The root causes of toxic othering: Narratives of Rohingya and Bangladeshis

Guest post by Mohammad Azizul Hoque[1]

Ascribed status and identity politics
“Why have I have become a stateless refugee in a world of 195 countries? Why have I been confined by persecution in my motherland Myanmar and beyond? I ask my friends and family, but none of them can soothe my inquisitive mind.” A Rohingya refugee asked this question while Professor Thomas Arcaro and I were facilitating an online sociology course for underprivileged refugee and host community youth in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. “Our hopes and aspirations are identical to other human spices of the Earth; however, because of our ethnicity, we are rejected, displaced and persecuted,” commented another student.

Their words triggered us to apprehend how the ascribed status of “Rohingya” has become the cause of needless discrimination. Professor Arcaro replied, “Being a refugee or stateless is an ascribed status which you neither earned nor chose. Rather, it has been determined by the dominant groups in society and as a result, minorities are often assigned lower statuses.” A Bangladeshi participant said, “Life under an ascribed status is not a bed of roses, but one of terrible spikes and fences.” Toxic ethnocentrism-fuelled identity politics based on language, religion and ethnicity in Myanmar, which manifested in reaction to deliberate political and military manoeuvres, have been largely backed by the Bamar (or Burmese) majority polity of Myanmar, a diverse nation comprised of hundreds of ethnic groups.

Iris Marion Young (1990) said that ascribed status of a minority ethnic group like the Rohingya makes them vulnerable to cultural imperialism (including stereotyping, erasure, or appropriation of one’s group identity), violence, exploitation, marginalization, and powerlessness. Similarly, Francis Fukuyama (1992) addressed religion and nationalism as the two leading components of identity politics. Robert H. Taylor (2005) articulated that, after independence of 1948, Burmese’s ruling forces were generous in handling the rights of the Arakanese Rohingya. However, in 1962, a new political transformation occurred when the Burmese military took over the political administration in a coup and embarked on a decades-long period of totalitarian rule, characterized by discriminatory campaigns against the country’s non-Bamar groups. Consequentially, the military’s ethnocentric identity politics led to the annulment of citizenship and nationality of Rohingya, and ultimately led to their deportation and ethnic cleansing.

Ethnocentrism, exclusion and power distance
“Social power and resources are unequally distributed in our society,” a Bangladeshi female student said. “Whether it’s monsoon flooding, pandemic, or political instability, the destitute are always more affected than social elites, who
can use their money and power to overcome crisis. The peripheral people cannot overcome the effects.” Here, social elites are privileged not only due to their wealth but also their membership in different dominant groups such as ruling parties, majority ethnic groups, affiliations with dynastic political and business families, roles in public administration, and other politico-economic associations. They often misuse their political power and commit nepotism in order to seize social resources; on the other hand, people at the bottom of the power hierarchy accept these imbalances as foregone.

In a society where corruption is deep-rooted, a citizen hesitates to approach powerful bureaucrats and political representatives to claim the civic services to which they should be entitled. A Bangladeshi participant said, “If we challenge the roles of social elites, they may retaliate violently.” In other contexts, disenfranchisement is legally enshrined altogether. In Myanmar, stateless Rohingya lack even basic legal entitlements to protection by the state, driving an intoxicated sense of impunity amongst the vigilantes and extremists who commit atrocities against them. Ethnocentrism has mushroomed alongside toxic-othering so that Bamar Buddhists, the majority, are perceived and promulgated as the superior ethnicity. As a Rohingya student said, “Powerful groups use religion to justify the claim that other ethnic groups, such as Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, and other religious minorities, are of foreign origins and have not been recognized as identity groups with rightful claims to Burmese nationality.”

Through Facebook and national media outlets, the state has deliberately inflamed anti-Rohingya hate speech and propaganda towards the “othered,” non-recognized groups, particularly followers of Islam (Reuters, 2018). A Rohingya student said, “In Rohingya areas, the military regime localized and tailored its human rights abuses and discriminatory rule by imposing restrictions on religious conversion and inter-faith marriage.” Extremist nationalist propaganda functions to validate the fears harboured by the majority Buddhist population about the threat of a Muslim takeover of the country. As it transmits propaganda, the state implicitly sanctions social prejudice and inter-communal violence against Muslims (CFR, 2020). Another Rohingya student said, “Both communities (ethnic Rakhines and Muslims) feel that ‘the other’ is threatening to their identities, particularly their religion and culture.” The key contestations have always been around equality (how power and resources are shared) and acceptance (how ethnic, religious and cultural identities are respected (UNDP & Search for Common Ground, 2015).

Ideological divide and confrontational politics in Bangladesh
Confrontation, hatred and blame games have been a common practice in Bangladeshi politics. Members of the “big others” (a small group in terms of the money and muscle power they hold) dominate the “small others” (who are large in size but remain at the bottom of the power hierarchy) through policy and law and by manipulating the state apparatus in their own favor. Political leaders have carried out elements of toxic othering at the local level in the name of both pro and anti-liberation movements, as well as religious ideologies, which are transmitted from the centre toward the periphery as tools to manipulate voters. Broadly described, these othering processes feature a wide array of confrontation, competition, and monopolization of state institutions and resources by the party in power, which uses every possible state apparatus to marginalize the opposition (Arfina Osman, 2010). This trend has tremendously weakened formal accountability mechanisms, escalated a sense of impunity among political cadres, and put governance in crisis.

Bangladesh has earned remarkable GDP growth and infrastructure development in recent years; however, the gaps between wealthy and destitute have escalated simultaneously. A Bangladeshi student said, “As power has been an effective tool of wealth accumulation, youths of middle and lower classes – particularly from urban areas – have become desperate to join government services or politics by any means.” Political leaders personalize state power by creating networks and alliances to meet their objectives (Islam, 2013). Another Bangladeshi female student said, “If there are two candidates in a municipal election, people will vote for the high-income candidate despite his poor education, competency and honesty.” Voters think that only the wealthier is capable to donate relief-good if they are affected by cyclone or flood. Hoque (2016) argued that some cunning candidate struggle to manipulate large poor voters with lump sums incentives like strait cash, token-money, wheat or rice as a shortcut tool of clientalism ahead of election. On the other hand, during the national election, mainstream political parties become desperate to win by hook or by crook. Because banally winner takes all and they monopolize state apparatuses with politically affiliated people.

Gender-based discrimination and false concepts of women’s role in society
From a symbolic perspective, patriarchy has been a powerful privileging force in Rohingya and Bangladeshi families living in Cox’s Bazar that results in gender-based discrimination, violence and marginalization. Unlike in more central areas, women in outlying and rural areas tend to be exceedingly underprivileged and suffer from poor health, illiteracy, and lack of participation in social and political decision-making, which persists in many spheres and poses particular challenges. “Rohingya women have forgotten how to speak publicly,” a 20-year-old female refugee student said. “Our women and girls are always excluded from decision-making forums, either in the home or in the social sphere. Neither family nor community elders think it significant to take girls’ consent on social and cultural matters.” A recent study (Olney and Hoque, 2021) addressed the escalation of gender-based violence in Rohingya families during the pandemic. A Rohingya woman said, “We, as women, are always the victims of domestic violence when there is any misunderstanding or impoliteness between a wife, her husband and in-laws.”

In many cases, false consciousness is the root cause among Rohingya refugees and Bangladeshi host families in Cox’s Bazar where some people think that, “Men have inherent authority to beat their women to correct their behavior,” according to one student. “Gender inequality starts from men’s toxic mind-sets.” A refugee student said, “Women have to talk in a lower voice, always. Their husbands could get angry even if their wife expresses that she is ill.”

Some students commented that societal discrimination against women leads families to marry off underage daughters as a strategy to ensure their protection, further compounding the same subjugation they hope to avoid. As another female student said, “Parents are prompted to marry off their daughter’s right after puberty, because they are concerned for their security and economic burden.” These dynamics consequently escalate the power distance between sexes, where women remain at the bottom of the power hierarchy and continue to be obstructed from accessing basic rights and education. “Men torture their wives whenever their parents disagree with her about something, or when he orders her to bring something to him from her parents and she can’t bring it due to poverty.” Bangladesh has formulated various laws, policies and affirmative actions for women, which have significantly reduced the rate of violence against women, but there is still much room for progress.

Toxic othering as a colonial legacy
From a comparative perspective, Bangladesh and Myanmar are confronting different challenges; however, their underlying politico-cultural pathologies are identical. Both countries were colonized by the British Indian Empire, which cultivated toxic othering between communities through divide and rule policies, which systematically broke up larger concentrations of power into pieces that individually had less power than the implementer of the strategy, enabling the empire to secure its dominion (Christopher, 1988).

The British purposely created fractions between ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities in the occupied territory by promoting prejudice and toxic othering, destroying congenial relations between groups, gerrymandering geographic polities, and denying traditions to distract populations with infighting amongst themselves that prevented them from uniting in order to challenge the regime. Indian scholar and politician Shashi Tharoor (2017) write that the creation and perpetuation of Hindu-Muslim antagonism in British India was one of the most significant accomplishments of British imperial policy: the “divide et impera” (divide and rule) strategy facilitated continued imperial rule and reached its tragic culmination in 1947. Until 1857, there were no communal problems in India (Katju, 2013). Katju notes that although there were differences between Hindus and Muslims, with Hindus going to temples while Muslims went to mosques, participating in different festivals, and members of the two groups always helped each other and held no animosity.

Conclusion
A Bangladeshi participant said, “I wish I were able to defeat privileging forces.” In response to that, Professor Arcaro said, “I have realized that the hydra, or privileging forces, never end in Myanmar or in Bangladesh. It is a cultural universal. However, we can pacify the hydra to make it more innocuous.” A refugee participant commented on the intergenerational transfer of the hydra’s power in Myanmar: “While General Ne win was brutally persecuting Rohingya people, our people thought that if he retired, the atrocities would stop. However, Ne Win has now gone, but many subsequent hostile persecutors emerged.” Now, efforts to mainstream social cohesion can contribute to a nation’s resilience in the face of internal divisions and conflicts. Such efforts have the potential to present a more coherent vision of a nation’s future to its diverse peoples.

References
1.     Arfina Osman, F., 2010. Bangladesh Politics: Confrontation, Monopoly and Crisis in Governance. Asian Journal of Political Science, [online] 18(3), pp.310-333. Available at: <https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02185377.2010.527224>.
2.     CFR, 2020. India’s Muslims: An Increasingly Marginalized Population. [online] Council on Foreign Relations. Available at: <https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/india-muslims-marginalized-population-bjp-modi> [Accessed 7 August 2021].
3.     Christopher, A. (1988). ‘Divide and Rule’: The Impress of British Separation Policies. Area, 20(3), 233-240. Retrieved August 7, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/20002624
4.     Fukuyama, F., 2018. Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, New York, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018, 240 pp. 1st ed. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
5.     Hoque, M. (2016). Tea Politics and Clientelism. [Online]. Dhaka: The Daily Independent. Retrieved 14 August 2021, from https://www.theindependentbd.com/magazine/details/45983/Tea-politics-and-clientelism.
6.     Islam, M., 2013. The Toxic Politics of Bangladesh: A Bipolar Competitive Neopatrimonial State?. Asian Journal of Political Science, 21(2), pp.148-168.
7.     Katju, M., 2013. The truth about Pakistan. The Nation, [online] Available at: <https://web.archive.org/web/20131110103720/http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/columns/02-Mar-2013/the-truth-about-pakistan> [Accessed 7 August 2021].
8.     Olney, J. and Hoque, M., 2021. Perceptions of Rohingya Refugees: Marriage and Social Justice After Cross-Border Displacement. [online] San Francisco: The Asia Foundation & Centre for Peace and Justice, p.12.
9.     Reuters, 2018. Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar. [online] Reuters. Available at: <https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/myanmar-facebook-hate/> [Accessed 7 August 2021].
10.   Taylor, R., 2005. Do States Make Nations?. South East Asia Research, 13(3), pp.261-286.
11.   Tharoor, S., 2017. The Partition: The British game of ‘divide and rule’. Al Jazeera, [online]. Available at: <https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2017/8/10/the-partition-the-british-game-of-divide-and-rule> [Accessed 8 August 2021].
12.   UNDP & Search for Common Ground, 2015. SOCIAL COHESION FRAMEWORK social cohesion for stronger communities. [online] Yangon: UNDP, p.18. Available at: <https://www.sfcg.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/SC2-Pariticipant-Guide_English.pdf> [Accessed 7 August 2021].
13.  Young, I., 1990. Justice and the Politics of Difference. 1st ed. PRINCETON; OXFORD: Princeton University Press.

