Hi Everyone!
I realize that we are nearing the end of the semester, and that extra reading may not be on your ‘to-do’ list… However this website might prove interesting/helpful to understanding some of the basics of WMDs, and in our case nuclear weapons. It is recommended by Professor Muller who teaches “Physics for Future Presidents” which is a really interesting class. It is a lot of information, but I think it could be quite helpful…
http://www.fas.org/nuke/intro/index.html
Nov 26, 2010
Nov 24, 2010
solidarity
Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP / November 24, 2010
NEWS
BLOG
"Second day of student protests - how the demonstrations happened"
Link to news blog at guardian.co.uk
BLOG
"Second day of student protests - how the demonstrations happened"
Link to news blog at guardian.co.uk
Hi All,
The above is a very interesting blog with live updates on the student tuition hike protests as they unfolded throughout the day in the UK. I am fascinated by the scale of their organization -- much to learn from.
Students march in protest in Glasgow, Scotland
Nov 23, 2010
south korea and north korea
Hi All:
I wonder how we can use the themes in class in analyzing or in attempting to understand the current occurrences between South Korean and North Korea. (this is sad and terrifying to begin with)
Here are the links of the news I have found in the past hour:
If there is anyone who knows or has a link to local news agencies in both, please feel free to share them. (though i would doubt that N.K. has one that is not under strict restrictions or control)
Nov 19, 2010
Quick question about USA-Russia nuke treaty?
I'm just confused as to what this agreement is hoping to achieve? As I understand, both countries have enough nuclear weapons to obliterate the world many times over, so about from a sheer political move, what is the purpose of this?
Timely Debate Over Surveillance
An interesting very public debate over how far security can justify the public sphere (in this case the TSA) intruding on the private sphere (individual airline passengers) is raging in the media, which has an obvious parallel to Lyon's reading on surveillance.
For those who haven't heard about it the summary is that 70 airports throughout the nation are beginning to use "backscatter" x-ray machines which enable TSA employees to look through the clothing of individual passengers. The TSA has allowed passengers to opt-out of the machines but these passengers will have to undergo an extremely "intimate" pat-down as a result. Concerns range from radiation exposure, to usage of the images beyond purely security. For more information here are a couple articles:
http://www.npr.org/2010/11/15/131328327/new-airport-security-rules-cause-traveler-discomfort
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/11/12/travel.screening/?hpt=Sbin
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov/16/local/la-me-oceanside-scan-20101116
Lyon discusses how increasingly our personal information and images are compiled, categorized and used commercially and politically. If Lyon had written his piece a little later he would take into account the recreational piece of this especially with the advent of Facebook. In recent years this information is increasingly volunteered which signals more implicit acceptance of varieties of surveillance (I don't think that is going too far out on a limb) but implementation of this "backscatter" technology has seemed to cross a line. I'm curious if this line is simply the more tangible visual/physical element of being given the option of being viewed naked remotely or being aggressively patted down? What does it say about increasing intrusion into the private sphere that our security apparatus didn't anticipate any public reaction to this? How much privacy do we need to give up collectively in order to travel safely? What are your guys thoughts about this?
Lyon's Surveillance Society: Maybe a little over the top?
So I was reading Lyon, and he was mostly making sense, arguing good points, but the first time I started to question the extent to which he gives surveillance credit was in the first section when he argues that modern surveillance actually looks INSIDE the body. At first I balked, but then the argument that medical records are available online to people with access or the right hacking knowledge made sense.
On page 12, another argument caught my attention, when he links gender, the public and private spheres, and 'private property'. I wasn't sure exactly what he's trying to argue with this, and what its relevance to the rest of the essay was, exactly. Is he saying that women are generally associated with the home, and therefore private property? Or is he mistakenly harking back to times when women were actually considered private property? Either way, I felt that this argument was, if not highly generalized, then actually reinforcing of historical gender roles.
