevitable, and everyone eventually dies anyway, so I’m not going to help you out from under that fallen tree that is crushing you lifeless.” Because if you were the one suffering, even if you knew it was meaningless, you probably would appreciate if that suffering could be diminished or removed. 

What I like about the “helping others” response to existentialism is that it can coexist with mutual recognition. Existentialism, no matter what, allows the existentialist to be a subject. However, if the existentialist realizes that others are subjects as well, their natural response will be to want to help them. In this light, existentialism can be a force for good not only for those who practice it but for the whole world. 

Altogether, I would say Meursault offers insight into one way an existentialist life can be lived, but certainly not the only way. Existentialism can make us apathetic, yes, but it also can rouse us to action. After all, life is meaningless, but we have to spend it doing something. Why not spend it doing things that make others a little bit happier?

“Victory Lap” and our Inability to Humanize the “Enemy”

On By Sonia ZIn Empathy, Short StoriesLeave a comment

Pieces of writing nowadays can take us through many different perspectives and points of view. We can see through the eyes of a schoolgirl from the 1800’s, a stockbroker during the great depression, or just your average teenager. But, what we don’t often get to see through are the eyes of those we are pitted against.

What surprised me the most about “Victory Lap”, looking past the very interesting characters and detailed plot line, was the writers choice to have a part of the story be told from the point of view of the assailant. We are often fed the backstory of a villain as a way to pick out his or her motives from the short list that is usually given (revenge, jealousy, etc.). We can infer from that a carefully and (often) simple narrative of why they do what they do. But, what is not always presented is the full perspective. This could include shows of emotional response, less relevant personal information, or even just a glimpse into how their mind actually functions. It is almost as if we are afraid to give these villains (or whatever you’d call them) full access to the human spectrum. We need to have an invisible wall between “us” and “them”.

Recently, these in depth narratives have been showing up more and more. What first comes to my mind are the surprisingly large number of Netflix documentaries focused on the backstories and minds of killers, depicting very detailed accounts of very gruesome topics and people. I think it’s interesting to see our society bringing awareness to the fact that these people are still human, and humans are capable of theses kinds of things. And, although it can be frightening to take down any walls that separate the “villains” from the “protagonists”, doing so can also provide insight into how certain actions come to be, and maybe even how they can be prevented.

“The Cariboo Cafe” and Current Events

On By Jack BIn Empathy, Imagination4 Comments

In Helena Maria Viramonte’s, “The Cariboo Cafe”, she constructs a powerful story that brings the reader to face hard reality’s, deal with current issues, an illustrates how many people live today. Throughout the past several weeks, “The Cariboo Cafe” has stuck out of the stories we have read to me, because of the intense reality that is shown. Hopelessness, Family, Immigration, Horror.

In many ways Viramonte’s story is not pleasant, but it strikes with a certain power. A Power to provide a fictional story but also display images in the readers head that truly stick. As of 2018, ICE held more than “42,000 people in custody each day” (CNN). All of these people that are detained in these horrible conditions are in search of a better life. Sadly, the characters within “The Cariboo Cafe” do the same, stuck in horrible conditions and try to persevere.

In the closing of Helena Maria Viramonte’s story, the third perspective shows a desperate mother who has grown so sick of pain, that she still is in search of her dead child. Many people like the woman of the third perspective face these very real problems and in the world that we live in, we do not always see that. Overall Helena’s story is most powerful to me because it shows a very real situation.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/12/politics/ice-detention/index.html

The Connection Between “The Cariboo Cafe” and Current Events

On By MEENAH HIn Empathy, Mutual Recognition, Short Stories2 Comments

The Cariboo Cafe by Helena Maria Viramontes is a short story that follows three different perspectives, that of two young children named Sonya and Macky, The Cariboo Cafe cook, and an unnamed mother. All three sections of the story share the common connection of the characters ending up at The Cariboo Cafe for a variety of reasons, the most important reason being the influence of society.

