After The Plague: Thoughts? Why did Camus right this?

I have to say, I was not as big of a fan of this book as I was The Stranger. However I still think that it is an important book and Camus makes a lot of good points in it. I also have to say that I totally called that the narrator was Rieux. I think the big give away is that Rieux has a very characteristic sort of voice. That of cool logic masking fervent emotion and passion. He is obviously passionate about certain things but very good at not letting the expression of those emotions get in the way of logical goals. The narrator had a very similar tone to me. The whole "I have opinions on what happened but I'm not going to tell them to you overtly." thing. And then ends up conveying his emotions anyway more subtly through his use of language. That was just something I had been thinking about and noticing throughout the book.

It's hard to really say why Camus wrote this. I did just make that post about themes of the book, and obviously those were things he wanted to comment on, and more importantly, have the rest of society be aware of and think about and for their own opinions. I think the book as a whole illustrates some of the same absurdist ideas that The Stranger did. Camus does actually make several allusions to that work throughout The Plague. He goes about it differently though. I think partly Camus wants the readers of this book to get thinking about what they would do in a situation like this and how they would react, looking at the reactions of Camus's characters. And that hopefully leads to deeper thought about human nature in general and our reaction to disaster, and our relationship to the various themes in the book.

The Plague Themes

After finishing The Plague, I'm going to discuss some of the themes of the book. There are really four that my group decided to focus on for our presentation and talked about more in class, but there are many more. This book is pretty multi-layered (like an onion, or an ogre), and I think it's open to a lot of interpretations as far as the main idea of certain sections.
Obviously, death/mortality is a big one. Rambert asks us at a point in the novel if man is an idea. What he's really getting at is what is the lasting effect of the life of one man, and more importantly the death of one man, on everybody else. Camus asks us in The Plague to evaluate our relationship with death, and how it changes when we are surrounded by it. There's a common saying that the death of one man is a tragedy, but the death of many people is a statistic. I think in The Plague, the citizens of Oran progress through many different stages in coping with the epidemic and the death it brings. It eventually grows from suspicion and disbelief, to horror and fear, to reckless abandon and carelessness. They eventually become very desensitized to the idea of death and many welcome it.
I also think that Cottard plays a big role in establishing the mortality theme. He tries to take his own life before the onset of the plague. We later find out why. But it is effective at illustrating the very different relationships that people can have with death.
Camus wants us to think about that relationship, not only with our own death, but with the death of others. What does it matter if we die? What does it matter if everyone else in the town dies? He's not saying it doesn't matter, he just wants us to really think about it, and what to do about it.

The Plague by Camus-Is Man an Idea?

On Page 162 of The Plague, Rambert says that he would rather die for love than for an idea. Rieux tells him, "Man isn't an idea, Rambert", to which Rambert replies that he is. In this scene, I think Rambert is really trying to justify his actions to the other two men. He is trying to show them that maybe he is greedy, but it is better than trying to play the hero.
The way I see it, Rambert knows that Rieux and Tarrou are dying for people they don't love, that they hardly even know. And he doesn't see the point in it, other than trying to be a hero, which he doesn't believe in and actually seems to view as a sort of easy way out. He is not trying to say that he's better than them for wanting to be with the woman he loves, but he definitely doesn't, or is trying to convince himself that he doesn't, see himself as somehow less than the other men because he values people he loves more than the "idea" of people.
I don't think he is trying to argue that man is inherently nothing but an idea, but I think he's trying to argue that he can become one. Tarrou and Rieux are dying for an idea. They like the idea of helping people and saving lives. Rambert also says that man is a "precious small [idea], once he turns his back on love". It kind of goes back to an idea that is central to Camus, that life may have meaning once you give it meaning. For Rambert, that is love. If there is no love, then there is no real substance, just an idea, and a weak one at that. I would have to say that I disagree, but I can see where he is coming from.

Civic Duty: All People Should...

Note: This is a WAY longer post than I was originally intending, and for that I say I'm SORRY, and also good luck.

Ah, this is a tricky question. I think everybody has various ideas of what all people should do or should not do, and it varies from the idea that everybody should help those less fortunate than themselves, to the idea that everybody should be working from 9 to 5, to the outdated and inherently misogynistic idea of "chivalry". Whether or not people's expectations of others or of themselves in society are reasonable is another question. 

