This is not meant as a rhetorical exercise; it is a genuine issue I’m wrestling with re: my own academic future. As such, please keep comments respectful and relevant. Content notice for discussion of the repugnant positions of the United States’s President and Vice President elect.
In October of 1992, on a stage in Georgia, Vice Presidential candidate James Stockdale asked the ever important philosophical questions: “Who am I? Why am I here?”
In the way of the 2016 Presidential election, I sit [more-or-less] comfortably in my office in Alberta wondering something not dissimilar. Many friends, between terrified pleas for an explanation I do not have and expressions of anger and frustration, have sent me notes congratulating me on my preemptive escape from a country that (like Stockdale) seems to have lost its mind.
The problem is, in lieu of these elections, I wonder whether it is appropriate to be the sort of person who pursues the beginnings of a career in philosophy in Canada. I know it is important to go where there are problems, and try and address those problems with the skills that I have; that’s a part of the person I aspire to be. However, at the moment, that general maxim seems entirely incompatible with what I’m doing.
Given that the United States just elected a President who openly talks about groping and demeaning women, has a history of violating the civil rights of black Americans, unconditionally supports the profiling and intimidation of black and brown Americans, advocates committing war crimes, and incites threats and violence against Jews, Muslims, Latinos, blacks, gays, trans*people, etc. ad nauseum; given that the Vice President elect believes that homosexuality can be “treated” with electroconvulsive therapy, that puritanism about needle exchange is more important then the spread of HIV/AIDS, believes in the importance between “forcible” and non-forcible rape, and actively tries to humiliate women in pursuit of safe and legal abortions with restriction provisions.
Perhaps the appropriate response is to think that there are already activists, there are already people doing the hard work. However, given that it seems the work is much harder, the state of things much worse, than previously understood and anticipated, it seems morally obligatory to lend a hand.
In a famous thought experiment, we ask students whether it is morally permissible to walk across a bridge as you see a child drowning below. The answer is obviously no. Suppose that there is someone else, at that very moment, fishing out the child. Then is it permissible to cross? Perhaps, but just in case the work that the person is doing doesn’t require an additional set of hands. If it does, then there’s a moral obligation to help out. In this moment, I feel like the guy standing on the edge of the bridge, watching some of my friends try to save the drowning child and struggling with the line. I don’t know how much help I’d be, but perhaps it would be enough.
The challenge is that I’ve built a life, an identity, predicated on the pursuit of a certain sort of position, and stabilized (more-or-less) that life in a certain sort of place. In order to do that kind of work, really do the work of contributing to the social good of protecting the rights of LGBTQ, black, and Latino people, I’d have to give that up. Do I have a moral obligation to do that? I’m not so sure. People tend to give a lot of leeway when it comes to protecting their identity, their condition. Even radical philosophers like Peter Singer don’t maintain that he should quit philosophy and go be of more direct service to the community; but, in this moment, I am not so sure that’s a defensible position.
As a philosopher, it seems morally appropriate to use my work and position in the field to engage in this sort of advocacy. As a human being, it seems morally obligatory to do as much as I can, simpliciter. Insofar as the former may require giving up the latter, I find myself returning to Stockdale’s poignant, existential question.
“Why am I? Why am I here?”
-Josh can be found on twitter at @thephilosotroll
A Philosopher's Take 
Joe
November 9, 2016
“This is not meant as a rhetorical exercise; it is a genuine issue I’m wrestling with…”
Wait is that allowed on a philosophy blog?
Sorry.
Here is my 2 cents. Teaching philosophy and teaching people how to use reason is as important and likely more important than any political issue you think is more pressing. Yes it is the long view. But I am convinced of it.
Yes it is appropriate to study philosophy. Teaching philosophy and critical reasoning is appropriate and exactly what the world needs.
Can joining a cause be as rewarding? It’s possible. But you will be doing allot of quibbling with people. You will find yourself making winning arguments regardless of whether they are rational. If you learned anything from this election you hopefully learned that. You will hope this will do good.
But if you help people understand critical thinking you will be doing good – for sure – every day.
As far as the election – well yeah. It was the perfect storm. Hillary is a fraud and no one except Sanders had the nerve to challenge her from the Democrats. The republicans were too dumb to see how they were splitting the vote in the primary – handing Trump the primary. So we had an election low point. That’s my take on it. It’s not the end of the world (fingers crossed.)
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Justin Caouette
November 14, 2016
Nice piece, Josh.
I had a similar thought after the election, and, I had similar thoughts during Occupy and in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings as well. I’ve concluded that working in philosophy can be a way to promote change, to directly help those affected by these events, and (maybe being overly idealistic) I believe philosophy can and does affect policy, depending on what you focus your studies on. And since you seem to work on pretty straighforwardly applicable stuff to the real world, which to my ears means that you are in a position to fight to the good fight, so to speak, I think staying in academia is compatible with helping that guy off the bridge THROUGH your work. AFter all there is more than one guy and there is more than one bridge…
Though I feel you on the thought example you raise, I truly do, I don’t think it’s apt in this context. You see, the guy on OUR current bridge can be saved in a number of ways, I’m not convinced that teaching 1000’s of students and publishing in places and in a way that people can actually read and understand is NOT one such way. You’d be surprised (maybe you won’t) how many students are negatively affected by the events I just mentioned (including the one under discussion) and hearing your views and hearing you tear down BAD arguments in favor of the harms that have come (or will come) can REALLY help. Philosophy helped me off the bridge, so to speak, I don’t see why it couldn’t do that for some of the students you will meet in the coming years as your career develops either.
SO I guess I want to reject the last sentence of this claim: “I know it is important to go where there are problems, and try and address those problems with the skills that I have; that’s a part of the person I aspire to be. However, at the moment, that general maxim seems entirely incompatible with what I’m doing.”
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philosotroll
November 18, 2016
Yeah, I’m still cooking on this a bit, due to conversations with a handful of faculty members and other graduate students who have similar thoughts. I’m in a bit of an odd place, as policy work is something I try to incorporate into my various projects. However, often the projects I like the most are the ones that are the least likely to produce something of substantially social value. (Though I’m absolutely certain that says more about the state of academia than it says about me.)
We’ll see; spending time talking with David Dick and Al Habib and many of the other more policy minded folks around UofC will likely help. Teaching and policy aren’t mutually exclusive; many of my personal favorite people in the modern discipline (Kamm, Liao, DeGrazia, Singer…) are illustrations of that. But it does feel that, at times, there are tensions and conflicts. This is likely not a straightforward problem, and so you’re right to push on the last sentence.
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