“It is a constant struggle, and that is how we know that we grow.” It comes to the end of the semester and of the class and perhaps of this blog, and I have an urge to share with you what I have learned the most from this class. The quote above was from Dr. Johnson. Honestly, I do not remember exactly the context of the quote; however, it made such a big impact in me because it recaps the philosophy behind all the topics that we discussed in class. The most recent topics that we touched upon were slavery and capitalism. Let’s look at slavery, have you ever questioned if slavery will ever get totally abolished? Realistically to say, I do not think it will ever happen because exercising power is a natural tendency of human being. People love controlling, directing, exploiting people. Also, in terms of financial consideration, the lowest waged worker out there, still, can never beat a slave working for you to pay debt or even better, for free. However, moral values do not allow us to accept that unethical benefit and that bitter fact should not discourage us from fighting for equality. Here we see, it is truly a constant struggle, we know that the struggle will never stop, but we do not give up fighting because that is how we progress. Same concept applied to the topic of capitalism, our class discussion already pointed out that crisis is part of capitalist societies. A capitalist society will always be full of peaks and bottoms; however, in that constant struggle, we, as people of that society, can always find a way to progress so that the next crisis, people will at least experience a lighter hit and a softer bottom.
Turning back to our daily lives, right now, we all breathlessly rush to finish papers and review for final exams. Some of you may find it enjoyable and for you, the difference compared with a normal day is just one more cup of coffee every night from now to Wednesday. Some of you may struggle, trying to study really hard to pull your grade up. Personally, my first semester at Rhodes so far has not been a bed of roses as I EXPECTED; however, I do have fun and I think the struggle is worth it. I hope you do the same.
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I definitely agree with you Thach! It is in these times where the stress is high for a number of reasons that we are able to learn and further develope personal knowledge of ourselves, as well as our intellectual knowledge. I think alot of what you're saying has to do with the Hegel's Dialectic Idealism, where there is a thesis, an anti- thesis that are in conflict. Through that conflict, we create a synthesis that holds the best parts of those ideas. Then the negation creates a new thesis and antithesis, so there is always a progression forward to find the synthesis. This is done in society, in politics, relationships etc. The conclusion that needs to be made in times of stress in ones own life, or in our country: we are in the process of progress, striving to find the greater synthesis.
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