Heirs to the Wreckage

Trying to make sense of reality.

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  • Empires, Genocides, and Superman

    Let’s retreat from the binaries of good and bad for a moment, try and live in that world we call objectivity. Liberalism is riddled with the problems of “doing good”, which in the US nowadays amounts less to recognizing the problems within the project and more with checking boxes. The worst kind of American liberal lives in constant fear of an ever-evolving blacklist of words, beliefs, and topics, subservient to either moral or social validation. We fail to produce reflective individuals and produce conformist ones on pain of alienation- though Conservatives seem infinitely worse in this regard. In any case, for the purposes of this post I’ll try not to resort to those tempting labels of good/bad, and only comment on what is necessarily, verifiably true.

    In certain conversations about Gaza, conversations with people who (like myself) have lived far removed from war, I’ve heard this recurring justification: “Wars and genocides happen all the time, why should we care about this one?”. And after giving it some serious thought, despite how cynical it sounded, I came to the fact that multiple genocides have likely happened before contemporary memory. Modernity and the age of interconnection is tiny in the grand span of human history. The Holocaust has probably happened 10 times over, perhaps not as systematic, deliberate, or technologically streamlined, but certainly equivalent in malicious intent. Humanity, call it the neuroses, an unfortunate predisposition towards violence, an ontological lack-in-being that no amount of power can fill, is riddled with violent episodes. So what’s the difference between the crimes of then and the crimes of now? Perhaps the answer lies in interconnectivity.

    The atrocities of the past were random, sprawling, unconnected events (relative to how intertwined political actions are today). And for some, maybe those sacrifices were necessary to bring about the imprints in history those empires made. No community (or civilization, to use the more phallic term), ever enjoys its ascension to greatness without being trailed by some form of sin. America was largely built on bodies, and I live in it now, awkwardly caught condemning that crime while reaping its bounty. Good or bad, this is a fact, and both the conservatives and the liberals in this country are struggling with that reckoning. Nowadays the world is too connected, too intimate with itself for atrocity to go unnoticed. Thanks to technology, we are all too painfully, acutely aware of one another to kill each other in peace. We do it live these days, streamed for all to see. Maybe, in response to the question given in the first paragraph, we should care about stopping genocides because we have the modern means to do so.

    Israel is an established genocidal state, by every definition possible; and perhaps it isn’t that the genocides of the past were excusable but rather that we didn’t possess the unity or means to stop them. Technological advance hasn’t distributed its benefits consistently or equitably, but what it’s crucially done is open the pathway to global self-governance. We have the reflexivity and the technological ability to act as a collective (although that potential isn’t fully realized, we are still split into different polities with different agendas, and the UN is a poor mediator for those competing interests). A million Gazas have happened before, but we haven’t been able to see it in real-time as we can today. Now obviously seeing has not been enough in this case, as Israel continues its war against Gaza despite multiple condemnations. But seeing is better than not knowing at all- it’s a start.

    To those who are simply blind to the loss of human life, or argue that a certain margin of atrocity is acceptable in the overall calculus of civilization, I would scrutinize that line of thought. Justifying any crime against humanity is a dangerous game; it’s not just to play with the rights of other people, but with your own. It is the socially agreed-upon precedent to protect everyone that also protects you. Not to mention that age-old justification of “all Palestinians are Hamas” doesn’t even make sense, nor does it follow that children or innocent lives should be taken in an effort to eliminate reported Hamas operatives. Once again, whether or not this is good or bad I leave to you, although I admit I’ve already abandoned my objectivity and made my own views clear. And all of it can be confusing. It’s difficult to pick apart what is truly discriminatory and unfair towards jews, and what is a legitimate critique of Zionism (although I know for certain the Republican party has every interest in equating the two).