[1] Mohammad Azizul Hoque is a Research Associate at Centre for Peace and Justice, Brac University. He worked with Professor Thomas Arcaro as an interpreter for Bengali and Rohingya speakers and co-teacher of Sociology. Email: azizul.hoque@bracu.ac.bd

Coming full circle
I wrote this essay nearly 40 years ago and now, though I might change some wordings, the essential message I sought to convey then is the same I am advocating now with Critical Hydra Theory. I have indeed come full circle.

 

Humanism, Feminism, and Cultural Relativity: Contradictions and Ambiguities

By

Thomas E. Arcaro
The Columbus College of Art and Design¹

[Note: First published in The Humanist Sociologist, newsletter for the Association of Humanist Sociology, fall 1980]

This essay is an open question to my humanist colleagues. I will outline below what I feel are basic theoretical contradictions in the acceptance of humanistic, feminist, and culturally relativistic ideologies and the application of these ideas to my everyday life and my teaching of undergraduates. I am not certain that I want my colleagues to respond with answers, and thus somehow reconcile the contradictions that are outlined. For, like Miles Richardson (1976), I feel compelled to view the human condition as necessarily involving contradictions and ambiguities.  Elaboration on that digression, however, will have to wait for a future essay. The question for my colleagues is this:  Can an individual be humanist, a feminist, and adhere to the principles of cultural relativity while remaining philosophically and ethically consistent?

First, some brief definitions

My definition of humanism² is simple. Humanism is an ideology of human growth and freedom based upon the assumption that every human should have access to whatever basic material and psychological environmental conditions that will allow and even encourage the individual to realize his or her own unique potentials.  This freedom to grow should be restricted only insofar as the overall good of the culture is threatened.

Feminism – and I label myself as a radical feminist – is an ideology of growth and freedom based upon the assumption that women should have access to whatever basic material and psychological environmental conditions that will allow or even encourage women to realize their own unique potentials. The basic reason why women are not able to realize their potentials is seen when one examines the internal logic underlying capitalism. A feminist, then, works toward radical change in the economic system and assumes this change will produce a social environment conducive to individual fulfillment.

We all were taught – and now teach – in Intro to Sociology what the concept of cultural relativism means.  Each culture has an internal integrity and balance of components.  To understand or explain any one part of a culture, it is necessary to understand the context within which this part is found.  Ethnocentrism – which we also explain to our Intro to Sociology students – is bad: you should never condemn the customs of another culture simply because they are different from your own; one must examine these seemingly bizarre practices relativistically.

On the surface they compliment

On one level I feel no problem stating that I am humanist, a feminist, and a cultural relativist.  As an instructor I make every attempt to impress upon my students the positive values that underlie each of these three ideas.  To be a humanist is good. To be a feminist is good. To be a cultural relativist is good. If my students walk away from my class at the end of the term understanding and embracing these three ideologies, I feel that I have accomplished something worthwhile and positive. Yet, as I further critically examine (with perhaps an upper division class) these three ideas, I encounter some perplexing contradictions and ambiguities.

Under the surface they contradict

As should be clear given the definitions I offer above, my definitions of humanism and feminism are essentially the same. I cannot envision being a humanist while at the same time not a feminist. Conversely, to be a feminist and not a humanist seems also a contradiction in terms. A humanist is necessarily a feminist (women, of course, are human), and a feminist who is not also a humanist seems to me in need of further intellectual development. Both the humanist and the feminist understand that the root source of much human misery is found in exploitative economic systems. The task of the humanist/feminist is to work toward radical social and economic change.

The humanist/feminist looks around the world and sees horror after horror: mutilation or removal of the young girl’s clitoris at puberty in Eastern Africa, the Arab rape victim fleeing her own family in fear that she will be punished or even killed because of what has happened to her, female infanticide in numerous cultures around the globe, Dani women having their fingers cut off as part of a funeral ceremony…the list goes on. Women all over the world are denied basic human rights, and on a gut level as well as on an intellectual level the humanist/feminist is “against” this, and vows to never rest until basic rights for all humans are insured.

The cultural relativist looks around the world and weeps as one primitive culture after another is contacted by technologically advanced cultures (the missionaries forge the path, followed by anthropologists, and finally by tourists, politicians, and assorted developers) and then slowly and painfully disintegrates, its internal integrity and rhythm raped and destroyed by greedy or (ostensibly) benevolent outside cultures. The total destruction of a unique and rich culture is accomplished all too quickly, caused very simply by external influences. The cultural relativism position argues that to tamper with the internal workings of a culture is tantamount to genocide, and that is a profound violation of human rights.

But what about a “little” tampering?  The humanist/feminist, viewing with horror the clitorectomies, might argue that we should get the East Africans to stop this practice. They can have the rest of their culture, but this custom is clearly wrong.  The relativist maintains that there is no such thing as a “little” tampering. And besides, who is to determine what constitutes a “little”; where does one draw the line?

A concluding question

When I have aided my students to understand and embrace the ideas of humanism, feminism, and cultural relativism I have at the same time encouraged them to accept competing and even contradictory ideas. Can one be at the same time a humanist/ feminist and hold completely to the principles of cultural relativism?  I think not. To thoroughly embrace the idea of relativism is to rationalize and justify a repressive and even destructive status quo in most cultures, at the very least with respect to the way women are treated. Yet how do I rationalize the go ahead to further culture contact and, necessarily, genocide?

REFERENCE

Richardson, Miles
“Culture and the Struggle to be a Human,” Paper read at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Washington, D.C., November 1976.

---

¹ My second job after graduate school, I taught at the The Columbus College of Art and Design for 5 years before coming to Elon College, now Elon University.

²My definition of humanism has been updated over the years.  I currently use this version:  Humanism is an ideology of human growth and potential based on the assumption that all humans need and deserve to not only have but also be encouraged to pursue pathways which allow the maximization of all their potentials -intellectual, physical, emotional, and spiritual- and that those who are able should work together to help create a world where all humans live with dignity while at the same time, critically, (1) respect the other life forms with which we share the planet and (2) insure the maximization for human potential for generations yet to come.

 

[updated 14 August 2021]

Retroactive application of critical Hydra theory

More on what my learners are teaching me
As I approached the task of talking explicitly and in detail about the Hydra with the learners in Bangladesh, I found myself going back to my ‘greatest hits’, ideas that had stead me well over the decades teaching sociology to mostly privileged US undergraduates.

I realize now, more deeply than I’d like to admit, I was part of a culture that taught about power and privileging in a very traditional way, that is to say ignorant to the history of how deeply and thoroughly asymmetrical and toxically marginalizing power had been embedded itself into every fiber of all world cultures. I knew the world was not fair but had not demanded of myself an examination of my own blinders and preconceptions. Knowing something in the abstract is very different from experiencing it in real time discussing topics with my learners.

A quick point, though. We are all creatures of the culture in which we were born, the weltanschauung in which we were socialized, our way of understanding the world absorbed deeply into our consciousness. In his book Ishmael Daniel Quinn uses with great effect the image of ‘Mother Culture’ whispering into our ears, providing each of us many subtle but critical unwritten assumptions about our world. Our common task is to learn the ability to be critical of our selves and the culture in which we live. Indeed this is the very reason I have taught this and all of my classes for the last 40 years about C. Wright Mills’ sociological imagination, about how to see the world beyond the lenses of our own culture. But this task is not easy or without risk. As anthropologist Jules Henry put it long ago, “To look closely at our culture is to grow angry and to anger others.”

My colleague Azizul and I talked about how gaining critical thinking skills was indeed one of the main goals we had for our learners and how using these skills in daily life may set some of them apart from their peers, making them ‘deviants’. Through history successful agents of social change have always been positive deviants, and we talked to the learners about how those fighting for democracy now in Myanmar are exactly that, women and men going against what the government says in order to fight the injustices and oppression. Given the in depth and frank discussion of gender based violence (GBV) we had in our recent class session -many of the comments going from the females in class- I am confident this cohort of learners has the courage to, as appropriate, speak true to power. I have not urged them to cause ‘good trouble’ as John Lewis would say, but I am not doubting some may choose this path.

Learners or students?
Why use the word learner as opposed to student? When we were planning our first communications for our class I referred to our ‘students’ but my colleague Azizul shared that the word ‘learners’ would be more appropriate. I had

seen this term used in various international contexts but always defaulted to the US norm of using ‘students’. I researched the difference and found that learner, as defined in this graphic, perfectly described my hopes for those who are in my classes, learns anywhere (!), at their own pace, motivated by the desire to learn and so on. Though Azizul liked and shared this distinction  between student and learner his explanation as to why we need to use learner points out a political and diplomatic reality.

“We do not use Student publicly for a couple of reasons. “Student” is related to a formal academic activity like school, working toward a degree in Bangladesh. On the other hand, Rohingya are not allowed to access formal education so far. However, they are allowed informal skill-building workshops, training, learning initiatives. Therefore we called our Rohingya either volunteers or learners. On the other hand, learners implies a more self-driven approach whereas the student is topdown. Thus, using learners, we wanted to make them proactive in learning. We do not teach however we facilitate their teaching-learning process. We learn collectively.”

There is much already written -with much more to come from both academic researchers and from those affected- about the many truncated rights of refugees, but our current experience with this cohort of learners highlights the limitations on the right to advanced education. This is an inherently political issue deserving of careful discussion at the highest levels.

Azizul, Trevor, and I have been interacting with a mixed group for the last several months -14 Rohingya refugees and 6 Bangladeshi nationals, males and females in each sub-group. As a statement of fact, some in our class have more rights than others. That this is so is in itself a delicate issue, one that I feel we have handled with utmost care, modeling a hyper conscientious egalitarian approach to all our class interactions.

Retroactive application of critical Hydra theory
As I write this Taliban forces reacting to the power vacuum created by the US withdrawal are retaking much of Afghanistan by force. Primarily controlled by the men from one Pashtun ethnic group, the Taliban is a political movement that has altered world history by its use of violence against both outsiders and those within who would rebel.

But see what I just wrote? A fairly ‘traditional’ statement about the Taliban which, looking now through the lens of critical Hydra theory, I argue glosses over the centuries (millennia?) old baked in misogyny which has subjugated women into second class persons. I will die on this hill: the treatment of women under the Taliban is not, as a cultural relativist might say, benign gender differentiation. We need to describe it as it is, stripped of male dominated cultural justification. Taliban treatment of women is overtly and toxically gender stratification.

Here is what I wrote nearly 40 years ago on this general topic. I have indeed come full circle.

“To thoroughly embrace the idea of relativism is to rationalize and justify a repressive and even destructive status quo in most cultures, at the very least with respect to the way women are treated.” [Here is the original essay.]

There is an old story from anthropology that I sometimes tell my students about how ethnocentrism is a cultural universal; all human groups have pride in themselves and tend to see ‘others’ as less than. Back to the basic definition of ethnocentrism as “if A  B therefore A > B.” The story comes from the British anthropologist E. E. Evans-Pritchard describing his study of the Nuer in east Africa, asking them what the word their people used for their culture “Naath” meant. Their response was it meant “the people.” Prichard asked for clarification, pointing out that though he was not Nuer but was not Nuer. They replied politely, ‘no you are not people, you are not quite human.’

As I pointed out to my Bangladeshi learners, the line from othering to ethnocentrism is pretty direct, as is the line

from ethnocentrism to racism. Through the entirety of human history cultures like the Nuer have embedded a low-grade version of racism into their world view, this becoming more toxic as we see the long, bloody global history of slavery and genocide in not just the continent of Africa but in much of the rest of the world.

