Seeing the Self in Context

SEEING THE SELF IN CONTEXT

Dr. Niall Twohig

SEEING THE SELF IN CONTEXT

Dr. Niall Twohig

Introduction The following is a tool to help you see the larger context surrounding and shaping your experience. To use it, flip through the pages and, as you do, imagine you are moving away from your body in space. See the home surrounding your body. See cyberspace surrounding your home and, for a moment, follow its data trails to the homes of close friends and family.

Follow that trail back to the neighborhood surrounding your home. Follow roadways or highways to work, school, or other frequented spaces. Then follow less-traveled streets to neighborhoods kept out of sight. Zoom out to see the city that contains these neighborhoods. Zoom out again to see the state that contains the city, the nation that contains the state, the globe that contains the nations, the environment that comprises the globe. As you move from circle to circle, envision actors and institutions operating within each sphere. See how problems and struggles, out there, ripple across space to your innermost circles.

Circle 1

The Self The smallest atomized unit of society.

Actor: “I” Problems/Pressures: In the 21st century United States, the experience of the individual self is marked by isolation and alienation. One participates in social life, not as a democratic participant, but as a consumer and competitor with other individuals. If one falls behind, one often blames oneself (“I am a failure. I am a loser”) or other scapegoated groups (“those foreigners are the cause of my problems.”). This leads to physical problems like exhaustion and hypertension, as well as psychological problems like anxiety, depression, attention deficit disorder, high rates of suicidal thoughts and suicide. The individual copes by becoming numb, medicating, abusing substances, acting violently, seeking self-help, or finding communities.

Circle 2

The Home The space where we are raised or where we raise our families.

Actors: Nuclear Family (two parents), non-traditional family, single parent Problems/Pressures: Working class and middle-class nuclear families have a hard time sustaining, especially amid crises. This is because the cost of living has increased, family wages have stagnated or declined, public goods have been defunded, the tax burden has shifted from elites to working families, and more families take on debt to pay for basic needs.

High rates of divorce and domestic violence may be symptomatic of these stressors. Single-parent families have an even more difficult time sustaining. Non-traditional families face added difficulties of discrimination and legal barriers.

Circle 3

Virtual Space A bubble that filters reality to the home and individual.

Actors: Traditional media, social networks, social media platforms, search engines Problems/Pressures: This virtual bubble appears to be self-fashioned but is, in fact, highly mediated by corporations to cater to pre-established beliefs rather than objective facts. The result is the formation of “epistemic bubbles” where one’s reality differs from neighbors and, even more, from users in different neighborhoods or regions. A better term for these bubbles is truth-silos because one’s truth often conflicts with others, creating a sense of insecurity and hostility amongst the populous. Within social networks, substantial human relationships are replaced by weak relationships in spaces governed by corporate values and profit-oriented algorithms. It is important to see that these bubbles let out as much as they let in: our data is a raw material mined by tech giants, and its value exceeds oil.

Circle 4

Home Away from Home Spaces where one takes part in intimate and formative social relations.

Actors: Extended family, chosen family, close friends and close co-workers Problems/Pressures: Pressures placed on individuals and nuclear families pull them away from these kinship networks. They have little time to cultivate or sustain these relationships. Social networking and texting replace in-person gatherings and face-to-face conversations.

Circle 5

Neighborhood, Work, School Those spaces outside the home where we spend most of our time.

Actors: Neighbors, co-workers, classmates Problems/Pressures: Private homes are not well-integrated into the community, which leads to feelings of isolation. “Main street” decays as corporations monopolize retail via online consumption. Corporate values dominate work and school (team building replaces solidarity, diversity training replaces equal access). Overall, the neighborhoods and institutions we inhabit are highly segregated; we are exposed to people from our strata in race-class hierarchy strata and disconnected from people outside our strata.

Circle 6

Surrounding Neighborhoods Those spaces beyond our neighborhood where we do not spend much time.

Actors: Those who live across the tracks, strangers Problems/Pressures: As you compare your neighborhood with others, notice the uneven development and inequitable distribution of resources.

Notice how the poorest, most resource-deprived, neighborhoods are populated by people of color and new immigrants. This is the result of discriminatory housing policies such as redlining and racial zoning. These populations are often pushed out by wealthier classes in a process called gentrification.

Circle 7

The City The space of local institutional power and power struggles.

Actors: City governments, courts, police, prisons, labor unions, grassroots movements from across the political spectrum (progressive, neoliberal, far right) Problems/Pressures: City governments prioritize austerity programs that defund social services to make up for budget deficits. Governments and courts lack representatives from all strata of society. Laws protect elites.

Police protect middle-class white communities while waging wars on poor communities of color. Labor unions are weakened and disconnected from a broader class struggle. Prisons become a spatial fix to warehouse criminalized and abandoned populations.

Circle 8

The State The space of statewide institutional power and power struggles.

