Cornel West: Hope Is Spiritual Armor Against Modern Society's Spiritual Warfare | Big Think

Cornel West: Hope Is Spiritual Armor Against Modern Society's Spiritual Warfare
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There is a spiritual war happening in the United States, and to be silent is to be complicit, says Dr. Cornel West. He takes his starting point at the elimination of arts programs under Reagan in the 1980s, and traces how that lack of spiritual nourishment has created a society of solitary nomads where once there was community. It has created consumers where once there were citizens. What must fill that emptiness is hope, West suggests-and hope not as a wistful wish for a better future, but as an enactment of a better future through action. Quoting from some of philosophy and music's greatest thinkers and doers, West presents a lyrical lecture on the role of hope in the battle over the soul of Americans, and American democracy.
This video was filmed at the Los Angeles Hope Festival, a collaboration between Big Think and Hope & Optimism, a three-year initiative which supported interdisciplinary academic research into significant questions that remain under-explored. For more from Dr. Cornel West, head to cornelwest.com.
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CORNEL WEST:
Cornel West is a prominent and provocative democratic intellectual. He is a Professor of Philosophy and Christian Practice at Union Theological Seminary and Professor Emeritus at Princeton University. He has also taught at Yale, Harvard, and the University of Paris. Cornel West graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard in three years and obtained his M.A. and Ph.D. in Philosophy at Princeton. He has written over 20 books and has edited 13. Though he is best known for his classics, Race Matters and Democracy Matters, and for his memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, his most recent releases, Black Prophetic Fire and Radical King, were received with critical acclaim.
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TRANSCRIPT:
Cornel West: What does it mean to learn how to die in order to learn how to live? That's platonic isn't it? Philosophy itself is a meditation in preparation for death. Montaigne says the philosophizers learn how to die. Seneca says he or she who learns how to die unlearns slavery because art, paideia-deep education, not cheap schooling-deep education is about a critical self-examination of that which is inside of us that needs to die. The fears. The cowardice. The complacency. The conformity. The assumptions and pre-supposition, the prejudices and pre-judgments that we have that need to go. James Brown called it 'give it up, turn it loose'. It needs to go. Just like falling in love. You fall in love with somebody, something has died in you.Anne Carson understands this well in her classic; something's died in you. The egoism, the fear, the narcissism-I know a lot of people don't undergo full-fledged death, but it's an effort because you're now entangled with a new self and that new self means you have been transformed and lo' and behold you walk around with a smile on your face feeling good before Sappho's bittersweet hits you.
That's part of love too, isn't it? If bittersweet hasn't hit you it's just sentimental. We're not going to go into that though.
But the connection of learning how to die and the saddest feature of our moment, in regards to Du Bois's first question, is that so many young brothers and sisters of the younger generation find themselves so far removed from the best of their past, far removed from the best that has gone into the shaping and molding them, that all they have relation is market forces, market forces, market forces. Stimulation, titillation. They're hungry for care and nurture, hungry for something deeper. That's what the spiritual and moral awaking young people in the last five or ten years is all about. The hunger for what Ashford and Simpson called The Real Thing. And what is the real thing? Well, it's something that is dynamic, you never get your hands on it, it's intangible but it has everything to do with the ways in which love, the ways in which justice in motion generate hope, generate encouragement, generate a certain sense of enthusiasm for what is to come. Anticipation of the not-yet rooted in the ugly what-is. And Ernst Bloch and others talked about it in the classical philosophy of hope. The volumes on philosophy of hope.
That's what Du Bois has in mind with integrity. And our young people these days more and more-I've spent a lot of time, in fact I've shifted most of my lectures now to both prisons and high schools and junior highs.
Read the full transcript at bigthink.com/videos/cornel-we...

[@paytonpryor]

This is one of the best videos Big Think has ever posted.

[@mmdurfee]

People get ready. There's a train coming. Don't need no ticket. Just get on board.

[@jonathankee5994]

Curtis!

[@sethcaplan859]

Societies walk backwards into the future. It's easy to say that we have been in a bad place but impossible to say where we should go next. hope is just the willingness to keep walking anyway.

[@AO-gn4hc]

Brother West is jewel.