Human character is not a monolith, and there is a range of personality types which appear to exist among humans. Though necessary perhaps for group fitness in early epochs of our existence during the period of our development as a species, the existence of a personality type which enjoys power and control seems evident. Just as we find handedness to be a cultural universal -most efficiently explained using the concept of group (not individual) fitness- the same is so for the small but significant percentage of the population with a strong need for power.

As we transitioned from mostly egalitarian hunting and gathering lives (through several stages) to agricultural lifestyles, the problem of how to distribute the surpluses generated by the domestication of both plants and animals was solved by those who wanted power by creating and justifying various forms of social stratification. These personality types have long dominated the global landscape, and by looking at their movement through history we can see the bloody consequences of colonization driven by the lust for power these men had/have. Our poster child example here is perhaps King Leopold of Belgium who is responsible for the decade long genocide of perhaps 10,000,000 Congolese in the late 1800’s. Leopold has much competition for his ignoble title of worst, as we turn to Mao, Pol Pot, Hitler, and others.

Back to the Taliban, their leadership, by systematically only pulling from one ethnic group, both outwardly and inwardly show overt signs of ethnocentrism, it but a thinly veiled racism. The Taliban appears to be primarily controlled by the men from one Pashtun ethnic group. To be clear, the Taliban have highjacked Pashtun and Afghan culture, and cancerous misognistic, racist, and classist privileging forces have taken root. The story of the racist and misogynistic Taliban is neither new nor uncommon; it can be seen countless times in cultures long before they came into existence and other examples fill every corner of the entire globe.

And so, we now see that the three main privileging forces representing the key ‘isms’ taught in most intro to sociology classes are all embedded inextricably in all world cultures. Race, gender, and class dynamics are central to the vast majority of socially structured inequality we find virtually everywhere. These three privileging forces continue to work in tandem with each other and all of the other privileging forces to sustain the many layers of marginalization which characterize human life. In the last several centuries the internal logic of capitalism and, more recently neoliberalism, have exponentially amplified all these forces, especially so classism.

An application of critical Hydra theory to our global history demands deconstructing our species’ history of toxic othering and how these acts of marginalization have been normalized and even glorified by leaders, past and present. This deconstruction effort is not easy, fast, simple, nor uncontroversial, but taming the Hydra, I believe, can be accomplished.

Taming the Hydra during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics

[Research help for this post was provided by Elon students Amelia Arcaro-Burbridge and Trevor Molin]

Shining the light on positive examples
My last several blog posts [chapters] have illustrated the nature of the Hydra and have painted a dismal picture of oppressive privileging forces imposing their will on many types of marginalized groups all across the globe and back through time. Through the millennia there has been a constant tug of war between those who are driven by hate, greed, and gluttony and those who act motivated by love, compassion, and humility. The ‘moral arc of the universe’ may indeed bend toward justice, but for every positive movement there are negative counter actions, the former barely winning the battle over the long term.

Recognizing positive actions -making them part of the news cycle- is a necessary step we need to support first to give ourselves hope, but perhaps more importantly by shining a light on these positives actions we are providing positive examples for those who want to join the cause of furthering our move toward a humanity that creates and nurtures pathways to dignity for all humans.

This exercise in identifying examples of ‘taming the Hydra’ reinforces the key premise that all eight heads of the Hydra are always present, and all are interconnected by various forms of toxic othering.

Taming the Hydra during the Olympics
Taming the Hydra can take many forms and is being done day by day everywhere across the globe. The Olympic Games bring together athletes, officials, fans, and the press from every continent and from most of our 206 nations. These games bring together different cultures, and hence many varied norms, traditions. As such provide a setting where ideas about how humans should treat other humans are out on the stage. A positive consequence of this cultural mixture is that one culture’s norms, policies and laws which are seen as oppressive are called out by those from cultures or nations who are more progressive. Olympic tradition is that all cultures should be respected, but that respect can be situationally withdrawn when universal human rights are violated. The discussion over the line between what is a cultural norm that should be respected and one which is a legitimate violation of human rights is ongoing, vigorous, and has constant political overtones. Asking hard questions is at the very core of understanding and taming the Hydra. The hard questions raised at the games are critical and illuminating.

With that spirit in mind, below are some examples of actions taken during the 2020 Tokyo Olympic games. Included are actions taken by individuals, organizations, and allies.

As with all social change efforts, there are competing forces; efforts to tame the Hydra are simultaneously being counteracted by those intended to maintain the status quo or worse to feed the Hydra poison so that toxic othering is reinforced. We have thus included examples of those individuals and organizations who act in such a way as to stifle positive social change.

Our reading of these Olympics is that this tug of war between taming and feeding is being won by those who stand for social justice and our evidence; the Hydra is being tamed, act by heroic act, in real time. We invite you to click on each hyperlink to read in more detail. Keep in mind that the Hydra is inherently intersectional and some actions may address more than one head of the Hydra.

Please note that by including any of the hyperlinks below I am not endorsing that news outlet nor all of the points made in the article.

Please join me
The list of links below far from complete, and I would love to update and make it more thorough. I invite everyone who reads this post to send to me via email (arcaro@elon.edu) any additional links which illustrate actions of individuals or organizations addressing the various heads of the Hydra.

Patriarchy -fighting sexism

U.S. Olympic Fencer, Accused of Sexual Misconduct, Kept Apart From Team
Norwegian women’s beach handball team fined for not playing in bikinis

Pink offers to pay bikini bottoms fine for Norway women’s handball team
Wearing unitards, German gymnasts promote comfort, take stand against sexualization

 

Race/ethnicity – confronting racial, ethnic, and religious based marginalization

Olympic Pressure And How Black Athletes Balance Being Applauded Yet Feared
The Olympics Rely On, but Don’t Support, Black Girl Magic

Race Imboden: What US Olympic fencer’s black X symbol on his hand means

Costa Rica’s Luciana Alvarado raises fist during gymnastics floor routine in support of Black Lives Matter

Belarusian sprinter reaches Poland after defying order home

Colonialism/Paternalism insuring representation from all peoples

IOC Refugee Olympic Team Tokyo 2020

Why is there a Refugee Olympic Team?

Hetero/cisnormativity – gender and sexuality inclusivity 

First openly transgender Olympians are competing in Tokyo
There may be more Olympians who identify as LGBTQ than ever before. But there are limits to inclusion

Record Number of LGBTQ Athletes Set to Compete at the Tokyo Olympics

Classism/class privilege

Sha’Carri Richardson, a Track Sensation, Tests Positive for Marijuana

How many sports are in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics? Which are the new ones?

An unsavory history of the Olympic Games in five outfits

Ableism (Physical, Mental, and Intellectual)

‘OK not to be OK’: Mental health takes top role at Olympics

The Paralympic Games

Ageism

Fmr. Olympic gymnast breaks retirement, challenges ageism in pro-sports 

Anthropocentrism – questioning human centered actions

Even With Cardboard Beds And Recycled Medals, Olympics Take Flak Over The Environment

Tokyo Olympics Medals Were Made With Tons of Recycled Smartphones, Laptops Donated by the Public

There are so many more articles to include and there will be updates made to this post.

Woke Olympics?
The Olympic games provide an amazing spotlight on cultural differences -and similarities. It is no surprise that in this #MeToo, #BLM, #Decolonize world these Olympics would generate attention on issues about the privileging forces represented by the heads of the Hydra. We can learn much about our species and its increasingly globalized culture by observing what is written and broadcast before, during, and after the games. In a very disparaging fashion American comedian and ‘commentator’ Bill Maher described these as the ‘woke Olympics’. I agree with him that these Olympics are calling out privileging forces that exist around the world in every institution, including sports, but rather than disparaging these efforts I respect and encourage this critical reflection on the human condition. I think applying critical Hydra theory can help us understand more deeply all of the links above.

 

Advanced Hydra Theory: Understanding power and social forces

[Updated 6 August]

Thank you to my learners for asking amazingly insightful questions
I am covering the chapter on social stratification with my Rohingya and Bangladeshi learners just now, and I want to thank them as a group and especially our translator/teaching assistant Azizul Hoque from the  Centre for Peace and Justice, Brac University for continuously inspiring my

teaching and for providing excellent questions.

This discussion of stratification cuts to the heart of Hydra theory and its emphasis on privileging forces, and by probing deeply we can advance our understanding.

For decades in my intro to sociology classes I have  summarized my longer and more technical definition of social stratification into just three words: structured social inequality. As I grappled with how to explain the phenomena of social stratification I was forced to get to the fundamental nature of social inequality, that is, to get at the root of the issue, to get radical. Reflecting on our class’ earlier conversations about othering and toxic othering, we were all forced to probe into a sober reality. Whenever there is an asymmetry of power in any social situation social differentiation can (must?) transition into stratification. This forces us to probe even deeper and thus deal with the concept of power. I explained to them that social powers are at play constantly and a good sociologist studies these social forces at both the micro (interpersonal) and the macro (community, organizations, and states) levels.

Here are the questions I posed in a short video message to my class … and to myself as I continue exploring the concept of critical Hydra theory.

“As we discuss social stratification it is necessary for us to grapple with the concept of power. Power has been studied through time by all major sociologists, most particularly Max Weber who defined power as the ability to impose ones will over other people. And so as we think about power I want you to consider power in your life.  

Who has power to make decisions that affect you: in your family, in your ‘village’, in your section of the camp, in the camp overall, in Bangladesh, in the Southeast Asian region, and globally? And considering each of these levels: Where did their power come from? How do those in control demonstrate their power (enforce their will)? What are the consequences when you or another person challenges their power? In your opinion do those in power at all of these levels -the family, village, in the [refugee] camp, in Bangladesh, in Southeast Asia, and globally- do those in power act fairly? What are the consequences for you or others for ‘speaking truth to power’ that is confronting people when they are using their power incorrectly or in an unjust way?  Another question to ask is how is their power used to support  a concept we talked about in depth, ‘toxic othering’?

What personal power do you have and how do you use it in your life? How do you use your power(s) to make your life better? How do you use your power(s) to make your family’s life better? How do you use your power(s) to make your community’s life better? How do you use your power(s) to make your village better? How do you use your power(s) to make Bangladesh or Myanmar better? How do you use your power(s) to make the world better?

Those are all very important questions that I just asked and I don’t expect everyone to answer them all, but I do want you to think about those questions, think about power swirling around you as you walk through the village, as you walk through the camp. Who has the power to control, who has the power to say what happens and what does not happen, and how did they get that power.”

In response to the video concerning power my teaching associate Azizul Hoque received a reflection from a Bangladeshi learner while he was mentoring the cohort. The learner noted,

“People with money and political affiliation are seemed to be considered as power holder regardless of his personality, education or capacity to guide community properly. Poor villagers unquestionably accept the words and work of a local influential person as a guaranteed as they can offer money to solve a social problem”.

Azizul replied to the learner and observed,

“In an underprivileged area like Cox’s Bazar most people are politically unaware of where power lies, especially at higher levels. The inequality conversely paves the way for certain tiny classes such as rich peasants, the family whose sons or relatives are government officials, the local political cadre who receive government’s contracts for infrastructural development or relief distribution, these people are small in number and common people cannot deny their influence. It motivates the young of these families, who are outside the power block,  to work for a wage or migrate to Middle Eastern countries as labour. It emancipates some of them from poverty however the majority can hardly come out of this powerless cycle. Certain cultural bottlenecks exist such as  malpractice of bureaucratic power, nepotism in resource distribution and petty corruption. Therefore power is unequally distributed in the communities where money and muscles act as determinates and whereas the socio-economically impoverished/marginalized species of the community are seemed to be taken it guaranteed.
 
The power dynamics of a refugee community are very different from host communities.”

The list of power influences that Azizul notes is indeed a massive problem. Massive understatement: The corrupt actions of those who gain power leads to much social injustice and systemic marginalization, and understanding full nature of the power dynamics of one’s social position is frequently difficult if not at times impossible. This is in part because legitimate and illegitimate power sources can exist separately but also within the same organizational entity, for example a corrupt official within a legitimate organization.

