In my Humanities class we are studying dialectics through the Russian revolution. Dialectics is a very hard way of arguing in my opinion because it’s not about whose right or wrong it’s about trying to come to an agreement that is fair to both sides. We do this through the process of thesis, antithesis and synthesis. For my action project I choose to apply diabetics to the political issue “Don’t ask, Don’t tell”. I did an artist exchange with a person who doesn’t share the same views as my. I created an art piece that represents my point of view and gave that to them and they responded with their piece. We discussed our different views and together created a piece about things we both agreed on. Th entire process was exciting and informative. In learned about a whole new level of argument with this project and I’m proud of my project. Below is a presentation on how that shows my work and the opposing persons point as well as our agreed upon points.

My thesis was that gay soldiers should be allowed to serve freely without any cultural or moral stigmas. The Anti-thesis was that people will discriminate no matter what and a law can’t just get rid of that. After much debate we were able to come to the synthesis that people shouldn’t be discriminated against because of who they are but change won’t happen over night. See for more details above.

References:

KHANNA, Satyam (May, 2009). “Obama sends handwritten letter to gay soldier ousted from the military promising to repeat DADT” Think Progress

Media Matters Staff (January, 2010). “O’reilly on Don’t ask Don’t tell: It’s not about anti-gay. It’s about being comfortable in the barracks” Media Matters

MORTENSEN W, Ronald (Novemeber 2009). “Federal Employmenment Verification Requirements: Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”  https://www.cis.org/mortensen/dontaskdonttell

BELKIN, Aaron (2003). Don’t Ask Don’t Tell: Is the Gay Ban Based on Military Necessity? eScholarship University of California