Egypt: The Distance Between Enthusiasm and Reality

       My dad emailed me this article titled "Egypt: The Distance Between Enthusiasm and Reality". http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20110213-egypt-distance-between-enthusiasm-and-reality
It really helped me understand what exactly is going on in Egypt because the author said the details very clearly.
Here is one paragraph that really stood out to me:
"That is the point. What happened was not a revolution. The demonstrators never brought down Mubarak, let alone the regime. What happened was a military coup that used the cover of protests to force Mubarak out of office in order to preserve the regime. When it became clear Feb. 10 that Mubarak would not voluntarily step down, the military staged what amounted to a coup to force his resignation. Once he was forced out of office, the military took over the existing regime by creating a military council and taking control of critical ministries. The regime was always centered on the military. What happened on Feb. 11 was that the military took direct control."
For me, realizing the impact the military had on the people and on the government was never totally understood until reading this. It also made me wonder that in a country hoping to achieve democracy...can a military so powerful actually let that happen? Sure, they say that that is what they are working towards right now, but promises can be broken.  This article taught me a lot about the disruption in Egypt as well as it made me ask a lot of questions. As my dad put in the subject line of the email "You will be smarter when you read this (long) piece."  And I am.
 

Associations in the U.S.

          Tocqueville gives the reason for creating associations when he says, "The citizen of the United States is taught from infancy to rely upon his own exertions, in order to resist the evils and the difficulties of life; he looks upon the social authority with an eye of mistrust and anxiety, and he claims its assistance only when he is unable to do without it" (104).    He then goes on to define an association as: "An association consists simply in the public assent which a number of individuals give to certain doctrines; and in the engagement which they contract to promote in a certain manner the spread of those doctrines...An association unites into one channel the efforts of diverging minds, and urges them vigorously towards the one end which it clearly points out" (105).
           First of all, I think both of these quotes relate back to our discussion on Friday about what exactly a voluntary association is -- they helped me solidify my understanding of associations.
          Secondly, thinking about how Tocqueville also mentioned that the U.S. has used associations successfully, and without them, the U.S. might not be what it is today.  This made me realize how much gets done as a result of associations -- political movements,  rights movements, even places as "simple" as the YMCA...none of this would have happened without people creating associations.  Even here at St. Olaf people make clubs or organizations to gather people with the same interests and intentions...and they get stuff done (such as the new "after dark committee").  It is almost scary to think about what the U.S. would be had individuals not gotten together and created these associations -- we would definitely not be the same nation as we are right now.

The Impact of War

           De Tocqueville describes perfectly what happens to a nation during war when he says...
"...The most important occurrence in the life of a nation is the breaking out of a war.  In war, a people act as one man against foreign nations, in defence of their very existence.  The skill of the government, the good sense of the community, and the natural fondness which men almost always entertain for their country, may be enough, as long as the only object is to maintain peace in the interior of the state, and to favor its internal prosperity; but that the nation may carry on a great war, the people must make numerous and painful sacrifices; and to suppose that a great number of men will, of their own accord, submit to these exigencies, is to betray an ignorance of human nature" (93).
        Being the person I am, I always want to expect the best in everyone -- to believe that everyone is trustworthy and sticks to their good side.  But it seems, according to this quote, that not everyone does...people only come together to do good and maintain peace during a war.  Why then, if Americans are stereotypically  seen as "good" people, does this not happen on an everyday basis?  And hasn't this standard of "people act as one man against foreign nations" kind of deteriorated as the years have gone on?  If we think back to the Revolutionary War, people were very united together to gain their freedom from England.  In the Civil War, even WWII, people did what they could to support their troops (victory gardens!!)...yet looking at the war against terrorism today, the government can't always look to its people for support.  People have conflicting views....the majority of the people don't want war, yet they want to stop terrorism....but we can't do one without the other.  As the years have gone on, the expectation that a nation will unite during a war seems to have diminished...and in a way is disappointing.

Why is Intellect Distributed Unequally in America?

