Cornel West on Aggressive Militarism

I picked up Cornel West's Democracy Matters again yesterday. In the first chapter, he identifies "the rise of three dominating, antidemocratic dogmas":

1. free-market fundamentalism

2. aggressive militarism

3. escalating authoritarianism

On the second point he writes:

The second prevailing dogma of our time is aggressive militarism, of which the new policy of preemptive strike against potential enemies is but an extension. This new doctrine of U.S. foreign policy goes far beyond our former doctrine of preventive war. It green-lights political elites to sacrifice U.S. soldiers - who are disproportionately working class and youth of color - in adventurous crusades. This dogma posits military might as salvific in a world in which he who has the most and biggest weapons is the most moral and masculine, hence worthy of policing others. In practice, this dogma takes the form of unilateral intervention, colonial invasion, and armed occupation abroad. It has fueled a foreign policy that shuns multilateral cooperation of nations and undermines international structures of deliberation. Fashioned out of the cowboy mythology of the American frontier fantasy, the dogma of aggressive militarism is a lone-ranger strategy that employs "spare-no-enemies" tactics. It guarantees a perennial resorting to the immoral and base manner of settling conflict, namely, the perpetration of the very sick and cowardly terrorism it claims to contain and eliminate. On the domestic front, this dogma expands police power, augments the prison-industrial complex, and legitimates unchecked male power (and violence) at home and in the workplace. It views crime as a monstrous enemy to crush (targeting poor people) rather than as an ugly behavior to change (by addressing the conditions that often encourage such behavior).

As with the bully on the block, one's own interest and aims define what is moral and one's anxieties and insecurities dictate what is masculine. Yet the use of naked forced to resolve conflict often backfires. The arrogant hubris that usually accompanies this use of force tends to lead toward instability - and even destruction - in the regions where we have sought to impose our will. Violence is readily deployed by those who cloak themselves in innocence - those unwilling to examine themselves and uninterested in counting the number of innocent victims they kill. Note the Bush administration's callous disregard for both the U.S. soldiers and innocent Iraqis killed in our recent adventurous invasion. The barbaric abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghuraib is a flagrant example. -pg. 5-6

Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against Imperialism by Dr. Cornel West

ebaadenews.blogspot.com

CORNEL WEST (Part 1 of 7)

We must never allow our suffering to blind us to other people's suffering.

A little while ago tonight, a friend shared with me a story of discrimination against him by an activist professor... I remembered, remind myself and any readers, echoing Cornel West, that we must never allow our suffering to blind us to other people's suffering.

-pg. 25 of Hope on a Tightrope: Words and Wisdom and pg. 50 of Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, A Memoir.

inspiration

When I went home to Sacramento that Christmas of my freshman year, I hooked up with Glenn Jordan, my close friend who had been president of Sac High the same year I served as president of Kennedy. Glenn had fought with me for Black studies back when we were seniors, and then gone off to Stanford. Naturally, we compared notes about our first months in college.

"Corn," said Glenn, "there's a man at Stanford who's changed everything for me. He's everything I want to be."

"Who is he?" I asked.

"St. Clair Drake. He's amazing. He's inspired me like no one else. He's a black intellectual conversant with any idea you can throw at him. At the same time, Corn, he's filled with humility. His fundamental aim is to connect the life of the mind to the struggle for freedom. He's grounded in the struggle for black freedom, but he's also a universalist who embraces all people. He's a professor. And that's what I intend to be. A professor."

At that moment, something clicked. Something turned. Something changed. I had entered Harvard pre-law, mainly on Mom's suggestion. But I really hadn't given it much thought. I hadn't really considered a major or, beyond that, a vocation. Until now. Now, in a moment that I can only call transformational, I was feeling the miraculous passion that professor St. Clair Drake had passed on to Glenn.