I thought about what my response to this blog was going to be for a long time (we're talking more than the usual 30 seconds), and it was hard for me to pinpoint some "civic duty" that I think all people should follow. At first I thought, well, everybody should obey laws. But there are a lot of laws that I think are outdated, or discriminatory, and would support civil disobedience in those cases. I also thought about manners in public, like not taking up three seats on the bus with all your shopping bags and forcing people to stand there next to you. This didn't really seem very urgent though, or like it qualified as "civics". That's just more about meeting the basic standards of being a decent human being. 

Later in the day, I was scrolling through facebook, and seeing all the red equal signs that people had changed their profile pictures too in an effort to show their support for marriage equality. Now, obviously the rights of gender/sexual minorities is super important to me because, you know, I am one, and everything. But I have a bone to pick with those equal signs. Because I have an even bigger bone (is that a thing that people say, it is now) to pick with the Human Rights Campaign, which is who is behind all of this. 

The HRC fits in nicely with the tradition of people claiming that they are supporting LGBTQ+ rights, and then promptly ignoring anything in that acronym except for the G, and MAYBE the L. This is apparent even in the fact that most people just refer to same sex marriage as "gay marriage", of the rights of the whole community as "gay rights". The HRC is run by awful transphobes, and racists. And people don't seem to realize this when they stick a blue and yellow equal sign on their backpack, or change their profile picture to a little red graphic, and then go "Well! I've done my part for the gays!"

And now, the point of all of this, which you are probably wondering about by now. People have a duty to society to educate themselves. To ask questions. To take a step back and think about what's going on in the world around them, and do their research, before blindly following leaders. I didn't mean to go all angry radical feminist queer on everyone but this is a pretty good example of what i'm talking about. We can only do so much to educate others, at some point people have to take initiative and figure out the meaning behind the information they receive, and what to do with it once it's in their heads.

That said, here's a link if you want to read more about what I was talking about in this post. Educate yourselves!

Is Poverty a Choice?

Poverty comes in many forms. And, there are many reasons for poverty. Some people fall into poverty because of lack of education, or lack of opportunities. Others are forced into poverty because of disabilities. There are a very small number of people who, yes, choose to become poor, and choose to stay poor, and are fully aware of what they're doing. The people of Southie are good example of a group of people who may appear to outsiders to be "choosing" their poverty. It looks like they're not trying. But it appears to me that a lot of the people in Southie and in other areas like it don't even really know what they're doing. They don't think of themselves as "poor", and they're not ready to accept that status. They turn their heads away from what ius going on around them and continue to label their neighborhood as "the best place in the world". Who would want to leave the best place in the world?
I think that this mindset is fairly common, especially in white working class neighborhoods like Southie. Most people don't choose poverty. If they appear to do so, it's probably because they don't think of themselves as in poverty.
The thing about getting out of poverty is that it means first acknowledging that you're lower on the ladder than almost everyone else, and that can be a pretty tough thing to do for a lot of people.

Malcolm X (chapters 1-12)

In the first half of the book we see Malcolm X go through a huge transformation. In prison he is uneducated. He is angry, but his anger needs direction. Then, something happens. He starts reading. He reads! He starts with copying words out of the dictionary, and then moves on to the history books. In reading this history, he learns more about his people and the great injustices that have occurred against them. This is what gives his anger direction and gives him the ability to become a completely different man.
Later, speaking of this experiences, Malcolm describes it as more valuable than any college education. I think that for him this is true. In prison he had far less distractions than he would have in college. Also, he could focus in on what was important to him. Any college he would have been attending would not have held lectures on the crimes of white people against other races, or the true history of the american slave, or any of the other things Malcolm X was most interested in finding out about. He would have been most likely taught a curriculum that was set out for him by a white man. He says that his "alma mater was books". Books are a really viable form of education that can teach you valuable things that you wouldn't be learning about otherwise.
Not that everybody should chose the education of a prison library over college, but in some instances self-education through a medium such as books with little distractions like those present on a college campus can be the best method.

King: Still King?

The short answer is yes. King is still king. Or rather, he should be. There is still a great need in our society for people like MLK who are willing to fight against racism. Some people have this crazy notion that we are living in a "post-racial" society. Honestly, nothing makes me angrier than that idea. I think most of the people using the term "post-racial" are privileged people who benefit either indirectly or directly from the racism still very present in society, and see no reason to change it. 