[@matthewmalpeli]

"Socialism is a resistance movement against the destruction of love in social reality" - Paul Tillich

[@SmallFries01]

Socialism is a movement that destroys societies. Example. Soviet union, Mao's China, Cuba, Venezuela. etc..

[@matthewmalpeli]

SmallFries01 You're talking about revolutionary communism, not socialism. #buyadictionaryfascisttwat

[@Insert639]

SmallFries01 why do people like you always use strawman definitions of what socialism is?

[@ott6428]

Is 'buyadictionaryfascisttwat' 'love in social reality'? Seriously though, my girlfriend is from Venezuela and she is worried about her parents. When she left Venezuela they were talking about Socialism, not Communism. You are engaging in the worst kind of 'no true scotsman'. Communism ALWAYS starts with socialism. It's because socialism cannot work without a totalitarian government, and a brief understanding of economics and/or history will tell you that. Hashtag 'buy a history book fascist twat'?

[@matthewmalpeli]

Otis Miller Socialism always starts with capitalism, a system with numerous internal contradictions making it crisis prone, while the nature of its machinery alienates workers and business owners in a variety of unintended, socially destructive ways. Socialism is inevitable in a capitalist system, otherwise it's unable to extend beyond a major crisis, like the Great Depression, or the 2008 Global financial crisis. The socialist response to the Great Depression was social security, collective insurance for the working class provided by taxation. The bourgeois response to the 2008 GFC was socialist too, collective insurance for the banks and major shareholders provided by taxation and digital money printing. In case you were wondering that's not actually what Marx had in mind. Communism in the Soviet Union started with a revolution to overthrow the Romanovs. Russia was a feudal monarchy at the time. Lenin was sent there by the German Kaiser to overthrow the Czar and call a cease fire on the Eastern front. Lenin was convinced this was a desperate play by Germany and once the war was over and the Germans lost, a revolution in industrialised Germany would come swiftly. It did, but it was put down after a brief civil war. The Bolsheviks were expecting to rapidly modernise Russian industry with German help. When that was snuffed out, they had no choice but to do it themselves. So why was that solution authoritarian in nature? That's easy, and you only need look at the pure tyranny in the organizational structure of a private company to realise this. The problem was that bureaucrats aren't good at anything except administrating government. There was no avenue for innovation to express itself, and no reason to waste time thinking about market failures. Socialism is about rounding capitalism's hard edges, not about replacing it. It's social security, universal healthcare, and old age pensions. What leads to communism is the ever increasing efficiency of modes of production under competition, reducing the need for human labour until it's not required. Robots and artificial intelligence will finish the job. We'll have to figure out what will be a worthwhile endeavour when that happens because the protestant "work for work's sake" ethic will be problematic.

[@micdavey]

Is his whole keynote going to be available? Thanks

[@krisballard541]

I attended your lecture at Cal-Berkeley several years ago.

[@pauz9776]

cool, open the mind. I like it. I can learn for this man.

[@jeronimotamayolopera4834]

GREAT JOB, INSIGHTFUL.

[@charleswarren1901]

Nonsense. Sartre ruined several girls' lives; he was a pervert, and he preyed on young women. By today's standards he'd be considered a Harvey Weinstien, but with a libido that was out of control. Sartre tortured people near him for his own amusement. Simone de Beauvior, who actually was an accomplice in his 19th century sexual exploits, eventually gave up on him.

[@cljerjr31]

I always enjoy doctor west!

[@joshmcadow764]

acknowledging you might lose that gives the gravitos to what you are doing ....10:42

[@michaelobeng7660]

wow

[@MegaChickenfish]

So with the "learning how to die" would it be more accurate to say learning how to change and put chapters of your life behind you? _Because everyone knows how to die, it's trying to figure out how NOT to that has us stumped._

[@EclecticSceptic]

He referenced Seneca who was an eminent Roman philosopher of Stoicism. When Seneca talked about learning how to die, he meant it literally, following the long tradition of Stoicism going back to 300 BC, hundreds of years before him. The point is that in coming to terms with death you come to terms with life and learn how to live. In your moment of death, what will you think to yourself? Will you worry? Will you regret the things you haven't done? Why didn't you do them? If your life is finite, what does that mean for you today, right now? If you are worried about dying, why do you worry? What does that say about you and how you enter the breach of life each day? This is the sort of thing which is meant by 'learning how to die'. As an aside, Seneca famously died by suicide (his choice was that or being killed by Emperor Nero), cutting his own veins, and continuing to talk in equanimity, with his family present, about philosophy and such things, until his light faded.