       "Of course, a multitude of persons are to be found who entertain the same number of ideas on religion, history, science, political economy, legislation, and government.  The gifts of intellect proceed directly from God, and man cannot prevent their unequal distribution.  But it is at least a consequence of what we have just said, that although the capacities of men are different, as the Creator intended they should be, Americans find the means of putting them to use are equal" (55).
                                           --Alexis De Tocqueville's Democracy in America
         Tocqueville seem to blame the inequality of intellect (and consequently wealth) on God -- that God presents certain individuals with more gifts of intellect than others. Yet, he finishes this paragraph by saying that Americans figure out how to use their unequal intellect in an equal way.  So even though he admits there is inequality of intellect, he claims that this can be overcome.
        If it were up to me, I would blame the inequality on something else. In America, the majority of people who have achieved the American Dream have done so because they were educated.  Education gives one intellect, and intellect leads to wealth.  An unequal distribution of intellect leads to an unequal distribution of wealth.  This is why the government has provided access to free education for all Americans -- so children and teenagers can become equipped with intellect and given the tools to succeed.  Perhaps Tocqueville should have gone one step further and said that it is only when we accept that we were given the amount of intellect we have...and it is our responsibility to go out and learn as much new knowledge as possible, and that this is how the American Dream is most readily achieved.

Upward Mobility as an American Dream and Religious Dream?

        The central focus of chapter 3 is upward mobility -- and DeAne asks us if religious conversion could be regarded, in itself, as a sort of mobility between one state and another.  While reading Cullen, I found three quotes that seemed to prove (or at least help prove) that the answer to this question is yes.
       "And like other American Dreams, the power of this one lay in a sense of collective ownership: anyone can get ahead.  An assertion of universal enfranchisement is routinely reaffirmed by this dream's boosters...Occasionally, it has been roundly condemned as an opiate of the people..." (Cullen 60).   The idea of "anyone can get ahead" pertains both to the American Dream of being monetary successful, but also spiritually successful.  Everyone is presented with the same materials from birth -- and just like Lincoln, people can come from nothing and have everything by the end of their lives.  With religion, anyone can get ahead.  Anyone can be more religious and devout than another.  This competition created an upward mobility for Americans in the religious aspect (Second Great Awakening)...people were compelled to become more and more religious in order to fit in to society ideals.
    "...in America, it was possible to make your own destiny" (101). In America, it became possible for individuals to create their own religious "destiny"... because of the Second Great Awakening, people got to choose which denomination they wanted to be a part of.  The collective "common" people were all "equal" in the religious hierarchy.  They had the power to be as religious as they wanted to be, and to allow their lives to take advantage of this.  This translated into upward mobility -- since people could control which religious track they went on, they were able to judge how much they have "mobilized" in their lives and if this was a positive (upward) contribution to their lives.
    This last quote is by Lincoln on the last page of Cullen's chapter 3:  "Let us hope, rather, that by the best cultivation of the physical world, beneath and around us; and the intellectual and moral world within us, we shall secure an individual, social, and political prosperity and happiness, whose course shall be onward and upward, and which, while the earth endures, shall not pass away" (102).    The piece about individual happiness can be related to religion -- and as long as people have the upward prosperity of spirituality, they have the potential to reach individual happiness. This can spread to help social happiness.  And as long as people keep having this upward mobility ("onward and upward") of religion like they do in the Second Great Awakening, religion (specifically Christianity) will continue to be a part of American culture -- which it most definitely is even today.

Personal vs. Social Responsibility

"And the dilemma posed for the pietists who sought to construct the New Jerusalem in America's green and promised land had two sides: first, how do I get myself into harmony with the moral law, and second, how do I translate that law into action without curtailing the freedom of others?  Or, in other words, the dilemma of personal responsibility for purity and social responsibility for order, for transforming myself and my society into that state of perfection which God requires on earth even as it is in heaven" (McLoughlin 165).
      First off, this is an excellent example of two sentences that say the same thing, but one is more clear than the other.  While the first sentence uses more fancy words and seems like it is the better one, it did not make sense to me compared to the second sentence.  The second sentence lays out the author's point more clearly in terms that are more easily understood.
     On a different note, McLoughlin's part about "personal responsibility for purity and social responsibility for order" prompts me to make the connect this not only to religion, but also democracy.  We discussed a "common people" and that the common people reshape society.  Whether it is religion or democracy, it takes this common people to reshape old beliefs into new beliefs, and consequently these new beliefs become more "normal".  In the religious aspect, each individual has the responsibility to hold themselves accountable for their own actions, all the while helping society keep order by reshaping what is accepted as "normal" religious behavior in America.  As far as the democratic aspect of this, each individual has the responsibility to be pure in the sense of honesty and participating in the democracy; each individual has the responsibility to keep social order by participating in the democracy and making their vote count.  So, in a way, religion and democracy have some of the same components that make them work -- make the functionable in a society that is so diverse.