The essay as a whole makes some interesting points, and Lyon is right to point out and criticize the massive way in which information is obtained, distributed, and used in modern times. However, he makes some pretty massive blanket statements and assumptions, that I think generally don't hold up and severely weaken his overall argument.
Also, and more specifically, Lyon seems to both point out, and fall into the trap of technological determinism. throughout the piece, he argues that technology is making our interactions more and more abstract, causing 'disappearing bodies'. I wonder if maybe this argument doesn't fall into the same technologically deterministic trap that he warns about earlier, attributing too much agency to technology in our social interactions. Of course, we would all admit that technology has drastically changed the way we interact with each other and the world, but I'm not convinced it goes quite to the point that Lyon argues. What do you all think?
On page 12, another argument caught my attention, when he links gender, the public and private spheres, and 'private property'. I wasn't sure exactly what he's trying to argue with this, and what its relevance to the rest of the essay was, exactly. Is he saying that women are generally associated with the home, and therefore private property? Or is he mistakenly harking back to times when women were actually considered private property? Either way, I felt that this argument was, if not highly generalized, then actually reinforcing of historical gender roles.
The essay as a whole makes some interesting points, and Lyon is right to point out and criticize the massive way in which information is obtained, distributed, and used in modern times. However, he makes some pretty massive blanket statements and assumptions, that I think generally don't hold up and severely weaken his overall argument.
Also, and more specifically, Lyon seems to both point out, and fall into the trap of technological determinism. throughout the piece, he argues that technology is making our interactions more and more abstract, causing 'disappearing bodies'. I wonder if maybe this argument doesn't fall into the same technologically deterministic trap that he warns about earlier, attributing too much agency to technology in our social interactions. Of course, we would all admit that technology has drastically changed the way we interact with each other and the world, but I'm not convinced it goes quite to the point that Lyon argues. What do you all think?
Nov 18, 2010
UC regents fee hike protest
(San Francisco Chronicle, Noah Berger / AP Photo / November 17, 2010)
I think most of us have seen this image and the YouTube videos from Wednesday's protest in San Francisco. Below are links to several news articles as well as photographs of the event that give us some context upon which to reflect. Clearly, it is an outrage and an abuse of power that is frightening, more so because it sets a precedent for how police may respond to moments of tension during future student protests.
ARTICLES
Los Angeles Times:
Huffington Post:
Washington Post:
L.A. Times photography:
Nov 12, 2010
"The Bomb" in the Everyday
Joseph Masco's article spoke about how the U.S. used images of a possible nuclear Armageddon to construct a new form of national culture, built upon the paradigm that arose out of the creation, detonation, and devastation of the nuclear bomb. This was because the U.S. government was panic as the true threat to national security. "Like the A-bomb, panic is fashionable. It can produce a chain reaction more deeply destructive than any explosive known. If there is an ultimate weapon, it may well be mass panic--not the A-bomb" (pg 366-367). So, in order to prevent this even more destructive weapon from taking hold of the American people and more or less leading to the end of American life, the government set about to transform the paralyzing effect of the threat of nuclear bombing from what Masco terms "nuclear terror" into "nuclear fear." A person can live with fear and still function in the everyday. Thus the goal of the government's "civil defense programs" were to train the public psychologically and make them impervious to the panic that would be likely to take hold after an atomic attack. This way, society could continue to function, even though its population and physical surroundings were damaged, and rebuild itself again, possibly stronger. Operation Cue was a prime example of the way in which this aim was achieved. Having the country witness the destruction of a "typical American suburban town" did more than show everyone the actual physical results of such an event, but also imprinted a vision in people's minds of they themselves as the victims of a nuclear attack. The result of this and other forms of propaganda over the ensuing decades made nuclear devastation an aspect of everyday life. It normalized mass destruction, and made it something that could be thought about, not in its true and terrible form, but in a manageable, after school special kind of way. At the same time, it became something sensational, that would be later replicated in movies and television shows. True, it was/is something to fear, but it's the kind of fear that one feels when watching a scary movie.