One of my refugee learners asked,

“When an authority people say criminal to an innocent public as accusation, it is ok. When a civilian says ill about authority, it is crime.”

He went on to give many other examples, each with the same theme, finally asking “What’s sociological views on this?” Here is the gist of my response.

“These are all excellent questions and each one points to the question of power and how it is used. One social philosopher put it this way, “The ruling ideas of any age are ever the ideas of the ruling class.”  That is to say, those in power get to make the rules, and they sometimes (maybe frequently) make rules that justify their own power and also justify rules, norms, policies and laws that serve to marginalize other groups (that is, they use their power to engage in toxic othering).
 
The role of the sociologist is to objectively, systematically, and thoroughly describe, document, and analyze power: how it is gained, maintained, used, and abused. Using this information the sociologist supports those who would challenge those in power when they are using their powers in harmful ways. Indeed, the reason d’être of sociology is to ‘investigate humanity for the purpose of service.’
 
There are several aphorisms (sayings) that come to mind when talking about power. Perhaps the most often quoted is that “Absolute power corrupts absolutely.” This 1887 statement by the British historian and moralist Lord Acton argues that as individuals gain power their sense of morality diminishes.
 
And this is how toxic othering leads to the marginalization of some lesser privileged groups: those in power, increasingly intoxicated by this power use their advantage to play on the insecurities of those ‘beneath’ them, making them feel inferior, thus setting in place a structure of power relationships that, over time, ossifies into permanence, becoming ‘baked into’ the culture.  This process is at the origin of and indeed what fuels the body of the Hydra.
 
Yet another Brit, novelist and social critic George Orwell makes much of the concept of power in two of his most influential works, 1984 and Animal Farm. In the later book, the idea that ‘power corrupts’ is indeed the main message is illustrated in the book by a pig named not coindidentially, Napoleon. The pigs, now in control of the farm and needing to explain why they have more power than the other animals state that ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.’ With this wording magic the transition from merely different (A≠ B) to being superior (A > B) now complete. 
 
Another frequently mentioned quotation (though it may now have aged out of common usage) is “Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.” This statement is thought to be first uttered by the Frenchman Napoleon Bonaparte but it

gained much currency in the US in the late 1900’s by American diplomate Henry Kissinger. Though the truth of this statement is suspect, the fact that men believe it to be true may help explain why some men seek power.”

This last aphorism leads me to put weight on the conjecture that out of all the privileging forces, that of patriarchy (sexism) was the first to emerge and take root. In our species males wield physical power over women, and this asymmetry of power eventually was exploited in culture after culture.  There is much written about the origin of patriarchy, some of it controversial, but that it exists now and is inextricably woven into the fabric of most existing cultures is a fact we cannot avoid.

One premise of my thinking is that allowing for and justifying one form of structured social inequality provides normative support for the marginalization of some humans by others in their culture thus making it easier and perhaps inevitable that additional social status power differences to be normalized. Restated, can it be argued, for example, that gender differentiation will lead to gender stratification and normalization of this social relationship gives license to additional toxic othering based on various status differences? I think yes.

Some basic sociology
One of our classmates asked this question, 

“Although social stratification is assumed as a system of inequality, why does everything [in] society support this system?”

My explanation to him was that yes, social stratification based on differences in status exists in virtually every culture, both past and present. But why? What is the social function of inequality? If social stratification is a cultural universal (true at least in the last several thousand years) why is this so?  Other cultural universals like the family, religion, or art can be explained by how they function to maintain a culture’s integrity, and perhaps this is so for structured social inequality.

The functionalists logic goes like this. Using the organic analogy, there are no superfluous organs in the body; all the parts of the body’s system are interdependent with all the other parts; every part of the body is there for a reason, and all of the systems have a mutual goal, that is to keep the body functioning in a healthy fashion. The same is so in cultures. Cultures are integrated wholes where all the parts (i.e., social institutions like the family) are mutually interdependent and all geared to keep the culture running optimally.

So, is structured social inequality -a cultural universal- healthy for society?

The answer to this question is not simple, but the critical theoretical tension here is between the two main macro theories in sociology, namely functionalism and conflict theory.  In question is whether or not social inequality, the unequal distribution of status and power, is or is not necessary and inevitable for cultures to function. The debate in sociology is more narrowly around the question of class, caste, and the distribution of economic power, but I argue that the underlying logic works for other privileging forces as well.

American sociologist Kingsley Davis summed up the functionalist perspective in one sentence:

“Social inequality is thus an unconsciously evolved device by which societies insure that the most important positions are conscientiously filled by the most qualified persons.”

Structured social inequality is necessary and inevitable, according to the functionalism perspective. In any culture there is a complex division of labor needed to get all necessary tasks accomplished and keep the culture running. Some jobs are more important than others and these jobs must be rewarded more highly in order to attract the most qualified individuals to do the job. Some people must be able to acquire more power and privilege than others to encourage them to take on the more critical tasks. Social inequality must be part of the structure of an optimally functioning culture, so says the functionalist.

The conflict perspective, implicitly adopted throughout my posts on the Hydra and in my discussions of toxic othering, is that social inequality is neither necessary nor inevitable to for a culture to function, and that a world without extreme social stratification can be made possible by human efforts to put in place norms, policies, and laws which embrace differentiation but reject toxic stratification. It is possible for humans to live an essentially egalitarian world where there may be some meaningful yet moderate disparities of material wealth but all members of the culture have access to basic needs and pathways to dignity.

Ultimately Critical Hydra theory is an effort to reach what I define as the goal of humanitarianism: an ideology of human growth and potential based on the assumption that we should all be working toward a world where every human not only has pathways to but is actively encouraged to reach all their potentials, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. And further that these pathways acknowledge and respect the rights and needs of not only future human generations but other life forms as well.

The sociological debate historically has centered around social class differences, but the Hydra theory proposes synchronous and inherently intersectional othering processes related to gender, ethnicity, etc. and this toxic othering   (the transition from differentiation to stratification) slowly and insidiously being normalized for all the heads of the Hydra. This quote from the original source of most conflict theory, Karl Marx, offers this summary explanation,

“The ruling ideas of each age have ever been the ideas of its ruling class.”

Social forces
In a video for the class I presented an equation explaining social stratification. In the very simplest form of this equation I present one way to answer the question ‘why are there rich and poor?’

Poverty/Affluence = f (P * S) where

P = personal traits like a good work ethic, being frugal, being ‘smart’
S = social structural factors like gender, race, or ethnicity

Put into words, Poverty or Affluence of a person is a function of two general variables namely personal qualities (or lack thereof) and social structural factors.

The Critical Hydra Theory explanation is more detailed.

Poverty/Affluence = f (IC * PS * C [S +H + G]) * x where

IC = Individual character (e.g., work ethic, being frugal, being ‘smart’)
PS = Privilege score (based on the Hydra model and calibrated by location)
C = Chance (S = social, H = health, G = geography)

X = other variables

Put into words, Poverty or Affluence of a person is a function of individual character, the privilege score of the individual (where all the heads of the Hydra represent various statuses, and chance factors such as social context (e.g., number of siblings, birth order, social relationships, and so on), health (mental, emotional and physical), and geography (where a person is born/lives, e.g., urban, rural, and a myriad of other dimensions).

Both equations as written infer that all variables have equal weight, which of course they do not. And demonstratively so, weighting matters a great deal. Using the simpler model to explain poverty or affluence, the question to ask is that if these two variables (P and S) are not equal, which should be weighted more, which is the more influential variable?

Those who defend the stratification system, mostly the rich, will argue that P is more important and that they are in their position because of a strong work ethic and in general being being frugal and smart, that is, superior humans. The poor tend not blame themselves and thus see S as being the dominate variable by far though acknowledging the influence of personal effort.

The Critical Hydra Theory view is that not only one’s relative wealth but more than that, what sociologist Max Weber called one’s ‘life chances‘, are determined mostly by social forces and hence the simple equation would look more like this:

P/A = f (P * 10S), with poverty or affluence ten times more influential than personal character.

In sum, all humans are impacted by power and the social forces put in play by the use and abuse of power by individuals and groups who find a way to exploit differences and turn differentiation into stratification. Personal character matters, but it is far outweighed by many external variables, mostly privileging forces.

Power and social forces

The dynamic described above, allowing for the marginalization of some humans by others, has played out throughout human history. Structured social inequality is the product of toxic othering, itself the product of the perhaps inexorable process of status differences being used to justify the inferior treatment of those deemed ‘less equal.’

Critical Hydra theory demands an understanding of power and the social forces that lead to structured social inequality. But looking at only the present is not enough, the critical Hydra theorist must look deep into the history of each culture, this task becoming increasingly difficult as the process of globalization accelerates.

Thank you
I’ll conclude by again thanking the 20 learners -14 Rohingya refugees and 6 host community Bangladeshis- in Bangladesh joining me in this journey of exploration and understanding. Their inspiring questions continue to push our analysis and understanding forward. Critical Hydra theory is maturing because of this special class of women and men, some refugees, other members off the host community, all joining together to move themselves and all of humanity in a more positive direction.

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This and all of the posts categorized in Hydra “privileging forces” will soon appear in Understanding and Taming the Hydra to be published late summer 2021.

Critical Hydra Theory

Deepening our understanding of ‘toxic othering’
Teaching an introduction to sociology class to Rohingya and Bangladeshi learners is an amazing experience. This class has tested my abilities as an educator, and for that I am thankful. Explaining topics like ethnocentrism and othering most definitely have stretched the limits of my pedagogical skills.

In a recent post I described how our class has gone thus far, and ended with a discussion of ‘critical Hydra theory’. I argued,

“Critical Hydra theory involves looking at how toxic and marginalizing othering is represented by all the heads of the Hydra and is evidenced in long standing norms, policies, and laws which have normalized and justified various forms of discrimination, exclusion, marginalization, and even genocide; toxic othering.”

In our WhatsApp chat one of my students asked,

“How to move or overcome from toxic othering to non-toxic othering?”

Student questions have always driven my analytical thoughts, and this one was truly inspirational.

Here is how I responded,

“One of your classmates recently asked a wonderful and very important question on our WhatsApp group and I want to take a few minutes to talk about this question. The question had to do with othering and toxic othering.  The question essentially was, “How do we change from toxic othering to non-toxic othering?”  There couldn’t be a better question, there couldn’t be a more important questions to focus on as we address the issue of our local problems and our international problems.  The question is essentially about social change and how we can reconstruct some parts of our society which are toxic othering and address those norms and policies and laws and change them in a positive direction. An American cleric used the phrase’ bending the moral arc of the universe’ and he made the point that the direction of the moral arc is towards justice, and our job -these are my words- our job is too work in such a way that we move the directions of the moral arc toward justice. The moral arc of the universe is long but it does -and I believe in this- bend toward justice. And what this means, what this justice means is a world where toxic othering has been eradicated [that] toxic othering of other genders, of other races, of other ethnicities, to other people in general, that toxic othering is eradicated from the earth. As so our job as social thinkers, our job as people who are leaders in our community is to work in such a way such that we minimize toxic othering and maximize pathways that are non othering [or rather] non toxic othering. In short, getting rid of toxic othering is a huge job that we all need to participate in both on the individual level and on the organizational level. We need to encourage ourselves and everyone around us and all of the organizations to which we belong….we need to have them move toward a non toxic othering kind of set of norms, policies, and laws. Let us begin this journey together. (Here is the video version of my response.)

The original “moral arc” quotation comes from Theodore Parker, a Unitarian pastor in Lexington, Massachusetts. In a 1853 sermon he preached “I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends toward justice.” The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. summarized that phrase into a shorter statement. He said “The arc of the moral universe is long but it tends toward justice.” Former President Barak Obama also used the phrase in various comments and speeches.

We must understand power to tame the Hydra
One question raised by both of these quotations is whether or not the moral universe bends towards justice on its own or rather through collective human action. Typically people that use the phrase indicate that we all need to work together to bend the moral arc toward justice; it is human will bending the arc.

In my case I have argued on both sides of the perspectives. Sometimes I feel as if human impact is superfluous and that it’s an anthropocentric illusion that we control our world. Other times, when I am more optimistic, I believe that the moral universe is impacted by our actions to change norms, policies, and laws that allow for us to make many incremental changes that, taken together, make our world collectively more just.