[@7srchoed]

that's a deep breath

[@wirezts]

AMAZING

[@aaronpederson8685]

Is that Hank Green waiting off on the side? Hella looks like him.

[@spaminbox]

good morning brother west!

[@yasinyasin2]

more relevant than ever

[@nikolademitri731]

To my fellow secular brothers and sisters who are so up in arms against the term "spiritual", stop and reflect for a minute. Spiritual doesn't equal religious and mystical. Hitchens, echoing other great minds before him, described it as the luminous and transcendent, which I think is a fair statement, as it is a description of something very real. Look at the group of men called "the four horsemen of "new" atheism", even these men talk about this existential, immaterial, spiritual side to life. While it may all be an emergent property of the CNS, that doesn't make it any less profound. Read Sam Harris' book "Waking Up", the subtitle of which is "A Guide To Spirituality Without Religion", and understand that talking about the "spiritual" needn't be an invocation of the supernatural. Cheers 🍻✌🏼

[@Insert639]

Nikola Demitri may you find the top comment that whined about this and post this comment there? People need to see it. You explained it well. As a secular individual myself, I agree.

[@ott6428]

I think some people are much better at using the word 'spiritual' than others. The problem is that it's a word that needs clarification, while there are many that do not. Usually spirituality means something else like 'transcendental', but often it means 'my ideas on religion that I've thought about for 10 minutes while high'. So why not use the word 'transcendental' or which ever word fits the context, instead of spiritual? Why put a sock on your hand when you have a perfectly good glove? Well, it's because when you say 'spiritual' lots of different people get different interpretations of what you mean. If you want to be clear, this is bad. If, however, you want to sell books and have lots of people agree with you, then spiritual is the word for you my friend. So personally, when someone uses the word 'spiritual', I think they are either bad communicators or skilled socialites. I get what they 'mean', it's just similar to how the Bible and Qu'ran are ambiguous when it suits them because they want more readers.

[@OrlandoEeckhout]

He sounds what like Bob Marley (the spiritual warfare& sometimes his accent).

[@letricelee6118]

👏👏

[@andrewkiminhwan]

this man

[@jameslove4432]

St. Paul and the Broken Bones are like a cultural atomic bomb, by this narrative. Check'em out!

[@ReformedThe]

30 secs. In and my back already hurts just watching this guy. Nothing with whats he is saying though i do disagree a little. But man how you stand like that for so long. My back is sore. Im gonna go lay down now.

[@CampingforCool41]

lmao I was thinking the same thing. I kept thinking he was gonna trip over that rug and fall off the stage too. Livin' life on the edge.

[@CYI3ERPUNK]

hope is fine and all ; but u need more than blind hope/faith, u need a deeper philosophical/ethical/logical foundation on which to stand against the tide of propaganda ; spirituality is a fundamentally innate facet of the human condition, but it does not need to be experienced thru organized religion, and religion likely hurts the experience more than it helps it ; and of course one should always strive to be a critical thinker

[@zerothehero123]

One of the more sane comments I've seen here!

[@teaziest746]

Well said.

[@firstptr3and10_]

You can't get deeper than hope. And hope is not blind. Hope empowers. Towards the end of the video, he says acknowledging you may lose strengthens your hope. Hope is not blind. Hope is visionary... It is decisiveness-in- action

[@JohnDoe-mv4ks]

The irony of the fake wall of books behind Mr. West...

[@danbee6103]

Look, folks deciphering the title with no appetite to watch a free informal video. Cool. This dude is always miraculous, the way he knows mankind, and how societies pursue ineptitude over what is to come of the ambitious frontier via all of mankind, while we cling to the sovereignty of money as it relates to comfort. Elon Musk knows the vision, or I believe personally he knows he has that ambition. To inject mankind with an awe inspiring mission we can work towards and to IGNITE the spirit of the human race, to get us towards a beautiful future instead of arguing all the time about resource allocation, traditions of how to say holiday, or electing the biggest liar in politifact's history to POTUS. We cannot just accept cities and country folk are unequal, we are capable of being on the same consensus without a idiot savant tyrannical distractor yapping everyday over his conniving mischief.

