Hostage Philosophy: Levinas’ Ethical Thought

TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY NOVEMBER./ OECEM B£R. 1987 f VO!.UME 3, NUMBER. 6 TheWritingLife byAnnieDillard T HERE IS NO shortage ofgood days. ltis goodlives thatare hardto comeby.A lifeof gooddayslivedinthesenses is notenough. The life ofsensation isthe life ofgreed; it requires more and more. The life ofthe spirit requires less and less; time is ample and its passage sweet. Who would call a day spent reading a good day? But a life spent reading-that is a good life. A day thatcloselyresembleseveryotherdayfor the pastten or twentyyears does notsuggestitselfas a good one. MARCH/ AP!t!L 1988 IVOLUME 4 , NUMBER 3 Victimology by Jessica Benjamin A ERTAIN TRANSITION in politics, which . ccurred in the six'ties, was required to pave the way for such thinking: the contruction of the idea of the oppressed roup as liberator. The notion ofa class uniquelysituated to opposethe ruling class because its exploitation is thehidden somce ofpower gavewayto a more simple propositionthatthe oppressed would rise up politically. In the sixties we evolved a new kind of "scientific" radicalism, the pursuit ofwhat we might call "victimology;'the higheststageofwhatLenin never called "left-wing moralism-agerontological disorder." What we have learned is thatthere is a tremendous moral capital in suffering, even ifyou aren't suffering anymore. Women have a good case for focusing on their ovvn suffering, for much abuse has been and continuesto be inflicted on women directlyby men. The question is: how to have a politics that recognizes injustice and recognizes abuse and suffeiing without degenerating into the victimological stance, without engendering the righteousness and sacrificethathas so longaccompanied this position? For example, the more righteous a position feminists take about heterosexuality, the more self-scrutinizing theyhaveto be abouttheir ovm sexuality, regardless ofwhat kind it is. In sexuality there is only a short step from censorship to proscription and inhibition. For most people it's not possible to continuallymobilize resentment againstwomen's sexual objectification and violation in pornography and then feel free to have a good timewith their own sexuality . Ofcourse, we might suspectthat those who are inspired by this righteous position have taken the stance they do because they have suffered under the current organization ofsexuality, not because they have enjoyed it. But, whatever the case, the liberation ofsexuality in the interest ofpleasure has latelybeen replaced as the goal ofthe movement; the goal now is to expose heterosexuality as fundamentally organized bythe principle ofdomination. There is no easy solution to this dilemma. Everything that we can mobilize in the way ofhuman passion has a dangerous or a repressive side. But without some form ofvision and passion, we can go nowhere. We therefore recognize that there needs to be a constanttensionbetween passion andself-awareness, between being "into" things and standing critically outside ofthem. My personal solution tothis dilemma is to add to these opposites a combination ofirony, humor, and self-criticism. The kind ofself-criticism I mean is not that which says, "Comrades, let us list all our errors and correct them immediately." It is based on life •vithout historical teleology, in which we do not imagine that being right now can absolve us ofresponsibilityfor the past, or that right and wrong will be lifted above ambiguity by an objective historical process. It is myhopethatthe next phase ofour movement may embody a very different kind ofspirit, one which allows us to be committed while seeing the drawbacks ofthat commitment, to respect the reality ofsuffering without making it a brand ofrighteousness , to articulate a vision that does not demand human sacrifice, to play even with whatis serious, and above all to accept-not resign ourselves to-living with contradiction. NOVEMBER/ DECEMBER 1990 I VOLUME 5, NUMBER 6 Hostage Philosophy: Levinas'EthicalThought by Martin Jay 0 NLY WHEN I lookfor reciprocity, when I can seethesame in theother,the neighbor in the stranger (even the stranger outside my kinship circle), will the likelihood offuture Sabras and Shatilas diminish .Only when the realm ofthepolis is understood asthe siteto adjudicate difference, and not unethically to suppress them in the name oftotalizing sameness, canthe dignityofthe otherbe genuinely upheld. NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2006 WWW. TIKKUN . OAG TIKKUN 21 TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY Although Levinas' profoundly moving reading of the Hebraictradition has revivified that tradition for an international audience ofJews...