Our amazing teaching assistant, Aziz Hoque from the Brac University Center for Peace and Justice, commented that the concept of power is essential in understanding othering. Though this idea has been implicit in how I have discussed othering and the Hydra thus far, I now know that going forward explaining both images must make this more explicit. Included here are the updated versions.

In WhatsApp discussions about this topic, this is part of what I said,

“Even when there is a slight difference in power between two groups (A and B) normal Othering can turn into toxic Othering very quickly, and those in power enjoy their privilege so much that they find ways to make the power disparity permanent. Through this lens we can look back at the entirety of human history and see how privileging forces have been woven into all aspects of every culture.

And so the book that I am putting out right now, Understanding and Taming the Hydra, begins with the very simple premise that #MeToo, #BlackLivesMatter, #Decolonize, #ClimateCrisis, and so on are all rooted in the process of toxic othering which has been systemically embedded (to varying degrees) in to all world cultures.”

Taming the Hydra means understanding and then deconstructing the toxic othering that has been done all through history. The counter forces that want to bend the moral arc in a negative, ‘unjust’ direction are strong, and they are represented in some of the leadership we have around the world right now. Look at what’s happening in Ethiopia. Look at what is happening in Myanmar. Look at what is happening in Palestine. Look what is happening in the United States. There are many forces, I am called them ‘privileging forces,’ that have been so woven into our cultures and nations around the world. Bending these, changing these, reforming these is tremendous work. There are many who fight this anti toxic othering work because they personally benefit, or they are driven by some base impulses, for example gluttony and greed.

Sending the moral arc toward justice, taming the Hydra, means an infinite number of small acts on each of our parts, all geared toward changing social norms, policies and organizations with which we work in our communities, and laws at all levels local, national, and international. We need to raise our voices not just as informal agents of social control and social change, but urge those who are formal agents of social change, our politicians and thought leaders in organizations and businesses. We need to urge all of these individuals through our phone calls, texts, emails, and one on one conversations to change each and every policy and law which contributes to toxic othering.

 

This path is difficult and fraught with cultural complexities. Some of our cultural norms and even our laws have demonized and marginalized some statuses. I know that it is going to be difficult for many to accept that, for example myopic heteronormativity, is a problem, and that acceptance of different sexualities and gender identifications is something that flies in the face of much cultural learning for many people around the world, especially so in cultures where religion is a core element.

Perhaps the biggest issue regarding toxic othering is that related to anthropocentrism. We tend to see ourselves as of course dominant over nature, that is we ‘other’ nature, and this relationship is clearly one which is toxic both metaphorically and literally. Being anti-anthropocentric  will seen as anti-capitalism to many because it means re-thinking our concepts of comfort, progress, and ‘life-style.’

I understand that this hill is a very steep one for many people, that being critical of one’s own culture and traditions may seem  unpatriotic or even heretical. Social change involving core institutions is anyways contentious and well meaning activists must be clear headed, sober, and willing be be allies of and accept ally support from other diverse social justice movement, always with an eye toward the basic process of othering.

Bending the moral arc means confronting entrenched power wielded by all those who enjoy majority status privileges (male, white, Global North, Cis/hetero/affluent, able, and non-old). Power is rarely yielded willingly; there will be -as both history and the turmoil-filled present will testify- resistance.

Teaching critical theory, a reflexive statement
As a decades long member and past President of the Association for Humanist Sociology, I have been teaching critical theory my entire career in each of my sociology classes. With that said, I will emphasize that my journey understanding, critiquing, and addressing historical forces creating and supporting social injustices is ongoing. Like most older, white, male, hetero, cis, able, and Global North persons my personal experience with injustice is limited. My class background (my family was well below the poverty line for my entire youth) does give me experiential knowledge of this privileging force. Regarding this and all other privileging forces, I listen intently to and take the lead from those who have first hand experiences regarding the marginalizing power of socially structured inequalities, reading and rereading histories focusing on and written by those most affected. By using a continually more finely informed understanding of the vast array of social injustices across the globe and back through time I hope to make a modest contribution to shining a light on and actively challenging all privileging forces.

All that said, I am keenly aware that the trope ‘critical race theory’ has taken on additional meaning in the last six months here in the United States as the political right condemns its teaching in high schools across our nation. By introducing the term ‘critical Hydra theory’ have I culturally appropriated this trope? I’ll leave that question to the reader, but I will argue that most who are advocating for the teaching of critical race theory would agree that separating racism from the other ‘isms’ is a an intellectually and tactically weak perspective.  To quote Cornel West, ‘Justice is what love looks like in public.‘ And justice never means ‘just us’ it means all who have been marginalized by any of the othering privileging forces.

And so perhaps West tells me I need to conclude by invoking an aphorism that has been oft repeated throughout history by the wise in all global cultures, religions, and thought systems: love is essential, love is the cure, love is the answer.  It is the human capacity to love that will, finally, find a way to bring humanity together and tame the Hydra.

Final thank you to my learners in Bangladesh and Elon
Thank you to all the learners I have encountered online in Bangladesh and here at my university. I feel your passion and sense your compassion; you are the loving people who will join with others to create a more just world for all.

Evolution of the Hydra in images

The Hydra metaphor almost demands a visual representation, and as soon as I was invited to be part of the ALNAP session I asked artist Dr. Ahmed Fadaam, my friend and colleague, to create an image for me. Over the nearly two years that I haver been working on the Hydra model Ahmed has added words and features dutifully. He is now working on a 3-d model that can morph showing the Hydra being tamed and ‘toxic’ othering changing into ‘normal’ othering. The ‘othering’ process is something I have used for years in my sociology classes, and just as the Hydra changed over the last two years so has the graphic I have used to present the idea of othering.

Throughout this blog (book) you have seen the development of both images; here they are in chronological order. See below how these ideas has morphed and deepened over the nearly two years of their existence.

 

The Hydra image
The Hydra image is now in its fourth version. This image was the first one created after I began preparations for the Ocyrber 2019 ALNAP conference. This was the fruit of discussions with Leah Campbell and others at ALNAP about the topic of our ‘jigsaw’ session.

Very soon after we starting using the phrase ‘privileging forces’ to describe all these ‘isms.’ In Berlin it became quickly apparent there were two more heads to be added, namely Ableism and Ageism. This version of the Hydra lasted well over a year.

 

After presenting the Hydra model to my sociology classes over several semesters one more head needed to be added, Anthropocentrism, this to address our species toxic relationship with the environment.

The most recent change to the image came just this summer. I was explaining the concept of ‘othering’ to my learners in Bangladesh and realized the image needed to clearly represent the idea that toxic othering is the process underlying all of the privileging forces.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Explaining ‘othering’

Here is the original image that I have used for years to illustrate in symbols the basic idea of ethnocentrism. When I began seeing all of the ‘isms’ as being related, this explanation served well.

 

This second image adds the words ‘differentiation’ and ‘stratification’, concepts I feel are critical to a deeper understanding of the process.

Adding the word “Othering” as a title was an overdue step.

This summer while teaching learners in Bangladesh the term ‘othering’ they found the distinction between ‘normal’ and ‘toxic’ othering to be useful.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Packing even more information into the graphic, a previously implied phrase was added, “The core process that generates privileging forces of the Hydra” underneath the title.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The most recent iteration adds the critical dimension of power, a fundamental point that generates much discussion.

Final thoughts
Just as with the rest of this book, I am sure that both the image of the Hydra and the graphic explaining ‘othering’ will continue to be improved. Constant critical feedback from my students, humanitarian friends and colleagues, and casual readers is always not only welcome but is fundamentally central to this journey.

 

Teaching an online sociology course in Bangladesh

Introducing ‘critical Hydra theory’

 

Midterm update from Elon/Cox’s Bazar/Bangladesh
My teaching assistants and I are over just halfway through our experimental 10 week short course ‘introduction to sociology.’ Our class is comprised of 20 learners, 14 of them are from Myanmar, Rohingya refugees in Cox’s Bazaar, and the other six are Bangladeshi nationals. The class also has a mix of males and females, though not unpredictably so males dominate in terms of numbers.

Our class meets synchronously via GoogleMeets or Zoom for approximately 1 1/2 to 2 hours each week. There are the usual technical difficulties on both ends, but in the refugee camp especially Wi-Fi connectivity is iffy in the best
times, and during hard rains, etc. the connections are sometimes poor or lost all together. As if on cue, the call to prayers comes through someone’s microphone at least once each class. Keeping all 20 students for the full amount of time is pretty much impossible, but we are doing our best. In addition to the chronic Wi-Fi issues my refugee learners are currently on lockdown because of Covid.

I have two extraordinary teaching assistants helping me with this class. Here in North Carolina is Trevor Molin, a former student of mine.  He volunteered to help with this class as part of the service component in my Global Social Problems class this spring and is now helping me on this end on a totally volunteer basis.

My other teaching assistant is Azizul Hoque, who has been given time from his other duties at the Brac University Center for Peace and Justice based in Dhaka to fix, translate, and otherwise make the class happen in Bangladesh. Without Aziz the class could not happen. Period. His ability to translate my sometime high level vocabulary into both Bangla and Rohingya is nothing less than amazing; he never hesitates and rarely asks me for clarification. The three of us have a great working relationship, and typically meet (via WhatsApp) several times each week both before and after our weekly synchronous class.

Our text is an OpenStax free text -Sociology 2e– which I edited down from 450+ pages to about 140. We had this modified text printed and bound in Cox’s Bazar and distributed to our students. The learners have been asked to read approximately one chapter per week and also watch the 4-5 short videos I create to add and clarify content.

We have our challenges. But the overall vibe of the class is that our time together is extraordinarily valuable and we all make an effort to do what we can to make our class happen. Bangladesh, of course, is many hours ahead of the
US, so although we meet in the late afternoon for the learners it is an early morning class for me and my Elon teaching assistant Trevor. We get up at 5:00 or 5:30, start the coffee, and join the class at 6:00 AM.

We had a good response to our mid-session student perception of teaching survey (80%) and overall earned very high marks.  When asked, Overall how would you rate your experience in this course?  ယေဘုယျအားသင်ဤသင်တန်း၌သင်တို့၏အတွေ့အကြုံကိုဘယ်လောက်သတ်မှတ်မလဲসামগ্রিকভাবে আপনি এই কোর্সে আপনার অভিজ্ঞতা কীভাবে রেট কর 81% indicated ‘very valuable’ and remaining 19% said ‘very valuable.”

Another key question was, “Is this class relevant and useful to you?”. Here are the results.

 

Some background and context
I have been writing about and working with Rohingya refugees for nearly 2 years now and my relationships led me to Jessica Olney, a fellow with the Center for Peace and Justice (CPJ) at Brac University in Bangladesh. Jessica visited my Global Social Problems class this spring at Elon University via Skype, and we talked about, among other things, creating an online class for refugees. Our plans became reality just after the end of Ramadan this spring we started a grand experiment that is made possible only by support from Brac University the the CPJ.

Currently across the globe 80 million people have been forcibly displaced from their homes -about 1% of humanity- and at any time there are approximately 7 million living in managed refugee camps. The harsh reality is that the average stay in refugee camps is counted in years and even decades, not months or days.

The humanitarian organizations administering the refugee camps have all manner of tasks to accomplish to keep a camp functioning. Top on their priority list is safety and security, but WASH, shelter, food, and camp organization and communication are all very high priorities. Lower on the priority scale is keeping everyone occupied. In the case of adults there are many ‘cash for work’ programs where refugees work with NGOs to do necessary tasks around the camp. I have written about these refugees and have called them refugee humanitarian‘s.

Younger people of course need to be taken care of, and there are various NGOs which focus on daycare, kindergarten, and primary education (e.g., Save the Children and World Vision). Secondary and tertiary education are far down on the priority list. That’s where this class comes in. I am teaching both refugees and Bangladeshi nationals that are in their late teens and early 20s, hungry to learn, but with limited pathways to further themselves educationally. To my knowledge ours is a unique class, bringing together refugees and nationals.