[@AdaptorLive]

Before watching this I think I need a video explaining what the word 'spiritual' means.

[@ibradul]

i concur, such speakers must define in detail what they mean by such words.

[@Insert639]

He has explained what he means by spiritual on many occasions. Check out "the examined life".

[@OfficialSvelton]

It usually translates okay to a blend of impactful/emotional/psychological, if that helps any.

[@ott6428]

That's precisely why the word itself is unhelpful. Those are three rather distinct words which would make fine replacements to the word 'spiritual', if that is indeed what he means. People say spiritual and I ask 'what do you mean by that word', and then 1 minute later the word spiritual is purged from the conversation and replaced with 'what they meant by spiritual', and then the conversation begins to proceed productively.

[@AdaptorLive]

Agreed. Besides, 'spirtual' is one of the favorite words of bullshit peddlers everywhere. It's not weird that people, including myself, have an allergic reaction to it. This is Big Think. Ideas need to be communicated clearly, with unambigious language, or they can and will be distorted.

[@distel1enyime245]

Humain first and materiel come after. The world is insane. We are control by psychopath. Powerfull lyrics

[@cronnyberg]

I can get on board with this 'kind' of discussion, in so far as spirituality is used as a shorthand for psychological and biological processes that the layman doesn't have the time or capacity to define when being self critical. However, the kind of sage-ness/rhetoric/performance philosophy that we see in this video has never appealed to me. My inner cynic kicks-in when people start talking about "killing what is inside" and the "death of the self" etc etc etc... I see why it appeals to other people, but for me it's just like... state your point and get on with it. I don't need these frills.

[@christianschwalbach7561]

Rob Cronin isn't a large chunk of his point the value of art and exploratory exercises of spirtuality and hope, however one may define it? Hence a flourish in speaking is art itself. It can be done poorly, though, and without point. I think he had a point here that was still put out there in a digestible manner

[@jetblack8250]

Rob Cronin your instinct kicks in because this form of speaking is usually associated with snake oil salesmen. So you are right to be on guard but if your critical eye sees substance in the content being delivered by the speaker then it’s ok to embrace his impassioned style.

[@leo959]

i think this guy was in the movie tales from the crypt

[@chestbuster1987]

There are some good ideas in this but I think passion and emotion went a bit too far and took away from the content

[@christianschwalbach7561]

chestbuster1987 in some ways yes

[@stenaldomehilli8809]

Tamas Egyed Every good idea is sustained with passion. Passion definitely is an emotion. I am crushed in spirit to see that society don't like listening these anymore! And, how else could it be! Success is now defined as naked body in the best way! To understand brother West, you have to be learning how to die!

[@iv1908]

Nothing this intelligent man said was no where near funny and all of the chuckling this crowd did was distracting and disrespectful.

[@JRibs]

My brotha!

[@ericpatterson8794]

did he throw his back out right before his inane sermon?

[@razxmnazx1031]

word up good sir haste in the proper circumstance is also a virtue god may love us but no window can stay open forever those would be god/universal rules not mortal ones run bitches run

[@216trixie]

Title Fail: Hope=Wish-thinking. Spiritual=Undefinable ideas.

[@UrukEngineer]

He's reading far too much into it.

[@Syntaxterror7]

Hope is unicornical Armor Against Modern Society's Unicorn War. equally as valid a statement

[@iwillheadlockyournan731]

Josh Barrett is it though?

[@buckybone89]

If you don't believe in something bigger than yourself, then your world's pitifully small...must be lonely on your high horse.

[@2bsirius]

John Barrett, _What does it mean to be candid in an age of criminality and mendacity?_ That question by Professor West is valid and thought provoking. Your sophomoric, superficial statement about unicorn wars should embarrass you. It's very sad that it doesn't.

[@teaziest746]

The word 'spiritual' is used in many contexts which are not necessarily religious. The word 'unicorn' is considerably less ambiguous. This comment is based on a knee-jerk reaction to a word, and has nothing to do with actual critical thought.

[@matthewmalpeli]

josé n. olmos My feelings are irrelevant.

[@eyeh8u1]

Eleven minutes of word salad and empty platitudes. Oh boy.