A teacher. A professor. Connecting the life of the mind to the struggle for freedom. That was it. That would be my life. And just as on that day in the winter of 1961 when, with Brother Cliff, I committed to the gospel of Jesus Christ, on this winter day of 1970 I committed to the vocation of teaching. From that time forward, I have never veered from either commitment.-pg. 59 of Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, A Memoir.

Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud

Just came back from the first stop of the book tour for Dr. Cornel West's latest Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, A Memoir.

At the bookstore (said to be the largest one (by floor space) in the country - the Barnes and Nobles on 17th street in Union Square in Manhattan), he shared reflections on his life and answered questions and was, as usual, inspiring and passionate.

I, of course, had to get the book (autographed copy :)) Here's a passage from pg. 5:

But what does it mean to be a bluesman in the life of the mind? Like my fellow musicians, I've got to forge a unique style and voice that expresses my own quest for truth and love. That means following the quest wherever it leads and bearing whatever cost is required. I must break through isolated academic frameworks while, at the same time, I must build on the best of academic knowledge. I must fuel the fire of my soul so my intellectual blues can set others on fire. And most importantly. I must be a free spirit. I must unapologetically reveal my broken life as a thing of beauty.

Dr. Cornel West on "The Crisis of Contemporary American Religion"

"American religious life - despite its weekly rituals and everyday practices - is shot through with existential emptiness. This emptiness - or lack of spiritual depth - results from the excessive preoccupation with isolated personal interests and atomistic individual concerns in American religious life. These interests and concerns unduly accommodate the status quo by mirroring the privatism and careerism rampant in American society. Like so much of American culture, exorbitant personalistic and individualistic preoccupations in America religion yield momentary stimulation rather than spiritual sustenance, sentimental self-flagellation rather than sacrificial self-denial. Needless to say, these accomodationalist forms of religion fit well with the thriving consumerism, narcissism and hedonism in the country. Religion becomes one more stimulant in a culture addicted to stimulation - a stimulation that fuels consumption and breeds existential emptiness. In this way, postmodern American culture attempts to eliminate spiritual depth, disseminate stimulatory surfaces, flatten out transcendence into titillation and replace the sense of the mystery of existence with that of the self's feelings of intensity (usually of the orgiastic sort). Accomodationalist forms of religion usually aid and abet this postmodern condition, thereby surreptitiously prohibiting the very existential state they claim to produce - namely, spiritual depth."

-from the introductory remarks to Prophetic Fragments by Dr. Cornel West and also quoted on pg. 357-8 of The Cornel West Reader

the frontline by cornel west

a lot of brothers and sisters

have the wrong conception

of the frontline

they believe the front line is gang banging on the streets

stealing with the underground drug industry

but the real frontline is

on the home front

with sisters and brothers

but especially sisters of all colors

caring for the precious children

often putting up with our male myth

the real front line is

working people fighting against

unaccountable corporate power

with its obscene levels of wealth inequality

the real frontline

citizens of all colors fighting against arbitrary police power

the criminal justice system that

oversees black people being convicted

for seventy percent of the drug sentences

but commit only twelve percent of the drug crimes

the real frontline is not just here

but around the world

its struggle against AIDS in Africa

its in solidarity with Mexican workers

Colombian peasants, Iraqi babies

brothers and sisters in East Timur and Tibet

the real frontlines

are memories

of those who sacrificed themselves on the battlefields

first to die, last to be honored

on the frontline

we hold up the blood stained banner for justice and freedom

on the frontline

we challenge athletes, entertainers, professors

doctors, lawyers,

pharmacists

to be on the frontline

don’t sell your soul

for a mess of pottage

stay on

the frontline

[Track on the companion CD to Dr. West's most recent book Hope on a Tightrope: Words and Wisdom]

Martin and Malcolm Slideshow with Dr. Cornell West and Imam Zaid Shakir

This special slideshow is taken from the DVD, “Malcolm and Martin: Implications of their Legacies for the Future”.

Featuring a spoken word performance of Dr. Cornell West’s critically acclaimed piece, “3Ms”

This slideshow features photos taken from the December 2005 event in Oakland, California.