Toxic othering
Today in class we talked about the content of chapter 6 in their text (Social Organizations), and I was describing the basic sociological terms of ‘in group’ and ‘out group.’ I have not talked to them yet about the Hydra model, but in a previous video lecture I introduced him to the concept of ‘othering.’ Today we talked about how one group tends to ‘other’ another group. I then went on to differentiate between ‘normal othering’ and ‘toxic othering.’ I described to
them how in much simpler simpler words, differentiation is very different from stratification. That is, seeing differences is normal and typically OK, but using differences to justify seeing people as inferior or marginalizing them is bad, it is toxic othering.

After class I talked to Aziz about how he explained othering in Bangla and the Rohingya language. He said that he had to first understand it himself, but through my examples where I talked about how one sports team is different from another sports team, and seeing your team as naturally better is part of how we all function. We are all a bit ethnocentric, for the most part benignly so. In the same way we can be a bit centered toward our other ascribed and achieved statuses, sometimes just ‘normally’ but all too frequently our othering become toxic, especially when there are scarce resources at play.

The same thing can be seen in the example of the family where families do things in slightly different ways. I made the point that it is a matter of perspective; we are the ‘other’ to those in different groups that we ‘other.’ People naturally see that groups can be different. Seeing and acknowledging these differences in others is normal othering. Toxic othering is seeing the other as inferior and not just different.

Going to the macro level, I used the example of colonization as toxic othering on a global level, pointing out that the British colonization of much of India and Southeast Asia (and elsewhere, of course) was a classic form of toxic othering, where one group saw that they (British) were different from another and made the assumption that this made them superior to the other (those living on the subcontinent of India) and used that assumption to justify and rationalize the colonization of these people. The irony that I was conducting this class in English was offered as another example of an oppressive colonial legacy.

My teaching assistant and translator later told me that the Rohingya language has no word for colonization. I find this to be both disturbing and a bit surreal given the fact that their lives are impacted in such a major way by the legacies of colonial control.

Here is what my US teaching assistant Trevor Molin had to say about this class,

Yesterday, I learned that many of the individuals I’ve been helping teach don’t have a word for colonizer in their language. A word that bares a history of hundreds of years of death and cultural erasure, a word so linked to the present conditions of these people, Bangladeshi and Rohingya alike. A word thrown around carelessly at times in the States, of a false identification of our forefathers as fighting against the colonial forces of the British Empire, when, all they truly did win the autonomy of their own colonial force. There are dozens of sayings speaking of the lessons that must be learned from the past, but for those learning in the virtual class with me today, a word doesn’t even exist to identify one of the greatest drivers of the way that they live today.

This class has been an eye-opening one to me, particularly in learning about the cultural differences between myself and those who are being taught. Each day I learn another way in which our education differs, or norms differ, our families differ, and today, how our language differs. 

At the end of the day Aziz was able to convey the concept of toxic othering very well to all of the learners, and I even had a couple of them give examples. One young woman talked about how the males in her life tend to see her as different and not as capable. Her father encourages her and sees her for the full human that she is, but he is an exception. A young man gave the example that as a Rohingya he was othered (also know as genocide) by people in Myanmar, in particular by the Tatmadaw, and that has led him to have to flee his homeland.

Here is how Aziz describes the challenge of translation,

“Being involved in the course, I realized that the success of learning depends on the use of appropriate language (e.g. first language) or medium of communication between learners and instructors and which helps learners to relate content to their context.

While I interpret, identifying appropriate words in the Rohingya language to interpret many English terms like culture, colonialism, and socialization was a regular challenge. Indeed, Rohingya is a dialectical language that does not have an available written alphabet. Therefore, it absorbed numerous foreign words e.g. Arabic, Urdu, Hindi, Bengali and Burmese and it has been a Hybrid. Sometimes, I had to use one more word or small sentence and example to interpret a single English term. Before attending the session, I had to collect words on the subject either from Google or sometimes asking my family and friends in Cox’s Bazar to know how they use the words in their conversation. However, translating into Bengali was easier for me as it has the available vocabulary to interpret from any language.”

I knew that this class would pose pedagogical challenges for me, and indeed it does, but my task is by far much easier than that of Aziz.  he has to not only understand the points being made but immediately find a way to translate these complex concepts into now one but two other languages. He handles this task with grace and unmatched professionalism each class.

Critical race theory and critical Hydra theory
So yes, I was teaching critical race theory today in my sociology class. The Hydra model developed in some detail in this blog [and in the soon-to-be published Understanding and Taming the Hydra] is indeed a call to understand how privileging forces of patriarchy, race/ethnicity, hetero/cisnormativity, classism, ableism, ageism, and anthropocentrism have all been generated by toxic othering and are indeed impacting the lives of everyone on the planet, negatively so people like the Rohingya and other refugees around the world.

Critical race theory deals directly with one head of the Hydra but also, done well, emphasizes the inevitable and inherent intersectionality of racial and ethnic histories. You can’t effectively cover critical race theory without talking about the history of toxic colonialism, for example. Critical Hydra theory involves looking at how toxic and marginalizing othering is represented by all the heads of the Hydra and is evidenced in long standing norms, policies, and laws which have normalized and justified various forms of discrimination, exclusion, marginalization, and even genocide; toxic othering. These socially structured inequalities exist in all cultures to varying degrees, and so critical Hydra theory in necessarily global and demonstratively historical in scope.

The overall intent of this certificate course is not to create ‘mini sociologists’, but rather better community leaders, with a deeper sense of who they are and the social forces that impact them and their communities. My deepest hope is that what we are learning in this class about various pedagogies, what works and what does not work, will eventually inform and contribute to other classes being offered by faculty persons from around the world. I firmly believe that critical race theory -and critical Hydra theory- have a central place in this and any future classes.

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Understanding and Taming the Hydra is going soon. Watch this space!

“Part of the reason we have not seen the Hydra defeated is that we attack the heads one at a time instead of learning from history that they are all connected.”  

-Grant Mitchell
SOC 131 student

Bringing the Hydra to class

Student reactions to the Hydra
I have been using my Hydra posts as a teaching tooling since the Fall of 2019.  Every semester I’ll explain the idea in class and then have my students read about the Hydra, using it in some manner to help deepen their understanding of core course concepts like colonialism, racism, classism, and sexism. To the present I have used this model in over a dozen classes, and each time my students push me to expand my thinking and to reconsider and deepen aspects of the Hydra’s impact. I owe a massive debt to all my students these last several semesters.

This summer I taught online ‘Sociology Through Film’ and was blessed with many very good students who, as a group, embraced the Hydra concept quickly and enthusiastically. Below you’ll read what several students had to say when I proposed they find and discuss a film which addressed one or more of the Hydra heads. I was impressed by the variety of the films on which they chose to focus and, in general, how well they used some of out course content.

Many thanks to student Trinity Black for editing these essays for clarity and content.

 

The Hydra in Film
Elon University
Summer I 2021: SOC131 Sociology in Film

Introductory Statement
By Caroline Borio
As a part of Dr. Arcaro’s Sociology Through Film course, my fellow classmates and I were tasked with reading and understanding Dr. Arcaro’s blog posts on The Hydra metaphor, and applying that knowledge to film analysis. From the first class discussion after we read Dr. Arcaro’s blog posts, it was clear that the entire class quickly embraced the idea and was able to apply it to film analysis, and to both historical and recent events in the world around us. In that first discussion, I recall hearing my classmates explain how forces such as racism and sexism clearly intersect, and all of us at once understood why it is important to fight against not just one, but all of these forces since they all stem from the same source of “othering”. It was clear from the beginning that the Hydra is an incredibly useful tool for students when trying to understand privilege, and the intersectionality of these privileging forces in the world.

In the following chapter, you will see the writing some of us completed when we applied the Hydra to our study of Sociology through film. Each of us chose one of the eight heads of the Hydra on which to focus, and found a film that centered around that particular privileging force. After watching the film and identifying the significance of the privileging force within the film, we were asked to write a blog post that applied the idea of the Hydra to our film. This blog post was to consist of a summary of the Hydra metaphor, a description of our chosen privileging force, and how our selected movie sheds light on that privileging force. I had the privilege of reading my classmates’ blog posts, and each and every one of them provided a clear depiction of how their movie explored their privileging force, and why this was significant to the film’s overall purpose. Through our blog posts, I recognized how the Hydra concept can be a useful too towards recognizing privilege, intersectionality, and how we can approach the fight against these forces in order to create a more equitable and just society.

“Victoria and Abdul” (Colonialism/Paternalism)
By Grant Michael
The privileging force I’m examining is colonialism/paternalism and the movie I chose to tie into it is Victoria and Abdul. This movie focuses on the head of the British monarchy in the late 1800s, Queen Victoria, and her friendship with a common Indian man named Abdul. Through this lens, we get to see a lot of the power struggles between the queen and her subordinates, and the view on the larger colonized British Empire. Colonialism is “the practice by which a powerful country controls another country or other countries.” (Colonialism) I would like to add that other definitions usually also include “to exploit its resources.” Paternalism is “a system under which an authority undertakes to supply needs or regulate conduct of those under its control in matters affecting them as individuals as well as in their relations to authority and to each other.” (Paternalism) This basically means the people in power tell those under their power what’s in their best interest, with an almost “we-know-better” mentality. This movie, while on the surface seems to be about the relationship between Queen Victoria and Abdul, gives a good glimpse into the mindset and power struggles of these privileging forces.

In the movie, we see Queen Victoria in her last year of rule. The movie portrayed her well as someone who loved to rule, but at the same time knew very little about the world outside of her royal life. All the high-class members of British society we meet know very little about India but speak of it and its people as lesser compared to them. The queen, despite being its ruler, hadn’t ever been there. They all have this idea that they know better than the people they rule, however they’re highly unqualified to tell Indians how to live their lives halfway across the globe.
The most enlightening part for me was how everyone had made judgments about the Indians long before ever meeting someone from that part of the world. He is called “the Hindu”, even know he is Muslim. He also must teach the Queen “Indian,” despite there being thousands of languages and dialects spoken in India. The queen knew next to nothing about India or its culture, and it was honestly very surprising to see someone like the Queen taking on a commoner from India and learning from him, since it doesn’t fit the monarchy’s image. I think it was a good lesson; however, the paternalistic attitudes of the rest of the British stopped them from seeing Abdul as someone who could add any value to their lives. I’m sure most of the rest of the British empire felt this way, too. Even now, there is a feeling of personal superiority the British hold over others. This was only one country in an empire that ruled over 58 countries, so imagine how little the queen could have known about any of the rest she ruled. These discriminatory forces are what many empires are built from.

After watching the movie, I sat down to write this blog entry, and took notice of the other heads of the Hydra I saw. I could find an example of almost every privileging force in the film. This idea that all these forces exist alongside each other means you can’t just kill one head on the Hydra, you must kill them all to truly defeat it. The force of colonialism can seem far above us as individuals, but it’s up to us individuals to see the flaws within these systems, and advocate against them. I think paternalism appears very prominently in the movie, and it can remind us as to not make choices for people who are in groups we aren’t, as Abdul knew things about the world the others barely comprehend.

“My Beautiful Laundrette” (Hetero/Cisnormativity)
By Trinity Black
The Hydra metaphor is a way of understanding all the privileging forces at play in our society and how they’re all interconnected and rooted in the same source, like the many heads on the Hydra. Although they can’t be separated from each other, the privileging forces affect people in different ways, so it’s still meaningful to talk about them as separate issues.

My Beautiful Laundrette is an interesting film, which ends up feeling more like you’re watching a short section of someone’s life unfold instead of a movie. “The movie is not concerned with plot, but with giving us a feeling for the society its characters inhabit. Modern Britain is a study in contrasts, between rich and poor, between upper and lower classes, between native British and the various immigrant groups‒ some of which, such as the Pakistanis, have started to prosper. To this mixture, the movie adds the conflict between straight and gay.” (Ebert) The contrasts in the movie make it interesting to look at through the perspective of the Hydra, with every character being marginalized but also benefiting from a privileging force in some way. There’s a lot going on in the film which isn’t relevant to hetero/cisnormativity, so I highly recommend watching it to get a better feel for how many other heads of the Hydra it depicts and their intersectionality.