    Especially now, when it’s been put to the test, we’re seeing just how much influence over the United States Israel really wields. I’m still relatively young, so growing up I didn’t understand Israel’s place in the world, or why so many sensitive jokes were made at its expense (jokes way ahead of their time, in hindsight). The likes of Ted and Rick Sanchez (from Ted and Rick and Morty) would feign satirical fear at criticizing Israel or the pro-Israel establishment in this country. This is obviously not meant as anti-semitism, and I reject the asinine right-wing suggestion that to question this genocide is to question the rights of jews (I mean it borders on propaganda at this point). Nor is it anti-semitism to note that certain historical events and values have been subtly baked into our cultural normativity by the establishment. For instance, the Holocaust is rightly held in sacred remembrance while other genocides are rarely given the same attention. Armenia, Cambodia, Kosovo, Sudan, colonial genocides and other well-documented genocides are practically invisible to daily cultural life. Perhaps this is changing now with recent events, but the undue influence persists. We see it now in the protracted smear campaign being conducted against Pedro Pascal, a stream of online hate that decries his reading choices, his close and intimate manner with co-stars, his overexposure in modern media, etc. The fact that this wave of criticism seemed to materialize from nothing, coupled with its bizarre objects of critique (him reading a Dostoyevsky novel for instance), indicate that it’s likely an army of paid trolls. And despite his immaculate reputation, the campaign seems to have impacted his career, with a substantial role in the next Avengers movie reportedly being cut down. The cause? Likely his outspokenness on Gaza.

    I wanted to talk about James Gunn’s Superman, because the reaction to this film has been divisive (though perhaps not as divisive as some parties were hoping). Let me preface this by adding this film was going to be divisive from the beginning, and not solely because of its commentary on Israel-Gaza. It followed in the wake of the DCEU Franchise, which was of course led by Henry Cavill in the role of Superman. Cavill’s Superman was an attempt to give the character the Christopher Nolan treatment and deconstruct the comic book element of him. He was gritty, realistic, wrought with moral ambiguities and internal struggle. Suffice it to say, there were many people unwilling to move on from Cavill’s era. The new, hopeful, appropriately comic book Superman was seen as too woke, too kind, and too soft in comparison to Cavill’s gray rendition of the character. In the theater where I was watching the film, there were a few audible groans and complaints as the credits rolled. Many of the red-pilled and self-proclaimed alphas could be found throwing tantrums online in the hours following the premiere.

    The very concept of a Superman is complicated. An all-powerful flying being who metes out justice, and has a pure, justifiable, and irrefutable moral compass is very particular in its symbolism. It was Slavoj Žižek who convincingly characterized it as an “authoritarian wet dream”. Couple this with the general trend of superhero stories leaning towards antiheroes and gray characters, and you get figures like Omni-Man and Homelander. Those two were perhaps the most prevalent Superman-like characters in the limelight before this film. Omni-Man, basically a walking power fantasy bent on conquering Earth by merit of being the strongest; and Homelander, a narcissistic superhero obsessed with validation as a reward for his strength. Regardless, suffice it to say Superman was a welcome shift against this backdrop, a return to the basic hero values of kindness and respect for all human beings- with appropriate critique for the political lenses that distort those values.

    The film received a lot of backlash for this and for its extensive commentary on Gaza, proving once and for all, and perhaps somewhat obviously, that Superman would never tolerate a genocide, even if it meant disagreeing with authority. I mean, it’s Superman, it takes a lot of mental chicanery to conclude he wouldn’t stop a systematic mass-murder. In the film he prevents the fictional nation of Boravia from invading the neighboring country of Jarhanpur (obviously meant to parallel Israel and Gaza) despite political scrutiny from the world. The accusations of anti-Israeli propaganda, anti-semitism, and being too woke indicate that some in this country can’t agree with the basic premise of Superman (of all people) saving lives. Even a Superman film can be boycotted on the grounds of criticizing Israeli-sponsored genocide. Someday I hope to see a global movement flying flags that say “No Empires, No Genocides”, even if it sounds like bourgeois liberalism. But of course, if we could completely change the cultural model that produces empires, established orders, oppression and genocides, what would replace that? That’s the million dollar question of our time.

  • On the Paradox of “Wokeness” and Patriotism

    There’s no phrase I see levied with more spite on the internet than the term “woke”, usually complemented by other edgy conservative insults like “leftist”, “radical”, “gay”. They deliver these terms like adolescents who’ve gleefully acquired a new swear word. What is being woke exactly? And how has it come to be so hated in the modern era? To be woke is to decry the excesses and failures of western society. It is painted as less masculine, less patriotic, in comparison to the jingoistic hyperaggressive nationalism that certain Americans seem so desperate to uphold now. Now, is there some truth to the portrait of the shallow liberal championing causes in the name of moral validation? Of course there is. I have met many a troubling liberal who can’t quite justify what they support aside from the fact that it makes them feel good. There is also some truth in production companies shoehorning cheap representation into modern media to adhere to political correctness. This of course, disadvantages efforts to implement authentic stories of representation, and only adds fuel for right-wing commentators. Despite these issues, it is shocking how in today’s society the basic notions of kindness and longing for a better world have become so scorned and despised by certain sectors of society.