[@christianschwalbach7561]

eyeh8u1 poetry of speaking mate. I think it enhances his point rather than detracts. He's talking about the arts and the soul anywaus

[@MegaChickenfish]

Pretty much. I've noticed with philosophy that past a certain point you wind up using a lot of words to say very little.

[@carolineholiday9285]

Are you talking about trumps last rally? When someone has trouble following a lecture because of a vocabulary gap or a short attention span it dosent make sense. Try watching it over and over until you are able to comprehend it

[@carolineholiday9285]

@@MegaChickenfish Philisophy comes off as wordy because it requires precision of vocabulary. Also, philosophers have very complex ideas and are often meticulous about accuracy of expression

[@FilipeBrasAlmeida]

Words are coming out of his mouth, but they're jumping over facts.

[@fishypaw]

As anybody with critical thinking skills knows, 'spirituality' is a ridiculous concept. So I think it's safe to ignore this video.

[@clockworkboy8968]

Lol ok. All the great people (past and present) who describe themselves as 'spiritual' are actually lacking in critical thinking skills. Thanks for enlightening me, fishy paw.

[@fishypaw]

Intellect and knowledge are thankfully increasing as we evolve (slower than I'd like but at least it is progressing), and as we do so, those that have read enough and have acquired enough knowledge and critical thinking skills realise that 'spirituality' is just another term like 'god' that describes a man made concept that has no basis or possible existence in the real physical world we live in. As we evolve, we will (hopefully) come up with better terms to more accurately describe our existence and experience that don't resort to the intellectually lazy and magical thinking standpoint of 'god did it' or 'it's spiritual man'.

[@spiritualphysics]

We are spirit beings mastering the human experience. When we shed this flesh there is still more going on in awareness.

[@andrewgodly5739]

Did you listen to what he said? He referred to spirituality in the metaphorical way, not the literal way like "ghosts". Like how you can break someone's spirit, which is like mentally breaking them

[@fishypaw]

Well, no, as I indicated in my first comment (lol), but I appreciate the enlightenment. As I said in my later comment, we do need better words to describe the human experience, and steer away from intellectually lazy (and erroneous) terms such as 'spirituality', whether metaphorical or not. So I still stand by my original comment.

[@7hi5on35]

Optimism is for children and the irresponsible.

[@matthewmalpeli]

7hi5 on3 A stupid notion without basis, but I'm a pessimist. I find it more bearable. It means you get little surprises regularly of nice things telling you it's not all so bad. An optimist must get disappointed a lot.

[@7hi5on35]

Matthew Malpeli I didn't say pessimism was the ideal either. Both descriptives are far too non-descriptive to say anything particularly insightful about anyone, as well, both are too shallow to constitute anything approximating wisdom. The only difference between the two is that one can be used to identify the nieve. Between them, pessimism is the one which is closer to wisdom, however, even then, I personally I don't prescribe to the use of either term. I'd far more favor the use of various other adjectives when trying to describe myself...

[@7hi5on35]

MeAndWhoseArmy Hope is only useful when in a situation where one has no influence, and western democracies have influence in abundance. We need sensible policy and frank conversation, not hope.

[@ott6428]

No you have to default to optimism when you don't have enough information to be a realist. If you were a robot this wouldn't apply but humans are very susceptible to morale and even silly things like music. For example if you're about enter a boxing ring, you don't have time to make rational decisions. You have to go in with the assumption that you're going to win, even if your rational mind doesn't/shouldn't believe it.

[@7hi5on35]

Otis Miller Your boxing ring analogy is poor, however, I think I understand the point you are trying to make with it, and I think you're wrong. Optimism, as I understand it, is a belief that one should "think" / "feel" positively about a situation, regardless whether or not such feelings are justified. I'm of the opinion that "positive thinking" is reckless and irresponsible because it impresses upon one a sense of security and safety, whether or not such feelings are justified or prudent. In terms which would fit within the boundaries of your previous boxing ring analogy; It's the blow which one doesn't see, or anticipate, which puts one down, and I personally believe that being a pessimist is more conducive to countering such proverbial blows than optimism is. That anxiety makes for better decision making than joviality, as the pessimist assumes the worst and plans for such, while the optimist does not. I think what you are doing is conflating being optimistic, for being bold.