It almost seems like after Malcolm X died, after King died, after the civil rights act was passed, people stopped fighting. Not that there aren't people fighting, but it isn't on as massive a scale as it needs to be. Race is still an issue. The blase attitude towards racist has gotten worse as time has gone on. We're in a new millenium, we don't need to worry about race anymore, right? Or you know, it's not really an issue anymore. Or it's not as bad as it was a long time ago. You can tell that to the millions of people in this country still facing race-related discrimination as violence. 

I think it can be easy for a lot of people, especially white people who are blinded by our privilege  to put on this air with regards to race that it's something that's already been dealt with. But it's not. We need people like King still. We need them now more than ever to show everybody that the war hasn't been won yet.

Music Review: The Russian Futurists - Our Thickness

The Russian Futurists are a lo-fi indie pop band from Toronto. The band consists of just one member, Matthew Hart (with additional members for live shows). He recorded his first three albums (The Method of Modern Love, Let's  Get Ready to Crumble, and Our Thickness) in the bedroom of his Toronto home, which gives the music a very raw, un-polished feel. His fourth album was the first to be recorded in a studio, and honestly I don't think it has the same effect as his earlier albums. The music style is kind of hard to describe. It's generally given the labels of lo-fi, or indie-electronica though. Russian Futurists songs are characterized by fairly catchy pop melodies played on keyboard, with slightly distorted vocals, and other keyboard sound effects. Personally, my favorite album is his third release, Our Thickness. It's not quite as cohesive as their other two albums perhaps, but to me every song is just really solid and it makes for an overall super enjoyable album. However, the first two albums are really great as well, and his first album has been praised by critics and some high profile artists like Graham Coxon and Peter Buck. Although Our Thickness is my favorite album, i'd have to say my favorite song is either this, from Let's Get Ready to Crumble:

or this, from The Method of Modern Love:

and if that isn't enough for you, here's my favorite song from Our Thickness too, because why not:

Overall, I just think that the Russian Futurists are one of those bands that, though they've had great critical recognition, deserve a lot more than the minimal commercial success that they've received so far. They're fiercely underrated.

The Direction of the Class

So far, I'm really enjoying this class. It's sort of difficult for me to pick out weak points because overall I think it's been pretty great. However, I do think I can come up with some suggestions as to make it even better, hopefully.

I think some of the strong points of the class are the blogs, and the system of small and large group discussions. I think they're pretty effective ways of getting everybody thinking about the material in some ways that maybe they hadn't considered when first reading it.

First off, i'm not going to name any names, but I think the class discussion has been dominated by a few people and has not been inclusive enough. This could be the fault of the class at large for not speaking up enough, but whatever the cause of it is, I think we need to establish some sort of system to make sure that everybody's input is being heard by the rest of the class, besides just with the blogs.

I also think that it would be a good idea to analyze more outside sources related to what we're reading. I thought that reading the article about Ward's Stranger translation and the Myth of Sisyphus gave me some helpful insight into some philosophical points related to The Stranger and Albert Camus. It would be really enlightening to get other perspectives on the texts we read.

Camus and Voltaire are voting for...

I think as far as Camus is concerned this is a trick question. Camus is a bit of an absurdist, so I don't think he would cast his vote at all. He sees certain acts that society values as meaningful as essentially meaningless. Existance is absurd, and whether or not he votes won't make a huge difference in the long run. He is one man and the act of him voting doesn't mean anything or serve any purpose. Or at least that's would I believe he would think.
As for Voltaire, he has often satarized the lives of rich men and people who are born into wealth and nobility. Mitt Romney fits this bill pretty well. I also think that Voltaire was more into the idea of power in people to choose and against the government having too much power and controlling people. Voltaire also, though religious himself, chastised the church and religion constantly for being hypocrtical. This would probably cause him to be more likely to vote Democrat, because they have less of a history of letting their religion govern their politics and of hipocrisy, though this is present for both parties. Voltaire would most likely vote for President Obama but view him as the lesser of two evils.

