Author Archives: zjb

Our Heart is a Prisoner in Gaza

I’m getting all of this from Marc Ponte, a public historian researching 17th century migration and slavery in Amsterdam, Brazil and Suriname. Ponte shared a wonderful twitter thread about the performance of Hester, of Verloosing der jooden by Johanne Serwouters, … Continue reading →

“To blame the victims for their own suffering is simply an easy way to distance oneself from them. Blaming the victims is just like idealizing them—at best superfluous, perhaps a sign of the difficulty of facing cruelty at all. It … Continue reading →

The last many months have been a demoralizing and disorienting nightmare, a nauseating disequilibrium for Israel and Palestine, and for anyone who cares about the people who live there and the violence they suffer. The people of Israel and Palestine … Continue reading →

Philosophers and other theorists distinguish between the wide-open, harsh infinity of space as opposed to the buffered configuration of being in place. This structural distinction conforms also to digital space and place. Digital space is full of malevolent chaos. It … Continue reading →

Moral shock is a complex of fear, disbelief, rage, and grief. In response to human violence, moral shock is both an instinctive and normative motor of human action, one that consumes attention and commands action. But moral shock, in and … Continue reading →

Hendricks Chapel at Syracuse University organized three vigils relating to October 7 and the Hamas Israel war, responding to the staggering loss of human life. A few other protests have been more narrowly circumscribed as political. I’m sharing here a … Continue reading →