This is what I really want to focus on, the normalization of mass destruction and how that influences the way that people deal with it today. A scene that has constantly come back to me over the years is a scene in Hotel Rwanda when the protagonist turns to the American photographer and says that his pictures will bring help to those being massacred because the American people will see them and respond. But the photographer says that no, people will look at them and go back to their TV dinners, never thinking twice. I think that this scene is so poignant to me because it seems so true. But why? Why are we so desensitized to such images? I'm sure many of us in class today looked at those horrendous images of Hiroshima and Nagasaki only to leave the classroom and go have lunch with a friend, take a nap, catch up on your shows on Hulu. I'm not judging you. I do it myself a lot of the time. But again, why is it so easy for us to?
I think these programs have had a lasting effect, not only in how we perceive ourselves in relation to the bomb, but how we perceive its after effects, and moreover, on how we understand and relate to events that result in mass death and destruction. It has become normalized, something that happens all the time, everyday, and naturalized, in that it is a part of the everyday because it is meant to be a part of it, a force of nature, no more preventable than the wind that rustles the trees. (Of course if there was a nuclear apocalypse then there probably wouldn't be any trees to rustle. But I digress.)
Our desensitization, our acceptance of these images and occurrences have had several far reaching and possibly unforeseen effects. But this has no doubt been useful to those pressing the big red button, because if we see the aftermath as something normal and natural that we cannot prevent then opposition to their use has been effectively obliterated, less than the shadows left behind on the bridges of Hiroshima.
This is what I really want to focus on, the normalization of mass destruction and how that influences the way that people deal with it today. A scene that has constantly come back to me over the years is a scene in Hotel Rwanda when the protagonist turns to the American photographer and says that his pictures will bring help to those being massacred because the American people will see them and respond. But the photographer says that no, people will look at them and go back to their TV dinners, never thinking twice. I think that this scene is so poignant to me because it seems so true. But why? Why are we so desensitized to such images? I'm sure many of us in class today looked at those horrendous images of Hiroshima and Nagasaki only to leave the classroom and go have lunch with a friend, take a nap, catch up on your shows on Hulu. I'm not judging you. I do it myself a lot of the time. But again, why is it so easy for us to?
I think these programs have had a lasting effect, not only in how we perceive ourselves in relation to the bomb, but how we perceive its after effects, and moreover, on how we understand and relate to events that result in mass death and destruction. It has become normalized, something that happens all the time, everyday, and naturalized, in that it is a part of the everyday because it is meant to be a part of it, a force of nature, no more preventable than the wind that rustles the trees. (Of course if there was a nuclear apocalypse then there probably wouldn't be any trees to rustle. But I digress.)
Our desensitization, our acceptance of these images and occurrences have had several far reaching and possibly unforeseen effects. But this has no doubt been useful to those pressing the big red button, because if we see the aftermath as something normal and natural that we cannot prevent then opposition to their use has been effectively obliterated, less than the shadows left behind on the bridges of Hiroshima.
Nov 11, 2010
Operation Doorstep 1953 and Operation Cue 1955 Test Films
Here is a supplement for Masco's work on visual culture and the normalization process of nuclear warfare during the Cold War as the state is capitalizing on the Americans' "nuclear fear" and acceptability of a nuclear war. It permeates their quotidian lives (in this case middle-class Americans) and induces them to accept and believe that there is this imminent threat of an "atomic warfare," thereby, producing a form of consent on their part for the state to act on their behalf. Masco's "be afraid but do not panic!" section talks about this more.
Nov 10, 2010
today's article in guardian.co.uk
OBAMA'S SPEECH TO THE MUSLIM WORLD CALLS FOR A NEW BEGINNING
Wednesday 10 November 2010 13.15 GMT
White House planners initially considered Indonesia as the location for Barack Obama's much-anticipated speech to the Muslim world, which he eventually gave in Cairo in June last year. Expectations then were probably impossibly high, and his address in Jakarta today did not get the same dramatic billing. Seventeen months on, the mood has soured and polls show that his popularity is in decline across the globe as well as at home...click here to continue to article.