Honestly, cisnormativity isn’t very present in the film, at least not in a way that’s meaningful to discuss. There’s a lack of transgender representation, but that means there isn’t anything to talk about in relation to its depiction of cissexism, besides the fact that you are meant to assume all the characters are cis. There’s a one-off comment about Omar’s penis by his father, and then nothing else. However, heteronormativity is much more visible.
The entire first third or so of the movie, there are a few hints towards Omar’s non-heterosexuality, but mostly we see characters unquestioningly uphold heteronormativity. Near the beginning, Omar’s father remarks to his brother Nasser over the phone that he should see about finding Omar a wife while getting him a job, implying he’s about the age where it’s expected, but hasn’t taken any significant interest in women. Later, when Omar visits Nasser’s house, he reconnects with his cousin Tania and she makes sexual/romantic advances to him, which he isn’t unreceptive to. There are also points where Nasser and Tania herself suggest her as a marriage prospect for Omar. Even Omar’s relationship with his poor white partner who rekindles a romance with him, Johnny, just comes across as reconnecting friends at first. Then, about 44 minutes into the film, it’s made clear that Omar and Johnny are involved with each other when they kiss in an alley.

Tania, Omar, and Johnny are all part of a younger generation, and they approach heterosexuality with a more casual attitude compared to the older characters. Omar and Tania casually get engaged or at least say they’ll get married a few times in the film, but it’s also made pretty clear to the viewer that Omar is with Johnny and Tania wants to move out and live away from home. Both Omar and Johnny kiss Tania at a point in the film, and there’s a moment where Tania is vaguely possessive over Omar, but none of these moments are played with any lasting seriousness. In fact, the possessive scene with Tania came across as humorous to me because it’s quite literally the only time any character clocks them as not-straight and it happens a few minutes before their kiss confirms the relationship. She realizes it because of one small, intimate (though still platonic) moment, but when Omar’s uncle walks in on them half-naked later in the film, he doesn’t even seem very suspicious.

All other characters in the film, including the older upper-class Pakistani characters and Johnny’s old white fascist gang, seem to have no clue they’re anything but heterosexual. This implies that the more conservative-minded people probably aren’t even used to considering options besides heterosexuality, or at least that the people around Johnny and Omar hold such rigid views of them that they can’t fit them not being straight into that view. Both their main social groups are marginalized in a way, but also benefit from a privileging force, and so heteronormativity is assumed so intensely that they barely have to hide their relationship. The fact that they do hide it anyway just means we know there would be consequences if they’re found out.

“Joker” (Classism) 
By Harish Prasad
All the heads of the Hydra show the types of privilege that exist around the world, with each head representing a different one. The head of the Hydra this post is about is class privilege/classism. It represents the conflict between upper and lower classes, and people of higher classes would be the privileged group. An example, outside of the 1% in the US, would be the caste system in India. At the top are Brahmins, and at the bottom are the Untouchables, and most people who aren’t Brahmins are looked down upon. This post is focusing on the movie Joker, which depicts this conflict between upper and lower classes well. This movie could also depict the ableism head of the Hydra, since this is a movie about a mentally ill man who is mistreated.

Joker is an origin story that centers around the Joker, Arthur Fleck, a man with a severe mental illness who lives in poverty in a beaten down apartment. The way society treats him drives him into madness which ultimately ends in him donning his villainous alter ego as the Joker. Arthur is clearly alienated from people, even other poor people, and thought of as a “freak” to the point where he gets fired from his job at a clown agency. This had been the case his whole life, as he lacked a social group, or a group that “consists of two or more people who regularly interact on the basis of mutual expectations and who share a common identity.” (S: UCSW, 6.1) This movie also has messages about capitalism. It can be seen as a critique of capitalism in multiple ways, but one good example in the movie is when Arthur can no longer get his medications or see his social worker anymore because they cut funding and shut down the place he goes to.

There will be a few scenes that piece together the story and how this movie ties into the classism head of the Hydra. The first scene is a scene on the subway where three well-dressed guys, presumably more upper-class, harass and assault Arthur because of his brain condition that makes him unable to control his laughter at times. Arthur has a gun on him and kills them, which leads to something like a social movement where lower-class people start protesting Thomas Wayne and other rich people in Gotham.

This leads into the next scene, where Thomas Wayne talks about the murders on TV and says a couple of things that drive the point. He stands up for the men who were murdered, who were apparently Wayne Enterprises employees, and talks about what good people they were. He also talks down to the protesters for taking the side of the killer and says the murderer was clearly envious of people better off than him. At the end of the interview, Wayne says that until poor people change for the better, “those of us who made something of our lives, we’ll always look at those who haven’t as nothing but clowns.” He also says people need to realize that he’s their only hope, which is why he’s running for mayor.

This leads into the last scene, which is the climax near the end of the movie, after Arthur fully transforms into the Joker. When he is on the Murray Franklin show, the Joker reveals that he’s the one who killed the men on the subway. He says that he didn’t kill them to start a movement; he did it because they are awful, and people are awful. He says this because almost everyone in his life mistreated him, and the system (which he criticized) left people like him to fend for themselves with no help. The most important part of this scene is when he rolls his eyes and asks “Why is everyone so upset about these guys? If it was me dying on the sidewalk, you’d walk right over me. I pass you every day on the sidewalks and you don’t notice me. And what, everyone cares about these three guys because Thomas Wayne cried about them on TV?” Thomas Wayne being a rich guy drew all the attention to these guys, but Arthur says if the murder happened to “anyone like him” (poor and mentally ill), nobody would bat an eye, which has a lot of truth, based on the events of his tragic life. He then asks if Thomas Wayne had ever imagined what it was like to be someone like him, and says Wayne thinks that “we’ll sit here, and take it like good little boys,” which seemingly is the mindset of the rich in Gotham. These were the most impactful examples of how this head of the Hydra is tackled in this film (with definitely more in there).

“Forrest Gump” (Ableism)
By Hannah Ellowitz
The Hydra metaphor proves that in order to fight for “all humanity,” we must attack many individual yet interconnected systems from the root (or body of the creature) in order to break down the systems that favor certain types of people. The privileging force of ableism is a newer addition to the Hydra, and the term is defined by The Center of Disability Rights, Inc. as “a set of beliefs or practices that devalue and discriminate against people with physical, intellectual, or psychiatric disabilities and often rests on the assumption that disabled people need to be ‘fixed’ in one form or the other.” (CDR)Leah Smith, a writer, communications professional, and disability advocate says that “Ableism is intertwined in our culture, due to many limiting beliefs about what disability does or does not mean, how able-bodied people learn to treat people with disabilities and how we are often not included at the table for key decisions.”

In July 2016, the Ruderman Family Foundation released their White Paper “On Employment of Actors With Disabilities in Television”, sharing that “95% of characters with disabilities on television were played by able-bodied actors.” (RFF)Furthermore, if the current Academy Awards trend continues as is, any actor nominated for their portrayal of a disabled/non-neurotypical role has a 50 percent chance of winning that prestigious award. Most notable examples include Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man, Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything, and Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump. In the Oscar’s nearly 93 year history, only 2 disabled actors have received awards for their work; Harold Russel was a handless non-professional actor who won Best Supporting Actor in 1946 for his role in The Best Years of Our Lives, and deaf actress Marlee Matlin won Best Actress in 1986 for her portrayal of Sarah Norman in Children of a Lesser God. I’m curious as to what abled viewers are so fascinated by when it comes to disabled persons in film, and how close these portrayals by able-bodied and neurotypical actors are to the lived experiences of disabled people. I decided to watch Forrest Gump through a more specific lens to help me better understand ableism and its Hydra head.

Forrest Gump is iconic for its humor, charm, and heartbreak. The notoriety surrounding the story’s many disabled characters brought newfound attention to the disabled community through film. The story was written, developed, and performed entirely by neurotypical, able-bodied people. I don’t at all believe that the Forrest Gump story is primarily about disability, but it is a central part of multiple main characters’ livelihood, making disability a relevant piece of the story. The Amazon Prime blurb about the film describes Forrest as being slow-witted, but it’s hinted throughout the film that he is disabled, despite the many wild experiences and accomplishments he achieves throughout his lifetime. The only disability that is specified in the script is that Forrest’s IQ is 75. The lack of specification with Forrest’s disabilities leaves audiences to stereotype his conglomeration of malfunctions into something misinformed and ableist.

The beginning of the film features a young, severely weak, and crippled Forrest running so fast that he breaks his leg braces and escapes his bullies, finally free from being physically disabled. After breaking through these physical barriers, he eventually gets accepted to a top university with a football scholarship, so “thankfully” he wouldn’t need the intellectual factor to influence an acceptance. From early on, we’re shown that for a disabled person to become successful, they must rid themselves of their hindrance and become abled in a way they naturally aren’t. There’s an excellent review question at the end of Chapter 4 in our text that definitely made me question my perspective on what it means to be equal in the case of ability. “Do you agree that effective socialization is necessary for an individual to be fully human? Could this assumption imply that children with severe developmental disabilities, who cannot undergo effective socialization, are not fully human?” (S:UCSW, 4.1) Socialization is, in a way, what shapes a person into a kind of individual, but what about those who can’t socialize? Forrest is incredibly social despite his disability, but how would audiences have viewed an antisocial achiever? Would it have made it as exciting of a movie?

Much of what I read by disabled bloggers and writers spoke to the character Lieutenant Dan and how they felt connected to him in more ways than they had with Forrest. Dan is presented to us as a dashing, masculine hero who Forrest is afraid to disappoint, only to have his heroism stripped when he becomes an amputee in Vietnam. The script does an okay job with allowing Dan to express his anger however he chooses, allowing him to speak directly to the overwhelmingly angry feelings experienced by many disabled viewers. Over time, Dan and Forrest develop a sort of Of Mice and Men dynamic, and they connect during the moment when they bring two sex workers back to their apartment after a night of drinking. After Forrest makes it clear he doesn’t have any interest in the women, Dan falls out of his wheelchair in protest, leading to the women snickering and insulting them as they leave. Here, the audience is reminded what it means to be diminished to being “crippled” or an “idiot”. I think that scene brings audiences into a vulnerable moment for these characters and shows how painful it can be for disabled people to be othered. Eventually, however, Dan is “redeemed” through the gift of prosthetic legs, meaning he’s now successful at acting like an abled person, free from his disability.

I don’t think there was any agenda by the creatives of the film to make a strong statement about disabled people– but I’d say there is a subtle commentary on the traumatic aftermath of Vietnam veterans who’ve developed disabilities and PTSD after their time overseas. I think there should have been more awareness and inclusion of disabled actors or creators through the development of the film, in an effort to make the story a bit more truthful to real experiences, despite the story itself being a bit satirical and humorous. Looking at this now, almost 30 years later, it seems rather bold for able-bodied and neurotypical people to produce a movie like Forrest Gump. It does seem as though folks in disabled communities resonated more with parts of this story and the effect it shows of society’s othering through ableism. As we strive for a more inclusive community, I think it’s most important for storytellers and creatives to consider how those receiving the stories feel about their portrayal and how the effects of viewing can help others better understand new perspectives of the human experience.

