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Jan. 11th, 2020 05:45 pm1. I stayed up too late last night and didn't sleep well, so lay about and didn't do anything today. Just felt tired and lazy. Also Parasite is not playing anywhere close by -- it's left BAM. The closest is Nite Hawk and the ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE -- and I am not paying to see thriller with subtitles in a dinner theater with waitresses walking up and down the aisles taking orders throughout the film. It's bad enough when I don't have to focus on subtitles. I also think my lack of sleep of late is wearing me down. I'm tired most of the time. And have a persistent cough that doesn't go away.
That's for films you've seen already or don't have to concentrate too closely on. CJL and I saw VICE at the Nite Hawk Theater in Brooklyn and mutually agreed, never again. It's pricey and impossible to focus on the movie. We were both distracted by the waitress going up and down the aisles throughout. Honestly, I'd rather just watch at home.
Did, see The Farewell -- which is the Chinese-American film about a family that travels to China to say Farewell to a beloved grandmother diagnosed with lung cancer and given a mere two weeks to live. They choose not to tell her -- and instead orchestrate a Farewell visit under the guise of a wedding celebration, letting her plan the wedding. It's based and adapted from a memoir.
This is a beautiful little film - about an hour and 40 minutes, so maybe not that little, which touched me deeply. I adored it. The critic didn't. But I don't tend to agree with most critics, the critic gave it three stars. It's mainly in Chinese with English subtitles. And I found it touching on multiple levels -- it also discusses various differences between the two cultures -- such as the "Big Lie" regarding the grandmother's health and why this lie is perpetuated. And how the two culture's perspectives vary in regards to the lie and how people are viewed in their culture at large. The Chinese or Eastern Philosophy does not see a person as belonging to themselves as Western culture appears to, but as belonging to family and society and the earth. And that telling the lie, is a way of carrying the burden of the diagnosis, the pain, the worry, the grief and the guilt of it for the sick relative.
It's an interesting notion.
The film was beautifully done. Highly recommend. It's important, I think, to watch films and read books by cultures outside our own -- it helps us learn to be empathetic.
2. The Good Place - this week's episode. - wherein we discuss the philosophy of the metaphysical reboot and the fallacy of putting cruelty first.
I've read two reviews...and I'm wondering if we all saw the same episode?
(We didn't of course, people watch everything through the haze of their own experience. Also I think the writers muddled it.)
Anyhow, the metaphysical moral philosophy was interesting and topical. But I'm not sure the writers understood the philosophy -- because some of the jokes didn't quite land, and I got a bit confused and rewound more than once. (Although in S3 they seemed to get it.)
What Chidi is discussing on the chalk-board, while skating about on roller-skates, is Judith Shklar's "Putting Cruelty First". It's hard to follow Chidi's thought process on it and his ideas get a bit lost due to Jason interrupting every five minutes with Jasonisms. Honestly watching this episode of The Good Place felt a bit like watching a movie in the Nite Hawk Cinema.
Shklar's thought centered on two main ideas: cruelty as the worst evil and the “liberalism of fear.” She discusses the first idea in her essay “Putting Cruelty First,” published in Ordinary Vices (1984). Her second main idea, expounded in her essay “The Liberalism of Fear,” is founded on the first idea and focuses on how governments are prone to abuse the “inevitable inequalities in power” that result from political organization.
Based on these core ideas, Shklar advocated for constitutional democracy, which she saw as flawed but still the best form of government possible. A constitutional democracy, in Shklar's view, protects people from the abuses of the more powerful by restricting government and by dispersing power among a "multiplicity of politically active groups"
Shklar believed that "the original and only defensible meaning of liberalism" is that "every adult should be able to make as many effective decisions without fear or favor about as many aspects of his or her life as is compatible with the like freedom of every adult." Shklar described rights less as absolute moral liberties and more as licenses which citizens must have in order to protect themselves against abuse.
Shklar was deeply interested in injustice and political evils, claiming that "philosophy fails to give injustice its due"; that is, most past philosophers have ignored injustice and talked only about justice, likewise ignoring vice and talking only about virtue. Ordinary Vices and The Faces of Injustice articulate Shklar's attempts to fill this gap in philosophical thought, drawing heavily on literature as well as philosophy to argue that injustice and the "sense of injustice" are historically and culturally universal and are critical concepts for modern political and philosophical theory.
The writers attempted, and failed (as evidenced by the two reviews I read on my correspondence list), to explain the philosophy through a series of jokes, and isolated character moments. But instead of showing that Shklar was stating punishment is a zero end game and that making decisions with fear attached -- does not result in betterment or evolution but is just well sadism, it sounds like they were saying it's better to be punished than erased or lets just make fun of it all with cruel jokes showing that punishment and cruelty is better than no life at all -- which furthers the argument that punishment works - the exact opposite of Shkylar's philosophical view and/well TeamCockroach.