Link to 31:00 minute speech, University of Indonesia, Jakarta
Nov 9, 2010
Classification of land
When reading the Kuletz article, I noticed once how important classifying something within a certain category is to its perceived use or value. Kuletz talks a great deal in how the value of the land of the nuclear test sites changed without changing the perception of the land itself. The land that the US government chose to "allocate" for the Native American population was chosen on the basis of its nonproductive nature, since it was not valuable, it was desired to shove natives onto this land. Ironically, only a century later, the land was still not valuable and nonproductive, but it is exactly these characteristics that make it valuable now.Through nuclear testing, the non-valuable became valuable through its non-value. Interesting transformation.
NY Times article about Afghan women
This article was rather horrifying, and the topic is one that we discussed a few weeks ago, but I also wonder how much of this article involves serious cultural misunderstandings. I don't want to offend anyone, I just read it and thought about our discussions and readings about gender ("Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving?"), and some questions popped into my head: How does this article impose Western values on Afghan culture? How might some of the words used in this article be misinterpreted by our Western norms like 'mental illness' or 'abuse'. What are the logical repercussions/solutions/problems that are implied by this article? Sorry if this offends, I don't mean it to, it is on the front page of the New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/08/world/asia/08burn.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha1
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/08/world/asia/08burn.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha1
Nov 7, 2010
The Third Jihad documentary
I was looking for a film to review for the class and found this:
The Third Jihad
It's a documentary on radical Islam's threat to the US, and has been labeled "propaganda" by many (I would tend to agree). The film follows the same lines as the anti-Muslim Cultural Center advertisements we watched in class, and just the message disseminated in the trailer (which is all I have seen thus far) is terrifying.
The film is put out by the Clarion Fund, which also distributed copies of "Obsession" (comparing Islam to Nazism) in newspapers during the 2008 Presidential Election.
The Third Jihad
It's a documentary on radical Islam's threat to the US, and has been labeled "propaganda" by many (I would tend to agree). The film follows the same lines as the anti-Muslim Cultural Center advertisements we watched in class, and just the message disseminated in the trailer (which is all I have seen thus far) is terrifying.
The film is put out by the Clarion Fund, which also distributed copies of "Obsession" (comparing Islam to Nazism) in newspapers during the 2008 Presidential Election.
Nov 6, 2010
The Predator War
According to the article by Jane Mayer, there are currently two drone programs in the U.S. The U.S military drone program as an “extension of conventional warfare” in Afghanistan and Iraq and the covert CIA program that targets terrorist internationally. Mayer describes them as “a radically new and geographically unbounded use of state-sanctioned force” and criticizes the CIA’s program specifically for its lack of visibility and accountability.
I feel safe in assuming the general class sentiment is that the current use of drones could have dangerous implications.
I’m curious of the class opinions on if the use of drones is ever acceptable. If so, what would be the conditions of acceptability?
What if we got rid of the CIA program and kept the military one?
What if we could somehow enforce a decrease in the amount of civilian deaths associated with the killings? Is even one civilian death acceptable?
What about the intelligence implications? Are we harming our national security by killing suspects instead of interrogating them? Would it even be possible to locate and capture them instead of killing them?
What are the human rights issues given the opacity of the target list creation? Is it more important that we are able to eliminate the potentially violent treat of the targets being alive?
What are your opinions?
Nov 3, 2010
Friday's Reading
For anyone looking for the Jane Mayer reading on Predator War, you can find it at this link:
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=44800523&site=ehost-live
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=44800523&site=ehost-live
"blackwater or xe services"
Just want to share these three articles from the nytimes about blackwater. Our discussion earlier was really interesting, as always. So here are the latest articles I could find that reiterate and resonate themes discussed earlier (accountability, litigation, and Eric Prince etc.,).
1. "Efforts to Prosecute Blackwater Are Collapsing"
2. "Use of Contractors Added to War’s Chaos in Iraq"
3. "Blackwater Founder Moves to Abu Dhabi, Records Say "
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