These two articles touch on issues that I’m very passionate about and that I’ve always connected. As a result, I’m very happy that we read them both at the same time because now I get a chance to sort out my thoughts by writing about them together.  The two articles brought to mind two of my favorite philosophers, two men that most people would not think to group together. 

The first one of those philosophers is Socrates, who always seems to end up surfacing in my writing.  In Minnich’s article, she actually references Socrates by name, which I laughed at because I had already made a note that I wanted to write about him for my blog response before I read that part.  She argues that the activity of thinking should be “exploratory” and “suggestive,” rather than the goal-oriented fact-seeking brand of intellectual thought that is preached in schools today (Minnich 20).  I completely and totally agree with her argument.  The reason Socrates has always been so fascinating to me is because of his idea that one can only be wise if he knows he is not.  He lived a live driven by continually questioning himself and everything around him.  Although he almost always reached a conclusion of “I don’t know,” he was wiser than all those around him because he was so open-minded towards learning.  Socrates would fail out of school today with the way our education system is set up.  Everything about education in our society is finite, from memorizing facts out of textbooks to calculating GPA.  In my opinion—which I share with Minnich—we’ve lost sight of what education means.  Instead of memorizing facts, we should be learning to think and reason with an open mind, so as to better ourselves individually and as a society.  As Minnich puts it, “Independent, open minds that regard knowledge and skills as resources to be used for responsible purposes, rather than possessions to be exploited for personal gain and power, remain all too rare” (Minnich 21).  So, the question is how did this happen? How did we move from Socratic dialogue to textbooks and scantrons?

The answer, which is addressed by Barber in “The Lost Art of Cooperation,” as well as Marx (the second philosopher that I was referring to earlier), is the rise of individualism.  I wouldn’t go so far as to call myself a communist, but I strongly agree with the Marxist idea that we’ve let capitalism and its intrinsic individualistic nature take control of our society.  Barber’s article brought back to my mind all of the realizations that I had after reading the Communist Manifesto.  All of the major aspects of life today are dictated by competition, not just the education system.  Barber also managed to make me realize just how relevant this is to our core questions: “Even the American understanding of democracy, which emphasizes representation and the collision of interests, puts the focus on division and partisanship.”  So, maybe it’s not capitalism.  Maybe it’s the way we define democracy today.  Maybe if we just remembered that the purpose of democracy is people working together to better themselves as a whole, then we would be able to get back to thinking like Socrates.  Unfortunately, that brings it all back to our favorite question: “How do we reclaim our democracy?”

-Will Armour

Since the majority of the interesting claims that Chafe makes at the end of his book were not only referenced, but analyzed, by Randy Johnston in his letter to Impact Greensboro, I am able to focus more directly on Johnston’s letter as a medium for analyzing this fascinating idea of “The Progressive Myth.”  I really liked the fact that Johnston started off his letter by discussing the idea of the “exercise of power” in society, meaning the behind-the-scenes system of how decisions are made.  Understanding this idea is essential to understanding his argument that the supposed progressive civic movement in Greensboro is a myth, fabricated and nurtured by the powers that be. 

The example that stuck out to me in his letter was on the third page (Printing made his 1-page letter into an 11-page letter) when he discussed consumerism: “Since our economy is driven by consumer spending, a key part of popular culture promotes consumerism—at the expense of citizenship.  Popular culture tells us that we need to buy more and more things to demonstrate our human value, we don’t need to think critically and build genuine relationships across the community and act collectively” (Johnston 3).  What he’s saying is that powerful institutions don’t benefit from open-minded conversation and relationships, they benefit from people spending money; therefore, our culture is controlled by consumerism.  And therein lies the systemic, institutional power.

So, even if I accept this idea that there is a secret network of institutions that make decisions for me even when I don’t realize it, and I accept the assertion that the institutions that control Greensboro have created this false notion that the city is progressive, the devil’s advocate in me wonders, “What’s so bad about that?”  To me, the idea of this ‘Progressive Establishment’ consistently pumping out hope by making people believe that Greensboro is moving in the right direction is pretty clever.  Positivity can be contagious, even if it has false origins.  One would think that something like that could quickly turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy.  So what’s the problem?