Actors: State governments, courts, police unions, prison corporations, labor unions, statewide movements from across the political spectrum (progressive, neoliberal, far right) Problems/Pressures: State governments are dominated by political machines that cater to special interests. This leads to the same problems and pressures of circle 7 played out on a statewide scale.

Circle 9

The Nation The space of nationwide institutional power and power struggles.

Actors: Two political parties (Democrats and Republicans), federal government (executive branch, legislative, judicial, electoral college), corporations and corporate lobbyists, neoliberal and neoconservative think tanks, the military industrial complex, social movements from across the political spectrum, third parties Problems/Pressures: The two parties in the US have been pushed to the right and far right of the political spectrum. Democrats have moved away from classical liberal approaches (FDR) to embrace neoliberal policies.

These policies reduce taxes on wealth and corporate profits which, in turn, shreds the social safety net. To make up for deficits, neoliberal democrats institute austerity programs that defund education, Medicare, Social Security, and other public goods. They turn to the private sector to manage once publicly funded programs as for-profit businesses. On the other side of the aisle, Republicans adopt neoconservative policies to “restore law and order” which is euphemistic for policies that scapegoat immigrants and criminalize black and brown communities while ignoring white collar crime.

Though seemingly at odds, both parties have prioritized elite and corporate interests above the common good. Far Right populist movements have exerted pressure on the Republican Party, but these movements have done little to shift the party away from corporate interests. Leftist social movements have been mired by a narrow identity politics that loses sight of the structural critiques of earlier progressive movements.

Behind the scenes of the two-party drama, corporations and the military industrial complex exert a stranglehold on US American politics. Their power is maintained through lobbying and campaign financing. This results in legislation that protects special interests antithetical to the interest of people and the planet. One clear sign of this is wealth inequality, with three men owning more wealth than the bottom half of all Americans and 140 million people (43% of populous) living in poverty and low wealth.

Circle 10

The Globe The space of global institutional power and power struggles.

Actors: Nation states and their militaries, multinational oligopolies, The World Bank, transnational social movements from across political spectrum (environmental justice movements, workers movements, water defenders and other indigenous movements, anti-Western insurgent and extremist movements, a Far Right International) Problems/Pressures: Global relations are marked by the hegemony of neoliberal capitalism, meaning that the world market is built by and for an elite oligarchic class. This class asserts tremendous power over national governments promoting policy that favors their class interest. The leads to legislation that allows oligopolies to enclose natural resources and charge entry to those who can afford it. Neoliberal deregulation allows corporations to become unfettered from the nation state. Chasing the lowest production costs and cheapest labor, corporations leave behind deindustrialized wastelands populated by insecure workers who turn to sweatshops, black markets, or gig jobs for survival. Global wealth inequality is obscene with 2,000 billionaires owning more wealth than 4.6 billion people (60% of the world population). Imperialist warfare and neocolonialism in underdeveloped countries shows that the world powers have not moved away from extractive economies despite the benign appearance they present in elections or on the media. The New Cold Wars between global powers are fought on the terrain of cyberspace through cyberwarfare and psyops campaigns. A new class of precarious workers across the globe (the precariat) has much in common but faces unfavorable, not impossible, conditions for organizing global movements to challenge this violent and inequitable status quo. A massive refugee population seeks asylum from imperial wars, violent regimes, and the fallout from climate change.

Circle 11

The Environment The space that allows all spaces to exist.

Actors: The web of life (all species, flora, fauna) Problems/Pressures: Neoliberal capitalism accelerates man’s vampiric relationship with nature. The material conditions are symptomatic of that relationship: irregular and destructive weather patterns, wildfires, super hurricanes, the acidification of the oceans, the destruction of life-sustaining habitats and extinction of species, the sinking of islands and major cities ( Jakarta), the spread of super viruses as humans encroach into fragile ecosystems. When this sphere trembles, we cannot help but feel it in our bodies, minds, and souls.

Full Circle

The Self in Context Now return. Come back to the self with the awareness of the circles surrounding you. Are you starting to see how some of your problems—your anxiety, your numbness and exhaustion, that sense of impending doom— are not unique to you and are not the result of internal flaws. These feelings are, rather, shaped by conditions around you. You might also see that these feelings are not unique to you and are, therefore, not yours alone to bear. Consider: who or what, out there, is working to alleviate the pressures weighing down upon you, your family, your loved ones? How can you join or support their efforts? How can you learn from their practices?

Are you starting to see forces beyond you that shape your bubble? Ask yourself: who profits off the construction of these bubbles? Who or what has a vested interest in keeping your vision trapped in the inner circles?

Who or what has an interest in you not seeing the outer circles?

Whenever you internalize the problems and pressures of the world beyond you, I hope you return to this circle. Meditate on it as you would a mandala.

Remember the forces that shape your experience. Remember that there are ways of connecting your inner circle with others, out there, who are working to create a more hospitable context. Remember that you were born of that outer circle, the environment. Though you appear to be an atomized unit separate from it, you and I are really its nuclei. There is really no space between you and it, for you are it. There is really no space between you and I, for we are it.