Rubber Soul, 3/17

In class today, we talked about Althusser's concept of the Ideological State Apparatus. We were asked to think of how we've experienced any form of ISAs in the past week. Pink Floyd's music video of another Brick in the Wall was an excellent example of education as an ISA. I thought of two other recent experiences involving religion and the media. Two people I know have recently told me that they were considering getting body altering procedures. One procedure being plastic surgery for breast enhancement and the other for electrolysis which is the laser removal of hair so that it never grows back. The first person thought her body was disproportionate and the second person thought her arms were too hairy. Obviously, women in our society have these ideological standards they think they need to live up to in order to be considered desirable. The media creates this "ideal" image of a woman and mass produces it everywhere you turn. Therefore, younger AND older women aspire to reflect these ideal characteristics by transforming themselves using expensive and sometimes dangerous surgical procedures. In this way, the media helps create dissatisfaction among women's self perceived body image in America. Therefore, conveniently there are expensive procedures to help you "fix" your societal proclaimed "problems." Another instance of an ISA I experienced this past week surfaced when I was talking to someone about finding a job this summer. I was telling them how my job of two years had fallen through and that I was applying for other ones, but I wasn't getting much positive feedback. The reply was, "Well it's all in God's hands." I realize that this was said as words of kindness, but really, how does this help me? So many religious people do leave it up for God to fix what's wrong in their lives. But what happens when things get worse instead of better for them? Like someone stays in an abusive relationship because they are convinced that God will fix it, or if someone has an eating disorder and they don't go get help because they think God will help them overcome it. Thus religion is an ideological state apparatus because it has become natural and rational to believe that a greater being is in charge and that is why things are the way they are.

I think it is important to keep in mind who is benefiting from these societal structures. People need to be more critical of what our society enforces as the "norm," because many times these norms benefit the minority instead of the majority.