Luckily, Johnston had an answer.  As he explains, taking off of Chafe’s thorough investigation, Nelson Johnson is a prime example of how the Progressive Establishment has become a hindrance to the very progress it claims to seek: “There was a period in the mid to late 90’s when the Progressive Establishment began building a working relationship with some of the people who had previously been defined by the Progressive Myth as unforgivable villain-extremists because of their involvement in November 3^rd…But then the Truth and Reconciliation project surfaced, bringing November 3^rd back into play.  The Power Structure restarted the operating system in villain-extremist alert mode…During this period, Nelson Johnson has once again been portrayed by the Progressive Establishment as villainous and extremist” (Johnston 5).  So, as long as the ‘Establishment’ is happy, things are peaceful in ‘Shangri-la,’ but the second that it loses control this ‘Progressive Establishment’ throws everything to wind: progress, the people, and democracy altogether. 

The way that Greensboro’s controlling forces dealt with Nelson Johnson and the TRC is explicit evidence of systemic institutional power being exercised—at the expense of individuals—in order to maintain status quo and avoid conflict.  However, contrary to its intent, it actually reinforced the racial conflict that continually stems from the issues that the ‘Establishment’ won’t allow the community to talk about.  Where is the progress in that?

So, in answer to my devil’s advocate self, the problem is that civic progress can only truly be civic progress if the civilians are the ones who want it, enact it, and embody it themselves.  The institutions can’t be the ones in control of deciding what progress means.  Giving a voice to the people through open-minded democratic discussion is the only way to start making progress toward solving the issues that plague Greensboro.  However, bringing that to fruition will require civic action.  It will require people like Randy Johnston to make responsible, concerted efforts in order to pull away the progressive façade.  Only then can the progressive movement in Greensboro begin in earnest.  

 -Will Armour

Devon Currie

Minnich differentiates “thinking” from other types of learning by calling thinking “exploratory” and “suggestive” (20), and stating that thinking is a constant, questioning process. Thinking is good for democracy because “The activity of thinking prefigures, prepares for, and lets us practice the freedom of mind we require to exercise discerning judgment while living among people who differ from us” (20). In other words, thinking in Minnich’s sense of the term forces us to explore alternate worldviews from our own, making us more amenable to such viewpoints in others. Indeed, she says that “thinking cannot be considered a luxury for the few if we would be a democracy” (24). Thinking is necessary for a democracy to function properly. She still acknowledges the importance of learning factual knowledge, but sees it as a medium for teaching thinking itself, or a useful tool when implementing one’s own opinions or conclusions. The facts themselves, she states, are meaningless if they are not shared and discussed.                It’s hard to argue with what Minnich puts forth: of course it would be good if we taught our society’s children how to think critically about the world they lived in and the things they learned. Then maybe we would make fewer mistakes, have better communication with each other, and have a more politically-engaged society. But I think I’ll play devil’s advocate here. What if our society runs better without people examining the facts too closely? If everyone learned critical thinking skills and applied them to everyday life, might we and our government become so inundated with such a variety of ideas that it would become impossible to take them all into consideration? Might we become a nation of “thinkers” instead of “doers” (to the extent that we can be called “doers” now)? Might “thinking” in the long term just slow us down?                 On another note, Benjamin Barber discusses the role of competition in America (it’s big). Because our society is so individualistic, we focus more on the divisions between us than on what unites us. For example, Barber states that entertainment, sports, and politics – America’s “favorite activities” (56) center around competition and the identification of winners and losers. In this all-encompassing, deeply-ingrained system, “winners lose perspective and put themselves above sexual norms, above ordinary standards, above the law” (59). This leads to celebrity excesses we see in the tabloids, athletes on steroids, and dirty politics. Besides creating a cutthroat and very weird society, this competition “threatens real democracy” by “distort[ing] and unhinge[ing] our common lives and slights the necessary role of cooperation and community in securing liberty” (59). We end up thinking that winning is the pinnacle of our existence, instead of working to the benefit of the community as a whole- which, ironically, might benefit us more than an individual win. In the corporate world, we see this played out as an excess of competition. When one corporation is such a winner that it buys out other corporations and works toward creating a monopoly for itself and its product, the consumer in effect has less choice- there is less competition. As a solution, Barber proposes the creation of a truly representative legislative body, but he fails to explain it in any detail.                Again, it is hard to disagree with Barber’s viewpoint. I would really like to know more about the system of proportional representation that he has in mind which will eliminate the specter of competition from our society. Without more details, what comes to my mind is Young’s “city” model. I could see Barber being very amenable to that idea, and I think that if it worked, it would accomplish his goals of greater cooperation without resorting to communism (which I don’t think he advocates and in any case will almost surely never be implemented in the US). 

Elizabeth Leman

Allie M.

First Takes On Chafe’s Book

The first part of Cafe’s book was especially eye opening for me.  I think there are few who love the state of NC more than my family and me.  We have been settled between Durham and Asheville since the Civil War.  We have seen the rise and decline of the textile and tobacco industries.  Despite this intimate relationship with North Carolina, I never viewed North Carolina as being especially racist or my benefitting from white privilege. 