In class, we discussed how the true protagonist of The Cariboo Cafe is not a specific character, but rather the society and system as a whole.

The Cariboo Cafe was written in 1984, and during this time was the Central American crisis. Countries such as El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala broke out into civil wars and communist revolutions that created violence and made it extremely dangerous to live in these places.

As a result of this violence, many Central Americans began to seek refuge in the United States for safety, like Sonya and Macky in The Cariboo Cafe.

Today, many people from Mexico and Central American countries are immigrating into the United States for safety and more opportunity, like Sonya and Macky and the unnamed woman in The Cariboo Cafe.

In The Cariboo Cafe, the cook seems to have closed minded opinions about these immigrants, referring to them as “illegals” and “weirdos” (Viramontes 2981).

Today, President Trump has said similar comments about Mexican immigrants, referring to them as “bad hombres” and “rapists” (Ross, Washington Post).

These closed minded and racist ideals from both the cook and President Trump reveal the consistency of American ignorance and how it hasn’t changed in the many decades between these two events.

It shows that Americans need to learn acceptance and empathy towards those who are immigrating to the United States to escape violence and to better themselves and their families.

Works Cited:

“The Cariboo Cafe”, A short story by Maria Helena Viramontes

Ross, Janell. “From Mexican Rapists to Bad Hombres, the Trump Campaign in Two Moments.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 29 Apr. 2019, http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/10/20/from-mexican-rapists-to-bad-hombres-the-trump-campaign-in-two-moments/.

If It Helps, Count Backward: “Black Box” and Trauma

On By Connor DIn Empathy, Power and Identity, Short Stories2 Comments

To me, “Black Box” is not a story about strong women. It is not about gender roles, or sexism. Indeed, it has nothing to do with feminism whatsoever. “Black Box” is about sexual trauma, and the many ways in which it destroys lives.

In the saltwater, our main character is cleansed, but she still doesn’t feel at home in her body. Her body is not hers; it is property of the government, and it exists to fulfill their mission. She floats above herself, conceptualizes herself as a series of tools used to complete a goal.

This dissociation is common among victims of abuse, especially sexual abuse. It’s a coping method. She feels as though she is separate from her body, as though her body is not her own, separating herself from the physical form touched and changed by people in power.

This story is told in sections, presented in black boxes. It separates you from the action, like she is separated from herself. The language itself is very matter-of-fact; it’s emotional without actually expressing much emotion.

And maybe all of this is just my point of view because I know what it’s like to feel like your body is separate from yourself. I know what it’s like to feel as though you are merely piloting your body like a great machine.

What do you think? What is “Black Box” really about?

Mutual Recognition in a Relationship with Domination

On By Micah DIn Empathy, Jessica Benjamin6 Comments

While reading all of these stories, many of them have interesting power dynamics. The Tlic with the Terran in Bloodchild, the designated mate with the beauty spy in Blackbox, the daughter and the mother from Good County People, the old man and the town’s people from the Very Old Man with Enormous Wings and many more. All of those stories contain a relationship between two parties where one is more so dominating the other.

With every story, I was trying to find mutual recognition between them. In Spiderhead was there mutual recognition between the man in charge and the narrator when the narrator had to first say “acknowledge” before anything was done to him? Was there mutual recognition between the narrator’s friend and Ms. Moore in The Lesson when the main character’s friend accepted the lesson? I’m still not sure. I believe that when a more powerful figure allows their less powerful counterpart a “choice,” it is not mutual recognition. I believe is more so them still lording their power over the other. Like saying “I will give a choice to make you feel like you have power,” but that way, they’re still in power but now only manipulating emotions.

If mutual recognition means that one party sees the other as an equal, I feel like majority of these stories lack that. But if mutual recognition simply means that one party sees the other as an individual with valid feelings and thoughts but still decides to lord power over the other, then the stories do have that. I’m not sure if mutual recognition is up to interpretation, but I believe that if something were to *mutually* recognize another thing, then it would have to see it as an equal being.