Carolina Ebeid, "letter to the Corinthians"

Hi everyone --

I have notes for an essay about optics that is going nowhere right now. I wanted to talk at length about whether we have an ironic relation to the media which prevents us from taking the notion of truth seriously. I mean, I know: this has been done before, e.g. essays criticizing Seinfeld. But I do think it is a huge mistake to give those with no media literacy and unending anger the responsibility of curating their own news diet. We've done this with social media and cable news and created a number of nihilists. They function as the producer and the audience, and it is hard to avoid a dangerous cynicism about the product. Why not indulge your worst self? Anyone can make up what the news is.

On that note, if you can read Taylor Lorenz's reporting about the newest right-wing craze, please do so (h/t: my brother, who read this and was stunned). She talks about how Blake Lively has been dragged for massive engagement not only by conservative commentators but by mainstream YouTubers. There's a harsh and mindless reaction to #MeToo leading directly to gross, misogynistic extremism. Lorenz points out that Candace Owens is getting rich from producing "sludge" about Lively. Partly as a result, Owens plans to do a future series asserting that Harvey Weinstein was wronged.

As always in the U.S., the situation escalates daily. We learned this Sunday about a Palestinian American graduate student whose green card did not prevent him from being taken into ICE custody. He was moved from New York City to Louisiana. Apparently it is quite routine for ICE to ship people to remote locations rapidly, where it is hard for them to access legal representation. It is not clear what he is guilty of aside from POTUS and the Secretary of State declaring him a supporter of Hamas.

I think it is essential everyone is alerted to this situation and made aware of how grave it is. People should not be made to disappear.

MAGA families say to their relatives fired from the federal government "this is good, actually"

We should talk about the recent trend of family members–including parents!–celebrating the loss of a relative's job as advancing the greater good. "Thrust into unemployment, axed federal workers face relatives who celebrate their firing" has plenty that's infuriating. One man who worked for the U.S. Forest Service was told his firing was "what has to happen to make the government great again;" he's applying for fast food jobs in order to make ends meet. Kristin Jenn, recruited to be an NPS ranger but now a victim of a hiring freeze, cannot get any sympathy from her own mother, who herself worked for the federal government. From the article: "She has somehow been convinced that public servants are a parasite and unproductive even though she was a public servant," says Jenn.

There's too much to say in response. We've been conditioned by the Reagan years to believe government is always a problem; conspiracy theories abound and none of us know how anything works; heavily right-wing media makes it extremely difficult to explain why an issue has priority; old people can't always grasp the reality of the situation; a resurgent fascist movement has plenty of positive attention and influence. There's so much more. The angle I'd like to think about has been brought up in another context by Mariame Kaba. She mentioned that Project 2025 explainers were everywhere, but obviously not enough people took them seriously. Is the American public completely deranged? What kind of people celebrate the unemployment of their own kids? How could you possibly convince them of anything?

Cults do turn their members against friends and family, and I think the cult framing is useful. Whether we're talking about being dismissed for telling the truth or people telling their relatives they deserve to be fired, we know what to do. Yeah, there's deprogramming and deradicalization. But first things first: we're up against a cult! Gotta get allies, gotta spread the word, gotta create shame, gotta be loud and not take any of their nonsense seriously. I know all that sounds cliche, but it is so clear we're still in a fight to create a "we." Not everyone we can get on our side knows what's going on with Musk and DOGE or the threats to Social Security and Medicare. I know this: many have no idea how to explain what's good about the federal government and how easily things can collapse without it. So I think it's imperative to put that many more explainers and slogans out there. Challenge the Fox News / radio talk show host / podcaster bro view of what an activist is. Don't let lazy thinking about how things work or who's doing the work govern. Lazy thinking, as we're seeing, results in viciousness and violence.

Carolina Ebeid, "letter to the Corinthians"

I am 45. It's been a few days since this happened but I've been in motion most of that time. I can't express how grateful I am to my friends, family, colleagues, and students for wishing me well and giving me lots of little things throughout the week. I still feel spoiled and deeply appreciated. I feel like I did when my students threw me a party in 2019. For a while, there were tears of joy at random moments.

Now I need to reflect. And here's Carolina Ebeid's lovely "letter to the Corinthians," a poem that's a bit of a joke. A play on some very serious words, the sort that change human history. But they can be too big for an individual, and maybe they need to be refashioned. Her "letter:" "But my most / magnificent / self, she runs / through a grass, / larkly." She lets "magnificent" sit on a line all by itself, as if the word alone deserves as much space as it can get. She also pairs her "self" with "she runs" on one line, embracing a motion constitutive of her being. A motion that I'm not always thinking about at 45, because getting older means increased cancer screenings.

Do I need a different sort of reflection?

letter to the Corinthians
Carolina Ebeid

But my most 
magnificent
self, she runs
through a grass,
larkly.

I wonder about Paul's original statement. "βλέπομεν γὰρ ἄρτι δι’ ἐσόπτρου ἐν αἰνίγματι (blepomen gar arti di esoptrou en ainigmati)," "for now we see through a glass darkly." 

I’m thinking about αἰνίγματι (ainigmati). Enigma. I see through a glass in puzzlement. I don’t know if today can be the mirror I need; I don’t know if I can be that mirror. There’s just glass, the possibility of reflection, and a problem not unlike Meno’s paradox. How would I know if I actually saw myself?

For Paul, the solution requires no less than an afterlife. Full knowledge, even of your own self, involves standing face-to-face with God. Of course, you can see more in this life; we didn't see as much as children, we see differently and expansively as adults. But to truly know, to truly see, our imperfect lives must be confronted with no less than perfection.

I've got to think. Is that adulthood? It is tempting. I envision someone who looks like me, but they're in a city from a tv commercial. Everything gleams, all the people smile, all the products work. And this person, who is me and isn't me, gets everything they need to get done. They don't make any mistakes while speaking. They always know what to do and how to do it.

You can object that Paul is not talking about this sort of perfection. He is concerned with a moral perfection, a heavenly justice which our own sense of morality can only glimpse. We don't really know what justice is, so it is relative for the most part. But in the best society, governed by divine wisdom, justice would always be absolute.

I feel like this is quite admirable and also a bit fantastic for me. Most of adulting is learning to accept grief and deal with loss. I have to work with fewer resources, less-than-ideal situations, bad people and institutions trying to harm others. I have to speak up when I'm uncomfortable because a failure to speak would be a complete moral failure. I also have to speak prudently, as it is possible to be exactly right and hurt everyone on account of timing. Justice, for me, often has to do with some very uncomfortable compromises or sacrifices.

And then here's Ebeid's poem, strongly suggesting a grace which could define life. The "magnificent / self, she runs / through a grass, / larkly." How do I get there? Do I pretend I'm a deer?

I want to reflect in the style of Ebeid's poem. I'd like to run fast, maybe so fast that obstacles have no time to be obstacles. I'd like to graze. Porochista Khakpour wrote about becoming the sort of person who really chews her food. Francis Bacon, the former Lord Chancellor, spoke of books that have to be "chewed" and "digested." Where you have to give the words–maybe another's life–as much "diligence" and "attention" as you can. And I'd like to see myself reflected in the water of a clear stream, where purity satisfies a thirst.