I’ll end with a section of an article by Kristen Lopez on her connection to Lieutenant Dan in Forrest Gump:
“And yet for all the ways Lieutenant Dan is indicative of the lack of change in representation, he’ll always be my first; the first time I saw someone in a wheelchair who said a lot of the things I was feeling internally regarding my disability. Outside of the story, it was amazing just to see a wheelchair on-screen. Sure, Dan uses a standard hospital wheelchair that would provide no comfort or support for his body, let alone be difficult to wheel full-time. (No wonder he fell down ramps and almost got hit by cars!) It was obvious no one was actually disabled on the writing team, but for a child who’d only been using a wheelchair for a few years, something was better than nothing.” (K. Lopez, Forbes)

“Up” (Ageism)
By Olivia Pierce
Tom Arcaro uses the Hydra as a metaphor to depict and frame the norms related to the privileging/oppressive forces that are fueled by “othering,” the justification of one group dominating another. One of the privileging forces in Arcaro’s Hydra model is ageism or discriminating against someone because of their age. Ageism assumes that the very old or the very young are biologically or culturally inferior to others. It’s related to ableism, which assumes that non-abled people are inferior. Since the very old and very young are generally assumed to be not as capable as an adult, they’re linked. Ideas about their inferiority are used to justify unequal treatment of people in these groups.
The movie Up highlights ageism as it relates to an elderly man, Carl Fredricksen. At the beginning of the movie, Carl is depicted as a stubborn, grumpy old man who is resistant to change and wants to be left alone. He uses a walker, has hearing aids, and wears dentures. We see examples of ageism throughout the movie, including the Wilderness Explorers’s assumption that older people need assistance and have a requirement to earn a merit badge for “Assisting the Elderly.” Carl is also shown as out of touch with what’s going on in the world (not knowing what a GPS is), and he’s described as smelling like “prunes and denture cream.” Each of the examples illustrate different dimensions of aging, as described by gerontologists: chronological, as Carl is 78 years old; biological, with his bad back, hearing impairment, dentures;psychological, by being stubborn and grumpy after losing his wife; and social, how he’s seen by others. (S:UCSW, 12.1)More strictly speaking, social aging refers to the “changes in people’s roles and relationships in a society as they age.” (S:UCSW, 12.3)

The movie may have helped people think about their views on aging, at least temporarily. It brought out the ageism in reviewers and toy manufacturers. They had negative views about its success because “the main character, a grumpy old man, is not considered commercially attractive.” (Walker) These people were essentially saying the movie did not have value because they could not profit off an elderly character.

Two studies, conducted by Humana and USC Annenberg, assessed the portrayal of older people in film and found that “few characters aged 60 and over are represented in film, and that prominent senior characters face demeaning or ageist references.” They also found that those depictions were not realistic. “Our popular cultural narratives do not present the stories and experiences of seniors. As a result, viewers miss out on rich depictions that can confront our stereotypes about older individuals and broaden our views about what it means to age today.” (Smith et al.)
It is interesting to note that in Up, Carl changes from a grumpy, stubborn man to a hero. He defies his age, fighting off the villain (although the movie sticks with elderly stereotypes by having his back go out and his dentures fall out), and ending with a new outlook on life. His determination flies in the face of ageism. It’s too bad that there aren’t more older characters in children’s movies. It would be a great place to start for changing people’s views on age.

“Okja” (Anthropocentrism)
By William Thomas
All the heads of the Hydra can represent forces which derive from “othering” and are embedded into our culture. Each head has its own oppressive force for each way to differentiate a person from another group. The Hydra is one creature just as each head of discrimination has an interconnected relationship with the others.
Anthropocentrism is the mindset that humans are at the center of the world. This view that humans are the most important form of life appears in many aspects throughout our history and particularly Western culture. The most common example of anthropocentrism is animals vs. humans. Many would argue that a human would not be classified as an animal because of our heightened awareness and consciousness compared to the other species. However, humans are still driven by biological desires and our animal nature could be one of the driving forces of deviancy. We are creatures affected by many things, but we are also still animals and driven by biological forces. The practice of sociology argues that culture has a deeper influence on human behavior compared to biology. (S:UCSW, 3.1) This may be true, but biological forces are the initial arbiter of our actions, and our cultural influences filter out decisions that may be considered deviant.
Along with the other heads of the Hydra, anthropocentrism spreads the idea that one individual or group is superior to another. This view of the world spreads the idea to other cases. The validation of anthropocentrism validates the thought that other heads of the Hydra are acceptable ideals. The symbolism of the Hydra helps one understand that the forces of “otherism” are one and the same: different minds but one body.
Humans generally don’t give too much attention to the suffering of animals, whether it’s human-caused or some other preventable occurrence. We are willing to sacrifice animals for the greater good of humanity or individual, even if it means killing a few elephants for a nice set of piano keys. This draws back into our talks about capitalism and how people don’t care about the suffering they create if they can make a sweet profit off it. It is a common belief that animals serve human existence by providing us food and otherwise have no other purpose in “our” world. We lock them away in zoos for our entertainment and eat them for our pleasure. The treatment of animals and their habitats has caused numerous extinctions, as well as created many endangered species. The excuses for the treatment of animals can be related to the same excuses made to justify colonialism: “We are superior and know what this group needs better than they do.” This excuse implies that humanity is some divine creature that was specifically made to control nature.

 

“On the Basis of Sex” (Patriarchy)
By Caroline Borio
The Hydra is a metaphor that represents the privileging forces that exist throughout the world, and more importantly, how they all interact. All heads share a common body, acknowledging that they all stem from the same source and they are all connected. One of the heads is the patriarchy, which Merriam Webster first defines as “social organization marked by the supremacy of the father in the clan or family, the legal dependence of wives and children, and the reckoning of descent and inheritance in the male line.” However, I prefer their second definition, which defines patriarchy as “control by men of a disproportionately large share of power.” (“Patriarchy.”) The patriarchy stems from sexism, which has led to the construction of gender roles and stereotypes about women and has prevented them from having the same rights as men throughout history. Women have had to fight for the right to vote, to work the same jobs as men, and so on. Even today, it’s unconsciously presumed that a woman’s job is to stay home and take care of the children while men go out and work. This is ever-present in our society, undeniably in the workplace, and there’s a direct connection between this stereotype and the film On the Basis of Sex.
On the Basis of Sex explores the ideas of the patriarchy and gender inequality as it follows the early life of Ruth Bader Ginsberg. However, before the film gets to the main plot, it shows how significant gender inequality was in Ginsberg’s personal life. In one of the very first scenes, Ginsberg walks into Harvard Law School surrounded by only men, all carrying briefcases and wearing matching suits. At the first dinner with the Dean of Harvard Law, he asks the women why they’re at Harvard and “occupying a place that could have gone to a man.” Finally, even after attending Harvard and Columbia, and graduating top of her class, Ginsberg is unable to get a job at a law firm, and instead takes a job as a law professor. Later in life, Justice Ginsberg said this about the experience: “I was Jewish, a woman, and a mother. The first raised one eyebrow; the second, two; the third made me indubitably inadmissible.” (Thulin) Even this early on, the movie demonstrates how sexist stereotypes and gender roles are present in our society and institutions. These assumptions can become incredibly harmful as they form a system of oppression that says women are less than men. That said, Ginsberg is an example of a woman who challenged the patriarchy by pursuing a career that is not traditionally a woman’s “job,” and used her career to challenge laws that differentiated based on sex.

The movie focuses on Ginsberg’s first case, where a man named Charles Moritz was denied a tax deduction on caregiving expenses for his ill mother, even though this deduction was given to other people in his position. The law said the deduction was to be given to “a woman, a widower or divorce, or a husband whose wife is incapacitated or institutionalized,” and Moritz was a single man who had never been married. (US Court) Ginsberg argued that this was discrimination based on sex, because women in the same circumstances would be given the tax deduction. Ginsberg believed this perpetuated the idea that women should be responsible for arranging caregiving, even though there is no reason a woman should be providing care more than a man. On its own, this case was important, but it was also the first step towards a larger goal. At the time, there were 174 laws that differentiated based on sex, and winning this case was Ginsberg’s first step to taking down all laws that assume gender inequality. In her final statement in court in the movie, Ginsberg says, “Our sons and daughters are barred by law from opportunities based on assumptions about their abilities. How will they ever disprove these assumptions if laws like Section 214 are allowed to stand?” This assumption about abilities based on sex is at the foundation of the patriarchy, and creates gender inequality in our institutions, laws, and everyday life.
While On the Basis of Sex focuses primarily on sexism, relating it back to the Hydra, it’s important to remember that this is just one of many privileging forces that is based on the “othering” of a particular group. People of various races, gender identities, abilities, and more face similar situations in which they are “othered.” While it may be impossible to kill the Hydra entirely, films like On the Basis of Sex remind us that it is critical to engage in an attempt of taming the Hydra to create a more equal, just world for everyone.

 

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The Hydra in Film References
“On the Basis of Sex”
“Patriarchy.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/patriarchy. Accessed 16 Jun. 2021.
Thulin, Lila. “The True Story of the Case Ruth Bader Ginsburg Argues in ‘On the Basis of Sex.’” Smithsonian Magazine, 24 December 2018, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/true-story-case-center-basis-sex-180971110/. Accessed 17 June 2021.
US Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit  – 469 F.2d 466 (10th Cir. 1972). Moritz v Commissioner. Justia US Law. https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/469/466/79852/. Accessed 17 Jun. 2021.
“Race/Ethnicity”
“Humanitarian.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/humanitarian. Accessed 17 Jun. 2021.
“Colonialism/Paternalism in Victoria and Abdul”
“Colonialism Noun – Definition, Pictures, Pronunciation and Usage Notes: Oxford Advanced American Dictionary at OxfordLearnersDictionaries.com.” Colonialism Noun – Definition, Pictures, Pronunciation and Usage Notes | Oxford Advanced American Dictionary at OxfordLearnersDictionaries.com, 2021, http://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/colonialism.
“Paternalism.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/paternalism. Accessed 17 Jun. 2021.
“What Countries Were in the British Empire?” Schoolshistory.org.uk, Schoolshistory.org.uk, 2021, http://schoolshistory.org.uk/topics/british-empire/questions-about-the-british-empire/what-countries-were-in-the-british-empire/.

“Hetero/Cisnormativity & My Beautiful Laundrette”
Ebert, Roger. “My Beautiful Laundrette Movie Review (1986): Roger Ebert.” Movie Review (1986) | Roger Ebert, Tim Bevan, 11 Apr. 1986, www.rogerebert.com/reviews/my-beautiful-laundrette-1986.

“Joker and Classism”
“‘Joker’ and the Crisis of Capitalism.” New Politics, 24 Nov. 2019, https://newpol.org/joker-and-the-crisis-of-capitalism/.
Robinson, Chauncey K. “‘Joker’ Exposes the Broken Class System That Creates Its Own Monsters.” People’s World, 4 Oct. 2019, https://peoplesworld.org/article/joker-exposes-the-broken-class-system-that-creates-its-own-monsters/.
Sociology: Understanding and Changing the Social World, 6.1, 13.2
“Ableism”
Smith, Leah. “Center for Disability Rights Inc.” #Ableism – Center for Disability Rights, www.cdrnys.org/blog/uncategorized/ableism/.
Woodburn, Danny, and Kristina Kopić. “ON EMPLOYMENT OF ACTORS WITH DISABILITIES IN TELEVISION.” THE RUDERMAN WHITE PAPER, Ruderman Family Foundation, July 2016.
Sociology: Understanding and Changing the Social World,  4.1
Lopez, Kristen. “’Forrest Gump’ at 25: Disability Representation (For Better and Worse).” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 5 July 2019, www.forbes.com/sites/kristenlopez/2019/07/05/forrest-gump-at-25-disability-representation-for-better-and-worse/?sh=81a3b00664d5.
“Ageism and Up”
Sociology: Understanding and Changing the Social World, 12.1, 12.3
Smith, Dr. Stacy L., Pieper, Dr. Katherine, and Marc Choueiti. “USC Annenberg Film Study: Pop Culture Stereotypes Aging Americans.” Edited by Dr. Stacey L. Smith, USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, 12 Sept. 2016, http://annenberg.usc.edu/news/faculty-research/usc-annenberg-film-study-pop-culture-stereotypes-aging-americans.
Walker, Kim. “New Disney Movie Sparks Ageism Debate.” Silver Group, 29 Apr. 2009, http://www.silvergroup.asia/2009/04/29/new-disney-movie-sparks-ageism-debate/#:~:text=New%20Disney%20movie%20sparks%20ageism%20debate%20Apr%2029%2C,grumpy%20old%20man%2C%20is%20not%20considered%20commercially%20attractive.
“Anthropocentrism and the Meat Industry”
Sociology: Understanding and Changing the Social World, 3.1

Coming soon

I am putting into book form all of the Hydra posts from the last couple years. Watch this space for more details.

                         Understanding and Taming the Hydra