Question: For this blog post I want you to discuss how the ideals described in reading #2 above relate to the definition of neoliberalism offered by your speaker. Select 2-3 ideals discussed in the reading and connect them to specifics of your assigned speaker’s definition.

Answer:

Some of the 5 ideals in Reading #2, “Chater 2: Refining and Debating America’s Founding Ideals,” may have connection to Sealing Cheng’s definition of neoliberalism. In the video, “What is Neoliberalism?” Cheng relates neoliberalism to gender sexuality.  She believes that neoliberalism is very private and individual. She thinks that the key strategy of neoliberalism is to balance heterosexual unions in society. There are two ideals that have connection to Sealing Cheng’s definition of neoliberalism. First, the ideal of liberty is close related to Cheng’s definition of neoliberalism because she believes in the liberty of gender sexuality. Second, the ideal of opportunity is another one, which connects to Cheng’s definition of neoliberalism because sexuality is every man’s dream. In other words, people should have the opportunity to pursuit sexuality since it is a man’s innate desire.

In the book, American Holocaust, David Stannard responds to the American identity in a historical perspective. By looking back in the history of before Columbus, American, and the rest of the World, we might be curious to ask the questions that Standard asks, “Who were these people? Where had they come from? When had they come? How did they get where they were? Were there others like them elsewhere in this recently stumbled-upon New World?” (Stannard 8). Furthermore, Standard thinks that the most important question should not be “can it happen again?” But, it should be “can it be stopped?” (Prologue xiii). When Standard talks about “it,” he refers to the indigenous people who are “not openly been acknowledge, and become embarrassingly unwelcome trespassers whose legacy of past and ongoing persecution by the celebrants might spoil the festivities’ moral tone” (15). Thus, the issue that the author reflect on is how to stop holocaust.

In order to respond to the question, how to stop holocaust, Stannard provides historical facts for readers to understand his arguments. Although we only read the prologue and the first 15 pages of the book, we see that the author is responding to the most important question, how to stop holocaust. In other words, the author puts his facts and evidences on the table in the first 15 pages, then, he will make his arguments later in the book. Therefore, we see that he is providing a lot of historical information for the readers. Slowly, he is giving readers facts to understand where his view points are coming from. Thus, the author is interested in introducing the history of America. Mainly, in these 15 pages, Stannard answers the question that he proposed on page 8.

Upon finding an article for this exercise, I found a few articles relate to sport.  First article caught my eyes is titled, “Steph Curry, Tom Brady, Serena Williams and others celebrate Father’s Day.” This article comes to my attention because today is Father’s Day. Also, I am interested in this article because the Golden States Warriors won the NBA Championship in 2015.  In this particular article by Cindy Boren, she knows that a lot of Golden State Warrior fans care about every single movement of Steph Curry. Therefore, it does not matter if the answer to “so what?” is valid or not, there are people who care about Steph Curry because he is a MVP basketball player. The first sentence in Boren’s article might be the answer to the “so what?” question. Boren states, “Plenty of athletes shared Father’s Day messages and wishes Sunday, but, to no one’s great surprise, the best may have come from Stephen Curry.” The writer specifically point out that Stephen Curry is a unique person in comparison to many other athletes.  Seemingly, the writer illustrates that Curry is not only a fantastic athlete but also an amazing father.  The strategy of using other people or things to compare the people or things that we want to exalt is a great way to answer the “so what” question. The titile of the second article that I found The Washinton Post is called, “LeBron James on NBA Finals loss: ‘I’m still in a little Funk.’” Even though the writer, Cindy Boren, does not answer the “so what?” question, we know that a lot of people, especially, people who live in Cleveland care about how the CAVS did in the NBA finals and LeBron James.

Here are the links to the articles:

“LeBron James on NBA Finals loss: ‘I’m still in a little Funk.’”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/early-lead/wp/2015/06/21/lebron-james-on-nba-finals-loss-im-still-in-a-little-funk/?tid=hpModule_a4df998e-86a7-11e2-9d71-f0feafdd1394&hpid=z10

“Steph Curry, Tom Brady, Serena Williams and others celebrate Father’s Day.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/early-lead/wp/2015/06/21/steph-curry-tom-brady-russell-wilson-and-others-celebrate-fathers-day/?tid=hpModule_c7c1f590-868f-11e2-9d71-f0feafdd1394

In Bobbie Harro’s article “The Cycle of Socialization,” she uses a diagram called, Cycle of Socialization, to reflect on how people think about themselves and how people relate to others. Furthermore, she claims that the way people see themselves and the way people relate to others are influenced by their experiences and environment. The way people relate to others and view themselves may or may not be true; thus, we should get out of our comfort zone or the core to challenge the facts that we think is true about ourselves and others. 

I agree with Harro that we should not be too dependent on our parents or those raising us, and we haven’t yet developed the ability to think for ourselves” (Harro 17). Even though our parents and those who raise us have good intentions but it does not mean that their worldview is correct or whatever they say is right.  Since we are capable to think for ourselves as adults and college students, we should investigate and do research to find the truth.

Bobbie Harro states in her article, “We need education for critical consciousness for all group. We need to take a stand… and begin a critical transformation that can break down this cycle of socialization and start a new cycle” (Harro 21). Obviously, we need a standard or a guideline to help us to determine the way we see think about ourselves and how we relate to others. To determine how people think about themselves and how people relate to others, they should match their knowledge with the reality.