Our Stranger Meaning

This is probably the hardest sounding blog I've had to write for this class. The meaning of life? Yeesh. But I guess when taken at a more individual level the question becomes easier to swallow. What gives my life meaning? I guess I haven't given it too much thought before know. I've sat here considering it and it's kind of hard to put into words. I think for most people life is about personal fullfillment whether this comes from helping others, or pleasure, or financial success, or whatever. For me there are a few things that give me personal fullfillment, but I think the main one is closeness to nature. That sounds silly coming from someone who lives in Chicago and takes the subway to school every day, but it's true. Not to mention that I haven't always lived in this "concrete jungle". For me, I may not think about it all the time, but some of the most "meaningful" moments of my life have been standing on top of peaks, or in the midst of redwoods, or wading through a river. I mean, everyone agrees that certain places and aspects of nature are beautiful, but I feel like there's nothing that makes me feel more fullfilled than nature. It amazes more than just in its beauty.  It's part of the reason why I think I want to be an environmental scientist, I want to be closer to what I love and what gives me meaning. I'm not exactly sure why its so fullfilling and meaningful to me, but what I know is that it makes me content and at peace on a level that nothing else has, and it's immensely important to me, so I suppose it's the closest thing to meaning that I can think of.

Does Candide's Punishment Fit the Crime?

In this post I'll focus on one of Candide's first punishments, which he recieved from the bulgar army after attempting to run away. They gave him the choice of being flogged many times by the entire army or being shot in the head. Foolish, naive Candide chose the flogging over the short quick death. This, of course, turned out to be a mistake and Candide begged for death after only a short while. The punishment that Candide recieved from the Bulgars was not appropriate to the crime. It was much too harsh. It shows the brutish nature of war and the army that Voltaire belives and is trying to point out. Later in the story, Candide almost gets burned at an auto-de-fe in Portugal by clergy members. That punishment obviously did not fit the crime (Candide didn't even really have a crime), and it is included because Voltaire is trying to point out the hypocrisy in institutionalized religion (yet again).

How Do I Know What I Know?

My immediate thought when I read the title of this blog was of Death. Death is something I knew about and understood only vaguely after I found out about it at some point in my childhood. However, it was always a distant concept, and one that only affected my loosely and indirectly, if at all. I didn't think about it much, and I can't even remember the point where I found out about Death, and how it is inexorable for everybody. In trying to remember the point that this realization occurred, I was reminded of this quote from the book Wicked, where the Wicked Witch's son (possibly), Liir, is questioned by the mean-spirited children of Fiyero's widow, Sarima (and possibly his half-siblings) on the roof of the castle of Kiamo Ko:

***

"Is the broom magic?" said Manek to Liir.

"Yes. It can sweep the floor real fast." 

"Can it talk? Is it enchanted? What does it say?"
They got more interested, and Liir bloomed and blushed under their curiosity. "I can't tell. It's a secret."

"Is it still a secret if we push you off the tower?"
Liir considered. "What do you mean?"

"Will you tell us or we'll do it."

"Don't push me off the tower, you oafs."

"If the broom is magic it'll come flying by and save you. Besides, you're so fat you'll probably bounce."

Irji and Nor laughed at that, despite themselves. It made a very funny picture in their minds.

"We only want to know what secrets the broom says to you," said Manek with a big smile. "So tell us. Or we'll push you off."

...

Liir's face had, in a matter of moments, developed deep black pockets under the eyes. He held his hands down by his sides like a traitor at a court marshall. "The Witch'll be so mad at you that she'll hate you."

"I don't think so," said Manek, taking a step forward. "She won't care. She likes the monkey more than she likes you. She won't even notice if you're dead." 

Liir gasped for air. Although he had just peed, the front of his baggy trousers turned dark with wet. "Look, Irji," said Manek, and his older brother looked. "He's not even very good at being alive, is he? It's not like he's even very good at being alive is he? It's not like it would be much of a loss. Come on, Liir, tell me. What did the damned broom say to you?"

Liir's upper torso was going in and out like a bellows. He whispered, "The broom told me--that--that--you're all going to die!"

"Oh, is that all," said Manek. "We already knew that. Everybody dies. We knew that already."

"You did?" said Liir, who hadn't. 

"Come on," said Irji, "come on, let's catch some mice in the pantry and we can cut off their tails and use Nor's magic straw to prick their eyes."

***

That passage had always been really striking to me. The fact that Liir, who had grown up for seven years with only the silent and sullen Elphaba (the Wicked Witch) and a community of Unionist Maunts for company, had simply no idea that everybody died. Then, confronted with the information gathered from the broom, and the prospect of his own death, he was forced into this realization. In the sequel, Son of  a Witch, this realization is solidified seven years later by the experience of Elphaba's death in the hands of the stranger Dorothy. This is the first time that Liir is coming into contact with Death, the first time that somebody he is at least sort of closed to, or somebody he depends on, is really gone. Although the other inhabitants of the castle (the children, Sarima, and her five sisters) had been captured earlier by the Wizard's army, he at least had some hope of their return.