Democratization of Christianity

"The democratization of Christianity, then, has less to do with the specifics of polity and governance and more with the very incarnation of the church into popular culture...By redefining leadership itself, these movements were instrumental in shattering the centuries-old affinity between Christianity and the norms of high culture.  They reconstructed the foundations of religion fully in keeping with the values and priorities of ordinary people" (Hatch 97).
     To me, this means that one of the most important parts of the democratization of Christianity is that it took away the "hierarchy"  that prevailed over all of Christianity.  In my microeconomics class, we've talked about the idea of civil society.  Where everyone works together to achieve an equal purpose.  This is kind of what people during this time period were doing --  there was a "civil society" of religious people. They were all equal, all trying to become more religious, but all the while understanding that everyone was (is) equal in God's eyes.  Ordinary people were able to feel like that had a part in their religion; they had a choice -- to be as devoted to God as they wanted to be.

Frykhom and the Rapture

      "We see then a 'new' Christian emerging in this fiction.  No longer ostracized, alienated, and old-fashioned, the new Christian is wealthy, technologically savvy, and exerts a powerful cultural influence" (36).  -- Amy Frykhom

        Frykhom writes this on the last page of her text that was assigned for Monday.  As soon as I read this, I made a connection to the Second Great Awakening.   We discussed in class Friday how during the Second Great Awakening, religion came to be less about intellect and rationality as it became more about morality and emotionality.  I got the impression from the Noll reading that those who were "reformed" were saw as wealthy.  And maybe this was not a monetary wealth, but a spiritual wealth.  Frykhom's writing gives me the impression that the idea of the rapture encourages Christians to have monetary wealth, but more importantly, spiritual wealth (a.k.a very strong in one's faith).  Furthermore, the more individuals evangelize and spread this want to be spiritual beings, the better (relating to Frykhom's "...exerts a powerful cultural influence").
       So maybe the Second Great Awakening can, in a way, be paralleled to the idea of the rapture, in terms of how people reacted to both.  Except, in the Second Great Awakening, people were becoming spiritually revived for themselves, for their own good and for the good of their culture.  Whereas, with the idea of the rapture, people are becoming spiritually revived for fear of what will happen if they are not "faithful servants of the Lord" when the rapture happens.  To me, the big difference here is in the idea of self-interest:  to better oneself because of individual desire to please God (Second Great Awakening),  versus fear of what will happen if one does not better himself (Rapture).  Is one better than the other? And if so, is this up to us as humans to decide? Or should it be a decision that God gets to make?  And furthermore...how do we know the basis on which to judge the difference between these two types of self-interest?

Democracy and What Government?

      In my microeconomics class today, we were talking about the ever-present economic debate of markets and government, and how much of each should be involved.  My professor pointed out that it is not a question of "markets or government?", but a question of "markets and what government?"  I thought about this and if there might be a parallel to the Second Great Awakening and the matter of religion in the government.  So the question that comes to my mind is "government and what religion?"
     During the time of the Second Great Awakening, biblical laws became integrated into the actual government law.  It seems to me as though the question of "government and what religion?" was never pondered, because so many people were invested in spiritual revival and wanted to integrate this into the government. But as our country has grown, there has been more and more debate with how our nation is not actually a Christian nation, yet the government runs under some laws that are founded on Christian principles.  For example, the ten commandments have been removed from public schools, and people are asking if "one nation, under God" should actually be part of our pledge of allegiance.  While this does not bother me because I am a Christian, I can understand how individuals of other religions could have a problem with this.  So...how much of the Christian religion should be integrated into the government?  Our founding fathers were Christian, and this is why our government includes Christian principles. Should these principles be kept? As long as our nation continues to be diverse in every aspect -- especially in religion, the question of "government and what (how much) religion?" will be present.  And furthermore, should this be something that citizens get to vote on (democracy!)?