The community has always existed apart from me.  Decisions are made at the state and local levels but I never paid attention to what they were.  I would not say that I grew up in a utopian world but I do feel that I was raised to think of my world as being post-racial.  Racism existed but far away from me. 

When I look back, I realize that the reason that racism seemed so far away is because there are no black people in my life.  I went to a private school and during my 8^th grade year, we had 8 black students out of a 1200-member student body.  Our neighborhood is (and was then) all white.  The clubs we belonged to were all white.  Because we were Catholic, we were taught that our faith was the universal faith and therefore more diverse than say Lutherans or Episcopalians.  We are also taught that in virtue of being Catholic, we were not privileged…the Catholic Church is the church of Mother Theresa and the poor.  It never struck me to look around and notice that there wasn’t a single person of color in the pews or that the families behind and in front of me were well-educated and pretty well off.  I lived in a bubble even when I came to UNCG.  Because A&T and Bennett College are in the city, there seem to be fewer black students at UNCG than at other colleges.

It never struck me that NC and Greensboro was divided down racial lines.  While I was growing up, I didn’t think of it in terms of the “New South.”  Instead, Greensboro was simply known as “progressive.”  I never thought twice about shopping in the same store as a black person, eating dinner at a table next to a black family, or walking down the street next to a black person.  This was enough for me to say, “what a world of racial harmony!”

This class and the recent elections have opened my eyes to the fact that I live in a white world. I believed by world was integrated.  Just now I am starting to realize that Greensboro is a city that masquerades as progressive but has an ugly diagonal line drawn through the city that separates whites from blacks.  Of course I never have to think of racism when everyone around me looks just like me and we are not “actively” imposing segregation.  “They,” meaning blacks, chose not to be over here with us.  I now see that they don’t have the ability to move around the city like I can and that this has resulted from years of oppression and economic disenfranchisement.  

From the Book

As I read the first few pages of the book concerning the Brown decision and its impact on public schools, I was reminded of a similar situation.  Once The Court handed down the decision, Greensboro agreed that Brown was the law of the land.  To use a cliché that I hate, they said, “It is what it is.”  At the time that the school board agreed to support this new law they didn’t realize the impact and the complicated nature of desegregating the schools.  How many whites would agree with the school board’s resolution?  How many blacks really wanted to move to new schools?  These and many other questions made the desegregation difficult and dirty; not as easy as the school board’s resolution made it seem.

While I was reading this, I was reminded of the Second Vatican Council that was convened in 1962.  Sweeping reforms were made that affected every Catholic.  These were reforms that come along once every 500 years.  When the last session closed in 1965, massive changes were handed down from the Vatican.  Bishops had to immediately inform priests and priests had to implement them in their parishes.  Some of the biggest changes were pulling the altar from the wall and having the priest face the people.   Women no longer had to wear veils in the church, the mass no longer had to be said in Latin, and communion could be received in the hand while standing instead of kneeling.   My parents told me that many churches refused to go along with Vatican II.  Parishes demanded that mass continue to be red in Latin.  Priests refused to face the people during mass.  My mom said of her own church that the bishop had to come into the church with a construction crew and tear the altar off the wall and replace it with a table. 

This reminded me of the implementation of desegregation.  So the court handed a ruling down in the Brown case but the implementing the changes implied by the ruling weren’t so easy to affect on the local level.  The same is true of Vatican II, the Council decided on changes at the Vatican level that were not so easy to affect at the parish level.

Finally, Chafe’s book struck me with something else that I had never considered in my life: white paternalism.  Growing up, A&T was a historically black college with good engineering program and a good marching band.  Never once did it occur to me that leaders of the college might have approached powerful whites, hat in hand, saying, “Mr White Man, can we please have some money to keep our college going?”  These things are “other-worldly” to me.  Because A&T is a historically black college, I just assumed, as I’m sure many white people do, that the school just took care of itself.

The first part of Chafe’s book reinforced the things that I have recently learned about my city and myself.  I live a far more insulated life than I once thought.  The city of Greensboro is divided because of decades of economic oppression in the black community.  The implementation of desegregation was not as cut and dry as just handing down the Brown ruling.  Finally, Chafe makes me realize that the impact of the civil rights movement is something that is still in flux today.  I can no longer talk about desegregation and civil rights in some distant and abstract manner like I would talk about the crusades or the fall of the Roman Empire.  It is real and it is in “the now.”