Liir's experience shows that there are basically two ways that we gain information. We can learn it by first hand experience, or we can learn it by what we're told, or second hand experience. In Liir's case, it was both, and I think that's how it goes for a lot of people with knowledge, especially Death. A better title for this blog would be How Do I Understand What I Know?, really. We know what we know from what we're told at a young age. It's not until we grow older and experience things for ourselves, until life happens to us, that we can fully understand what we know.

In my case, I didn't fully grasp the notion of imminent Death until my cousin died earlier this year. She passed away after losing a long battle with heroin addiction. She was 24 and died alone in a motel room, leaving behind a husband and four children. Her funeral was the first that i've ever cried at.

Her death was jolting for me. I felt like Liir, bewildered, wide eyed, trying to make sense of unexpected  and frankly terrifying events. Except I didn't pee my pants. 

The unexamined life is not worth living? and a modern day gadfly

Or so says Socrates. According to him, if you aren't constantly asking the big philosophical questions about life, and specifically your life, then what are you even doing still? Your life has no purpose. He didn't exactly say it in those words, but still. This is his argument for why we should all have philosophy, and all be questioning and examining. While I think that it's true that become more knowledgable and understanding things more fully sometimes leads to a more fulfilling life, I still do think that ignorance is bliss. Being happy with your lot in life and never questioning anything probably isn't morally satisfying for a lot of people. However, if it is, I say knock yourself out. I think a lot of us kind of wish we could be living in ignorance. Because while knowledge is power, a lot of the time it is also pain. I understand, however, that this isn't exactly what Socrates meant. He knows it can be painful, he shows that with the story he originally spoke of (although Plato wrote it down, yes), the Allegory of the Den. He knows that the unexamined life can be blissful and content, but it's still not worth living when you're not actually experiencing "Truth". But I'd still take contentedness over truth any day. Maybe one's existence is only a shadow of reality, but if it's a happy existence, I think it's worth living, and the choice of whether or not that person wants to take the risk of experiencing what is true and shaking that existence to the ground is their choice.

Okay, now for the second question. Who do I think is a modern-day gadfly? I suppose the person in my life who would most resemble that would be my father. Which is probably a sort of generic answer but I mean really, he's always questioning my brothers and I. He wants to make sure we're not blindly assuming or believing things that we haven't fully examined. Whenever I make a large statement about my beliefs or philosophy or otherwise, I become subject to thorough questioning and challenging from my father. It can be annoying sometimes, and it can shake me when he asks a question that I don't know how to answer, and then I have to rethink that statement. However, it's one of those "you'll thank me for this one day" deals, I'm pretty sure. It's caused me to be more wary of everything I'm told and everything I tell others.

Eulogy

So, we're all gathered here to mourn the loss of one Andrea Wilberding. But not really, since I'm writing this in present tense so it won't sound like much of a eulogy. Anyway. She goes by Andy and is a high school senior. Anyone who met her freshman year knows that she was exceedingly annoying during that time so we're going to pretend that that whole year didn't exist. Anyhow, what can I say about her? She has a number of passions, the strongest of these most likely being music. Music has always been very important to her, and she's been playing viola for almost 8 years now and is acceptable on a few other instruments, like violin and guitar. Listening to music is something that she does whenever she's not playing music. Another one of her passions is concerning the outdoors. She's been backpacking since she was eight and has hiked and backpacked in a number of different states. She's spent most of her childhood and young adulthood reading. She may not have had many friends when she was young, but it was pretty much just because she liked books a lot better than real people. Nowadays she still reads frequently (although she likes people a little more now-seriously, I'm friendly, I promise). If she had to choose a favorite book it would probably come down to Wicked by Gregory Maguire or American Gods by Neil Gaiman. She lives on the south side of Chicago and has two parents, two younger brothers, and a dog (She loves the dog the most). She's a bit of a nerd (well, more than a bit) when it comes to certain topics, like literature, science, and music. She's heavily involved in GSA and various other queer rights-related activities. Other things she enjoys but probably wouldn't be considered passions include certain video games, laughing at sketch comedy shows and bad 70s sitcoms, watching shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and, funnily enough, blogging. I guess this post ended up sounded more like some sort of weird internet dating site description than a eulogy...which is less than desirable but it's pretty hard to write a eulogy about yourself in the third person present tense. So there we have it.