Finney and His View of Religion and Government

         After reading about Charles Finney, I did some more research to better see the influence he had on the American culture.   I came across this quote  "No man can possibly be benevolent or religious, to the full extent of his obligations, without concerning himself, to a greater or less extent, with the affairs of human government" (Finney).
         To me, it seems as though this echoes why our government is the way it is -- this country was both founded and shaped by predominantly Christian people, and that's the reason our government has some of the morals that it does. What Finney is trying to say then, is that if we follow "God's Law", that we will also be following the government's law.  Which signals that the government was largely influenced by biblical principles during the second great awakening.  This can somewhat explain why the Christian influence in the government has stayed with our nation so far. 

Democracy Based Off of Walt Whitman's Writing

“...The present is but the legitimate birth of the past.” -- Walt Whitman

Democracy in the American government was put in place by our founding fathers.  Much can be learned from the past about how democracy has both positively and negatively affected our nation.  America is able to keep a democratic government from going completely corrupt because it looked back on the past and discovered where the democracy went array.  We can learn from our past, and that is why America is a democratic republic: so far, it seems to have worked well for the nation as a whole. 

Democracy is based upon the idea that We the People matter because in the end we have the final say. It both separates and unites the American people, but requires that there is political equality between all citizens. The downside is that America possesses a tyranny of the majority; those who fall in the minority just have to stand by as policies that they are against get put into effect.  To help this, the government has a separation of powers among the legislative, executive, and judicial branches.

Within democracy, the judgment of the wise is subordinated to the prejudices of the ignorant. The question of who should really get to vote gets raised.  Should proportional representation and extra votes for the better-educated exist?  And will the majority poor citizenry vote for confiscatory legislation at the expense of the rich minority?  The debate is whether the government should do something to control these problems, or just let the democracy run itself and take into account each person’s vote. 

  In hope that democracy will succeed in making the nation prosper, the American people have put their dreams and freedom in the the hands of democracy.  Yet, democracy is freedom: it allows each individual to take as much of a hold on their freedom as they wish. Though democracy calls for freedom being the ultimate goal to preserve a peaceful togetherness, the harsh reality is that individuals and opinions are abundant and varied, and no one will ever agree.  Therefore, a true democracy is not possible as long as people crave to have more wealth, more money, and more of everything; no one will ever completely agree on everything.  This is why America has a democratic republic. We have representatives who take our votes into account, but they get to make the final decisions on policies and who is elected.  

Democracy is present in our everyday lives because in each of our encounters, we have the equal opportunity to be heard. We are able to inform those who are authoritative to us about public problems, and possibly work together to solve those. We have the freedom to do what we want, write what we want, say what we want.  It was Walt Whitman who noted, “I say that democracy can never prove itself beyond cavil until it founds and luxuriantly grows its own forms of art, poems, schools, theology, displacing all that exists, or that has been produced anywhere in the past, under opposite influences.”  Historians, teachers, professors, and many others, have studied and put democracy into its own form. Whitman writes,“the problem of humanity all over the civilized world is social and religious, and is to be finally met and treated by literature” (760). This has caused it to become better understood in the American culture, and therefore it is deemed a more successful part of government.  Democracy has been shaped by the American people because we have looked back on what has been produced by democracy in the past, and each individual has an opinion on where democracy should go from this point.  This has allowed democracy to get molded to the American culture. 

There is no true democracy in America, but the democracy we do have causes us to anticipate the future in hope that each new day will be better and that the nation will move towards fixing the problems that are currently present.  The definition of democracy will perhaps vary for each American citizen, because as long as each individual holds his or her own opinion, the possibilities of policies and elected leaders will be vast.  By looking at America’s past, it has been established that America’s liberty and democracy has flourished in America and how it differed from the normal progressions of other nations, and this is why democracy has stayed a part of the United States’ government.