Indeed it may be only by risking the incoherence of identity that connection is possible.
Judith ButlerRead
When Zionism becomes co-extensive with Jewishness, Jewishness is pitted against the diversity that defines democracy, and if I may say so, betrays one of the most important ethical dimensions of the diasporic Jewish tradition: namely, the obligation of co-habitation with those different from ourselves.
Interpretation
The quote discusses the tension between a singular Jewish identity and the values of diversity and democracy.
Judith Butler reflects on the relationship between Zionism and Jewish identity, arguing that if Zionism is equated with what it means to be Jewish, it may undermine the democratic principles of diversity and inclusion. She emphasizes the ethical responsibility of Jewish people, particularly in the diaspora, to coexist with and respect those who are different, highlighting the importance of pluralism in society.
In practice
During a lecture on multiculturalism, this quote can illustrate the importance of embracing diversity.
Indeed it may be only by risking the incoherence of identity that connection is possible.
When we say gender is performed, we usually mean that we've taken on a role or we're acting in some way and that our acting or our role playing is crucial to the gender that we are and the gender that we present to the world.
It's my view that gender is culturally formed, but it's also a domain of agency or freedom and that it is most important to resist the violence that is imposed by ideal gender norms, especially against those who are gender different, who are nonconforming in their gender presentation.
I do not deny certain kinds of biological differences. But I always ask under what conditions, under what discursive and institutional conditions, do certain biological differences - and they're not necessary ones, given the anomalous state of bodies in the world - become the salient characteristics of sex.
Sexual harassment law is very important. But I think it would be a mistake if the sexual harassment law movement is the only way in which feminism is known in the media.
We act and walk and speak and talk in ways that consolidate an impression of being a man or being a woman.
I preach there are all kinds of truth, your truth and somebody else's. But behind all of them there is only one truth and that is that there's no truth.
It is curious that while good people go to great lengths to spare their children from suffering, few of them seem to notice that the one (and only) guaranteed way to prevent all the suffering of their children is not to bring those children into existence in the first place.
Man is not a machine that can be remodelled for quite other purposes as occasion demands, in the hope that it will go on functioning as regularly as before but in a quite different way. He carries his whole history with him; in his very structure is written the history of mankind.
Capitalists are no more capable of self-sacrifice than a man is capable of lifting himself up by his own bootstraps.
Remember that you have only one soul; that you have only one death to die; that you have only one life. . . . If you do this, there will be many things about which you care nothing.
Without you, without your onslaughts, without your uprootings of us, we should remain all our lives inert, stagnant, puerile, ignorant both of ourselves and of God. You who batter us and then dress our wounds, you who resist us and yield to us, you who wreck and build, you who shackle and liberate, the sap of our souls, the hand of God, the flesh of Christ: it is you, matter, that I bless.
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