                Being woke is a paradox. For me, it’s contradictory to denounce all elements of the status quo. I’m a product of modernity, conditioned to consume, near addicted to the pleasures of social media and commodification, and tragically not free of its narratives or demands. Despite knowing that everything I buy comes with an increasingly high environmental and labor cost, I still find myself spending money on frivolities. Despite critically idealizing feminism I would be lying if I claimed to not derive some amount of pleasure from the continued objectification of women. That relationship has been coopted through years of interaction with the neoliberal sexual apparatus, which means that some part of me will never quite be free from its influence. I do not make these statements to absolve myself of any culpability, I have consciously made choices to capitulate to these influences. I haven’t lived some charmed liberal life that now enables me to preach to others from a pulpit. I instead want to show that the contradiction of wokeness is more complex than anti-woke critics make it out to be, some things are deeply entrenched and woven into our lives and require serious unlearning. Obviously, some concessions to the system are downright necessary for survival. Workplaces are demanding, food needs to be put on the table, sometimes the pleasure of consumption is the only way to alleviate stress and malaise. But even so, many of us don’t stop at the bare minimum when society offers excess in exchange for maximum labor. No doubt this is where one of the criticisms of “woke” people come from, although it is equally unrealistic to demand they deprive themselves of vice and crucify themselves to prove their devotion to their ideals (it really isn’t that simple, and many times this means stripping them of their platform). There is a contradiction in criticizing a system that one profits from, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be done. And it is isn’t purely a matter of moral validation. I am far from being first on the chopping block when it comes to these issues, but they do affect me. I care about climate change not only because I worry for non-human nature and people immediately at risk, but also because I perceive a credible threat to my own freedoms and contentment.

                And the mission of the “woke” movement, is all the more complicated. In America at least, the mission is to radically reimagine a country that suffers from a lack of political imagination. I recently watched an interview with Mehdi Hasan, as he debated with a conservative who claimed “all whites are Native Americans”. Indigenous people be damned, they came over from an Asian land bridge, to be white is to be native to America. This view is obviously vile for many reasons, but I’ve found myself questioning if it’s really that out of step with the logic of America. Even our history is framed explicitly through a white lens: a clear genealogy is established from the British and from the settler colonies that built America’s political foundation. This characterization of America persists, so that one might see how the most conservative of white people see themselves as the inheritors and protagonists of the US. This obscures that America is a diverse place, where its government, by conquest or less tragic means, came to govern many different kinds of people with their own histories. And the white mythology is powerful, it remains attractive for many people, yet so precariously fragile and fantasmatic (which is perhaps why those people become so vehement and reactionary when defending it). 

    Forget Trump’s policies (I have met few supporters who explicitly praise his policies, most fiscal conservatives in the limelight have already denounced him), it’s this idea of defending the “soul” of America that attracts so many conservatives. And that soul is composed of ideas, experiences, myths, that are typically or even exclusively white originating a la the “City on a Hill”. They would never equate it to white supremacy or racism, perhaps they themselves cannot think of it that way due to the malicious connotations, but it is in fact both those things. “The Dream”, as it’s labeled by Ta-Nehisi Coates, excludes enslavement, the genocide of the First Nations, and the current inegalitarian experiences Americans are subjected to in service of The Dream. And so much of this logic, of white supremacy, the very social construct of whiteness and race, is still baked into the fabric of our country. To be woke means to challenge much of this, which is uncomfortable for the woke and confrontational for the anti-woke. But then this leads to a misinterpretation (inflamed by the neoconservatives of our time), where the idea of being woke comes to mean anti-American and anti-white. And from this misconception (aided by roots of racism) came the “All Lives Matter” slogan. 

    Firstly, it goes without saying that being white is not the liberal movement’s problem. Yet, it says much that certain people are offended at their children’s extensive exposure to the concepts of slavery, critical race theory, other religions. The parents say, “I don’t want my children to feel guilty”. But where would this guilt come from? The children clearly did not commit these crimes, nor are they responsible for them in any way. This would be akin to non-Jews in Germany demanding that their children not learn about the Holocaust. The fact that these parents react in this way reveals that people still can’t separate themselves from that slaveowning culture, or mistakenly perceive an attack on slaveowning culture as an attack on them. That seems an important difference between the US and Germany; Trump attempts to lord the defeat of Nazi Germany over the German chancellor and he replies, “That was actually the day my country was liberated”. Mention the defeat of the Confederacy to certain Americans, and they might not react the same way. 

