(Anti) Hero of the Month

Immanuel Kant is quite famous for his dismissive attitudes towards the fathers of international law, such as Grotius, Pufendorf and Vattel. He calls them 'sorry comforters' in the sense that they have sought to circumvent the problematic quest for a metaphysical realm of moral ethics, by reducing/aligning the 'essence' of international law towards/with the strategic interests of nation-states today. So the type of international law that we observe in this world today is not so much of a cosmopolitan law that could flourish without the constraint of nation-states, but a reductionist mode of rules, regulations, treaties, 'expert' opinions, and 'scientific' truths, that will allow us to have a degree of control in our social life, which is assumed to be an extension of the natural world. The maxim for the sorry comforters is to 'control' the natural world as means to emancipate a freedom that is found within the literatures of political 'science'. The maxim for Immanuel Kant is to position oneself in a shifting and indefinite position of inquiring the noumenal (and inaccessible) world - to understand the mind of God, figuratively speaking - as means to emancipate a freedom that is associated with the literature of political 'philosophy'.

So, for a rather simplistic example, take a look at the big LCD tv screens in MRT stations, where you have a highly retarded 'documentary' instructing you on how to spot a terrorist in a train, as well as the brief history of terrorism that can be myopically traced back to the fateful day of september 11. From the sorry comforters' point of view, knowing the dos and don'ts of spotting a terrorist is a highly effective way of achieving freedom from fear. From Kant's point of view, such a security culture merely replaces the cultures of rights, and in fact, the ability of one to think critically about the type of fear that one should be concerned about, given that terrorism is not a new phenomenon (and can be found in the 1970s as well, eg. the Red Brigades), but it is nonetheless instrumentalized as a policy for control, which in turn generates more self-referential policies that create further control (of the mind, and then the body). What comes out from this generation and regeneration of policies after policies are retarded programs on MRT stations that teach passengers how to spot mysterious bombs and bags. Osama would probably have a higher chance to die of laughter than to die at the hands of Bush, when he sees these retarded programs.

Immanuel Kant is therefore the anti-hero of the month, because he made me realized in the past week that I am a 'sorry comforter', in the way that I've approached my thesis. So much for reading Kant in the past week. I'm thinking about my thesis's second marker now - cos one is clearly kantian in his worldview while the other is more inclined towards the 'sorry comforters'. Maybe it is not so much the grades, but it is a bit demoralizing that 4 months of research can be quite easily refuted by reading one week's worth of literature from a dead philosopher. I guess I didn't read him deeply enough previously. Or maybe the disciplines of political science and international relations are just inferior fields when compared to the richness of political philosophy. But who cares about philosophy these days? Honestly speaking? The debate in my brain continues....