This was not their intent at -- which is made much clearer, if you did what I did, which is ignore the dumb jokes, distractions, etc, and just pay attention to the philosophical statements by Chidi. ( Read more... )
3. Also finally watched Stumptown -- which I've mixed feelings about.
( spoilers )
That's for films you've seen already or don't have to concentrate too closely on. CJL and I saw VICE at the Nite Hawk Theater in Brooklyn and mutually agreed, never again. It's pricey and impossible to focus on the movie. We were both distracted by the waitress going up and down the aisles throughout. Honestly, I'd rather just watch at home.
Did, see The Farewell -- which is the Chinese-American film about a family that travels to China to say Farewell to a beloved grandmother diagnosed with lung cancer and given a mere two weeks to live. They choose not to tell her -- and instead orchestrate a Farewell visit under the guise of a wedding celebration, letting her plan the wedding. It's based and adapted from a memoir.
This is a beautiful little film - about an hour and 40 minutes, so maybe not that little, which touched me deeply. I adored it. The critic didn't. But I don't tend to agree with most critics, the critic gave it three stars. It's mainly in Chinese with English subtitles. And I found it touching on multiple levels -- it also discusses various differences between the two cultures -- such as the "Big Lie" regarding the grandmother's health and why this lie is perpetuated. And how the two culture's perspectives vary in regards to the lie and how people are viewed in their culture at large. The Chinese or Eastern Philosophy does not see a person as belonging to themselves as Western culture appears to, but as belonging to family and society and the earth. And that telling the lie, is a way of carrying the burden of the diagnosis, the pain, the worry, the grief and the guilt of it for the sick relative.
It's an interesting notion.
The film was beautifully done. Highly recommend. It's important, I think, to watch films and read books by cultures outside our own -- it helps us learn to be empathetic.
2. The Good Place - this week's episode. - wherein we discuss the philosophy of the metaphysical reboot and the fallacy of putting cruelty first.
I've read two reviews...and I'm wondering if we all saw the same episode?
(We didn't of course, people watch everything through the haze of their own experience. Also I think the writers muddled it.)
Anyhow, the metaphysical moral philosophy was interesting and topical. But I'm not sure the writers understood the philosophy -- because some of the jokes didn't quite land, and I got a bit confused and rewound more than once. (Although in S3 they seemed to get it.)
What Chidi is discussing on the chalk-board, while skating about on roller-skates, is Judith Shklar's "Putting Cruelty First". It's hard to follow Chidi's thought process on it and his ideas get a bit lost due to Jason interrupting every five minutes with Jasonisms. Honestly watching this episode of The Good Place felt a bit like watching a movie in the Nite Hawk Cinema.
Shklar's thought centered on two main ideas: cruelty as the worst evil and the “liberalism of fear.” She discusses the first idea in her essay “Putting Cruelty First,” published in Ordinary Vices (1984). Her second main idea, expounded in her essay “The Liberalism of Fear,” is founded on the first idea and focuses on how governments are prone to abuse the “inevitable inequalities in power” that result from political organization.
Based on these core ideas, Shklar advocated for constitutional democracy, which she saw as flawed but still the best form of government possible. A constitutional democracy, in Shklar's view, protects people from the abuses of the more powerful by restricting government and by dispersing power among a "multiplicity of politically active groups"
Shklar believed that "the original and only defensible meaning of liberalism" is that "every adult should be able to make as many effective decisions without fear or favor about as many aspects of his or her life as is compatible with the like freedom of every adult." Shklar described rights less as absolute moral liberties and more as licenses which citizens must have in order to protect themselves against abuse.
Shklar was deeply interested in injustice and political evils, claiming that "philosophy fails to give injustice its due"; that is, most past philosophers have ignored injustice and talked only about justice, likewise ignoring vice and talking only about virtue. Ordinary Vices and The Faces of Injustice articulate Shklar's attempts to fill this gap in philosophical thought, drawing heavily on literature as well as philosophy to argue that injustice and the "sense of injustice" are historically and culturally universal and are critical concepts for modern political and philosophical theory.
The writers attempted, and failed (as evidenced by the two reviews I read on my correspondence list), to explain the philosophy through a series of jokes, and isolated character moments. But instead of showing that Shklar was stating punishment is a zero end game and that making decisions with fear attached -- does not result in betterment or evolution but is just well sadism, it sounds like they were saying it's better to be punished than erased or lets just make fun of it all with cruel jokes showing that punishment and cruelty is better than no life at all -- which furthers the argument that punishment works - the exact opposite of Shkylar's philosophical view and/well TeamCockroach.
This was not their intent at -- which is made much clearer, if you did what I did, which is ignore the dumb jokes, distractions, etc, and just pay attention to the philosophical statements by Chidi. ( Read more... )
3. Also finally watched Stumptown -- which I've mixed feelings about.
( spoilers )