the real lacc: 11/07/2010

do no harm:

idit dobb-weinstein: "teaching is action and thinking at once. What I try to guard against most when I teach is not speaking as if my answer were conclusive, so as to avoid (to the extent possible) any kind of dogmatic appropriation. It is understandable why students might wish to imitate their teachers, but there are different modes of imitation. I try very hard to avoid the mimetic appropriation that is immediate, passive, and occludes thinking. One other reason is that if I made clear what my views were, and my views appeared as if they were final, it would preclude the possibility of first, students challenging me and second, learning from my students. The relation between the student and teacher is, to me, a dynamic relationship . . . Teaching and learning is a movement that occurs between. In other words, we are at once both agent and patient, both teacher and learner. If we are not very careful, we can do a great deal of harm. And that, too, I have learned from my teachers, Maimonides especially.

I believe my task is to provoke students to think and to engage them in genuine dialogue and questioning. To paraphrase a rabbinic saying, 'I have learned from my teachers, and I have learned from my peers, but I have learned most from my students.' And that is a continuous process of learning."

Tuesday 13 July 2010

anti-semitism and animal rights

now this a fine point---or maybe a very obvious one if you are jewish or a holocaust survivor.

at one point in animal rights theory it became popular to use the word holocaust to describe slaughter of animals.

this was a huge controversy of @2004-5.

unthoughtful groups like PETA got themselves in major trouble by equating animal slaughter with human slaughter.

even as a long term vegan i totally get it and disavow or disaffiliate with any insult offerred to genocide.

plus i have always been obssessed with genocide, holocaust, and judaism.

so, for example, when bartelt used the word "cow-schwitz" to equate factory farming with auschwitz, on the day he brought in his animal sacrifice videos where animals were manually disemboweled as a "ritual"----then to contrastingly reflect the discomfort back on to the audience/students by saying well think of the american factory farming scenario----which he called "cowschwitz."

the point that we are immune to this degree of suffering and the associated enviro poisons is a great point.

but casually taking an unconscious smack at judaism, or the holocaust, or equivocating animals with humans---really doesn't go off well.

and i am afraid this point was too subtle for the discourse, but to me it seems evident of a callous disregard for the effects of language and epithet.

similarly with the sexist utterances or the slur against anorexia and bulimia---the lack of compassion and sensitivity really bothered me. as it continues to . . .