| |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="SecondPaper" |
|---|
|
|
<
< | *UNDER CONSTRUCTION* |
>
> | *READY FOR REVIEW* |
| | |
| | David Foster Wallace's highly acclaimed novel, Infinite Jest, revolves around the unknown whereabouts of the master-copy of a film so seductive and pleasure-inducing that its viewers invariably lose all interest in everything but its perpetual viewing (a scenario perhaps not entirely far-fetched). As a kind of psychological weapon of mass destruction, the captivating power of the film exposes a precarious tension between maintaining respect for freedom of "choice" in the Oh-so-American pursuit of happiness, sacrosanct on the one hand, and advocating for appropriate government intervention on the other, i.e., when the choices of an orphan citizenry beg for parental guidance -- when by reason of undue influence or moral turpitude the citizenry is deemed incapable of choosing for itself. Salty snacks for example.
|
|
<
< | Of course, this calls for an explanation of what terms like "choice," "freedom," and "autonomy" mean, a task which can leave even the fittest and most dexterous of minds exhausted and stretch-torn. Perhaps only in the contexts of outright coercion and total elimination of options is the issue of autonomy vs. unfreedom relatively simple: |
>
> | Of course, this calls for an explanation of what terms like "choice," "freedom," and "autonomy" mean, a task that can leave even the fittest and most dexterous of minds exhausted and stretch-torn. Perhaps only in the contexts of outright coercion and total elimination of options is the issue of autonomy vs. unfreedom relatively simple: |
| | "We don't force. It's exactly about not forcing, our history's genus. You [as an American] are entitled to your values of maximum pleasure. So long as you don't fuck with mine." --p.424 |
| | "Always with you this freedom! . . . as if it were obvious to all people what it wants to mean this word. But look: it is not so simple as that. Your freedom is the freedom from: no one tells your precious individual U.S.A. selves what they must do . . . . But what about the freedom to? Not just free from. Not all compulsions come from without . . . . How to choose any but a child's greedy choices if there is no loving-filled father to guide, inform, teach the person how to choose? How is there freedom to choose if one does not learn how to choose?" --p. 320
|
|
<
< | Consumer education and consumer protection, then, converge to define the debate over the pursuit of happiness. And given the implication that both miscibility variables -- autonomy and susceptibility to coercion -- are shaped by education, what then is the appropriate role of government, as adult, in shaping the decision-making process of the greedy child? To what extent should temptations and their advertisement be prohibited or at least mitigated by administrative regulations requiring brutally honest disclosure; to what extent should school curriculum function to indoctrinate/routinize cognitive decision-making algorithms of children from a ripe age; and to what extent can/should those algorithms be shaped to leave room for multiple and equally correct solutions to the same problem of choice (a kind of freedom via relativism)? |
>
> | Consumer education and consumer protection, then, converge to define the debate over the pursuit of happiness. And given the implication that both miscibility variables -- autonomy and susceptibility to coercion -- are shaped by education, what then is the appropriate role of government, as adult, in shaping the decision-making process of the greedy child? To what extent should temptations and their advertisement be prohibited or at least mitigated by laws/regulations requiring brutally honest disclosure; to what extent should school curriculum function to indoctrinate/routinize cognitive decision-making algorithms of children from a ripe age; and to what extent can/should those algorithms be shaped to leave room for multiple and equally correct solutions to the same problem of choice (a kind of freedom via relativism)? |
| | "This is the crux of the educational system you [anti-American people] find so appalling. Not to teach what to desire. To teach how to be free. To teach how to make knowledgeable choices about pleasure and delay and the kid's overall down-the-road maximal interests." --p. 429 |
| | "Get real. The [irresistible] Entertainment isn't candy or beer . . . You can't compare this kind of insidious enslaving process to your little cases of sugar and soup." --p. 430 |
|
<
< | Freedom from; freedom to. Freedom from government-forced extinction of those joyfully enslaving MCDonald's jingles, 3am get-rich-quick commercials, and those creepily strategic facebook ads that kindly remind us of pleasures we might otherwise live life without, emptily. As entirely opposed to the so called freedom to live one's adult life without excessive temptation -- a kind of autonomy via elimination of coercion. Does one more accurately represent the kind of American "freedom" often trumpeted boldly and certainly with seemingly unbreakable religiosity, or is there room to experiment and find a miscible balance? |
>
> | Freedom from; freedom to. Freedom from government-forced extinction of those joyfully enslaving MCDonald's jingles, 3am get-rich-quick commercials, and those creepily strategic facebook ads that kindly remind us of pleasures we might otherwise live life without, emptily. A freedom entirely opposed to the so called freedom to live one's adult life without excessive temptation -- a kind of autonomy via elimination of coercion. Does one kind of freedom more accurately represent the kind of "American" freedom often trumpeted boldly and certainly with seemingly unbreakable religiosity, or is there room to experiment and find a miscible balance? |
| | If the heralded absoluteness of American freedom, at least for adults, exists as an entirely singular dimension of freedom-from, the tension can be cut with a plastic spoon. Get American or get real. Or get to them while they're young, one might say, because a prevailing attitude maintains that only children need protection. "Adults" in America have a right to encounter infinite seduction unfettered and, if they so choose, to indulge the fruits of any and all insidious pleasures? |