    In any case, America has work to do before forming a coherent liberal movement. Being woke is imperfect, which opens it to critique, but it is a start. It’s a sign people are grappling with the necessary questions this country’s legacy presents, for people of all ethnicities and genders. Again, the attack is not on being white, but on a symbolic politicization of the unjust justifications of the Dream. It’s a politicization that needs reworking and recontextualization if it is to rise to its political ideals. It’s not anti-American, if anything I contend that it is a more honest form of patriotism. Being a patriot who simply chants USA is not enough in this day and age. Continuing with this line of thought, my next post will discuss James Gunn’s Superman.

  • Introduction: Welcome to the Jungle

    I debated naming this blog “The Political Jungle”, which references a high school blog I was involved with as an assignment. Sadly my group and I never took it past a school project, but I found the exercise of writing in it liberating, and I’ve paid it a small homage in this first title. The purpose of this new blog is to serve as a sort of therapy for me. Every single day, I find myself on the internet seeing more headlines than I can keep track of, and each one seems to mark another shift in the global status quo. And then it gets worse. I find myself on Threads, Reddit, YouTube, and I see the signs of a vile culture war where every sides stubbornly insists on its own narrative. The pendulum never shifts, it only oscillates between toxic A and toxic B.

    To be Gen Z in 2025 is to be subject to rampant disinformation, to live under the looming threat of climate change, to be dispossessed or to spectate people being dispossessed, and to constantly have the truth distorted. For me, the experience has been one long circus of rushed decisions and debates. Study for this test, get this thing on your resume, swallow your revulsion and network, make sure you don’t overstep political correctness. And this is privileged compared to what many in the world experience, but not a day goes by that I don’t feel some sense of insecurity despite having lived a relatively safe life. How can we just sit in our own lives worrying about our circumstances, grinding for that job that’ll supposedly secure our freedoms for us, when some of the problems we face threaten generational fuckery? And at the same time, it isn’t practical nor psychologically sustainable to try and live life on the scale of those issues.

    Please don’t mistake this for pessimism. This is my view of the world, but there’s joy to be found in it. There’s joy in finding answers, in growing up, in meeting people, and in satire. Satire is an incredible tool for deconstructing things. I’ve known two types of people who will make a “racist joke”. The first type will hold full-on racist beliefs, and the joke is offensive or uncomfortable. On the other hand, I have met people who within the joke can satirize racist beliefs, as opposed to expressing them. Conceptually, racism is darkly and tragically ridiculous, the things we say about people, what we do to people, how we flee hysterically from a person for being different. That can become satire, because it’s not a race joke but a joke about racism itself. I would love to be in the 2nd category, but I don’t fully have the comedic awareness, so I wisely refrain from trying at all. Alternatively, one runs the risk of referencing racial traumas that are simply too painful or visceral to satirize.

    So what is this blog? And what can I tell you about myself? Broadly this is a place to reflect on, disseminate, and discuss politics and culture. I want to probe certain questions, such as: why is genocide suddenly justifiable in the name of protecting a western status quo? Is that job (as I mentioned above) really worth pursuing, should we accept their normative definition of success? There’s no real agenda beyond things I personally find interesting or worth talking about. On the admittedly slim hope that this attracts readers, I also want to see what other people believe. Comment, challenge me if you disagree with something I say. If you feel you have something to express that is taboo, or unaccepted in your social sphere, jot it here. I want complete, open, unadulterated conversation. My only condition, of course, is that you express your views respectfully- with curiosity and openness.

    I would largely describe myself as left-leaning, but this does not mean I champion all “left-leaning” positions. I’m American, and this means a lot of my posts will be centered around the US since it’s what’s familiar to me- I’m happy to go beyond this. I studied political economy but my interests also include pop culture, movies/games/books, politics, and critical theory. I’m quite new to the last one, having just started reading my first book. I was always awed and even a bit jealous of philosophy majors during undergrad, they had such artistic explanations for everything. I’m not an expert on anything I plan to discuss, and certainly will never claim to be. All I have are my opinions, and those are contestable. Again I consider this a sort of therapy for myself, writing for an other helps me understand and structure my own thoughts. However, I also have the hope that I’ll be exposed to the ideas of other people, and other dialogues. Anyways, that’s it for today, I enjoyed the rant.

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