Super!Geek, 3/22, Post-Class, Ideology

Ideology seemed to be the featured theme of the week, and it definitely made for interesting discussion. In CMC 100, I'm pretty sure most of us encountered Althusser and the idea of RSAs and ISAs, but gave a deeper weight and meaning to the ideas. For the most part, we function is a society dominated largely by ISAs, but I was a little disappointed as to how easily we discarded the relevance of RSAs role in some American's lives. I think for those outside the hegemonic population, RSAs can play a very visible role in a minority community. Take into account the percentage of Blacks within the prison population. 1 in 8 black men will likely see jail/prison time within their life, as opposed to the 1 in 100 for white men. A large percentage of those individuals will see jail time for drug related offenses, like heroin and crack abuse. These particular drugs hold heavy time, yet possession of the same amount of prescription narcotics or cocaine hold a much more lenient punishment. Even the possession of meth holds a slight lesser sentence. To put it plainly, drugs that are considered to be consumed largely by African-Americans hold a heavier sentence than those considered to be used by mostly whites. In that alone, a clear repressive state apparatus can be observed, but there is other observable oppression as well, via treatment by the police, etc. Such experiences should not be so easily discredited as issues of the past. Though the Rodney King case only occurred 17 years ago, the case Timothy Stansbury, Jr. only occurred less than five years ago. We need to continue to be cognizant of all apparatuses that influence our lives, so not to let an ideological state devolve into a more repressive one.

In a further, mildly off-topic point, I think I might have had that fabled "aha" moment Dr. Rog spoke of at the beginning of the semester. I went to see a film called Knowing this weekend (believe me it was against my will; and spoilers are about to be posted so look away if you must). It was a pretty horrid film, which I was expecting, but one of the final scenes features the destruction of earth, and I remember watching it thinking, "This is miserable! Zizek would have a field day with this film!" I then spent the remaining period of the film imagining what Zizek, and then Benjamin popped into my head, and I kept thinking about how perverse it is that we receive such pleasure from our own aesthetic destruction. It was both a horrifying and exciting moment, mainly because I realized any hopes of being a passive media consumer have pretty much been chucked. Needless to say, I've been unable to force myself to watch the telly since.

It's Better Not Knowing!