Shusterman meets Strzeminski

Ed Trotta and Petra Lucas in 

"Kobro or the Madness of Love" by Alicja Kuczynska.  

American Center for Music Theater,  Hollywood, CA, 2001

In a strange twist of things Wladyslaw Strzeminski as played by Ed Trotta returns in a small but significant moment in the upcoming "Exposure and Self-Knowledge" (a documentary about Richard Shusterman)

Politics as a tool for self improvement

James Madison in The Federalist Papers (Federalist No. 51) balances between a realistic reading of the human nature and a dream of establishing a social structure as the reflection of the best in man.  In the quote below "ambition must be made to counteract ambition" points to the former, " the line "But what is government itself..." to the latter.   Between the two the current political commotion unfolds. 
  

"Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary."

What do we hear?

Charlie Brown in "Charlie and the Common Good" talks about Ahimsa as one of the fundamentals for his theory. The quotes below come from a circular that just came from ISUD (an organization that Charlie was one of the co-founders) to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi's birth:

Ahimsa (non-violence), was a key tenet of Gandhi’s beliefs. He held that complete non-violence means removal of anger, obsession and destructive impulses. A daily life of likes and dislikes creates an illusion of reality and becomes a stumbling block to advance on the path of truthfulness. The mental impurities of anger, lust, greed, attachment and ego need to be cleansed for making progress on the spiritual path of approaching absolute truth. A life of opposing polarities of joy and sorrow creates a partial reality of truth as at any given moment only one polarity is active. To rise above this dualistic reality, one has to get detached from both likes and dislikes and become an observer.  

Dr. Ramanath Pandey

Fearlessness is the first requisite of spirituality. Cowards can never be moral.’ Each and every person has got his conscience, which is nothing but the inner soul. The infallible universal law is the result of the direction of the intuition of inner soul. The direction of the conscience comes from within in the form of command. When it is the inner voice that speaks, it is unmistakable… This phenomenon of ‘Inner voice’ is described by Gandhiji as the Divine Radio who is always speaking in the form of giving us directions. Gandhiji observes: “The Divine Radio is always speaking if we could only make ourselves ready to listen to it but it is impossible to listen in without silence.”  For Gandhi violence signifies social, economic and political exploitation of a section of human beings for the benefit of others.  (..) Gandhi’s view is quite opposite to the utilitarian one, which advocates the greatest good  of the greatest number. 

   Raghunath Ghosh