We've got a fantastic dialogue going here and rather than keep it all in the comments I thought I would go ahead and branch out a bit. The question is, why worry about the establishment at all? The idea being here (and I am hopefully interpreting this correctly) that since we cannot change the establishment (meaning society/culture etc.) and replacing the current establishment with one of our own creating would simply make us the oppressors instead of the oppressed it is best to focus solely on the individual and individual existence.

The reason I must disagree with that idea is a fundamental difference in ideology. As some sort of post-modernist/feminist/naturally argumentative being that I am I subscribe wholly to the Bakhtinian belief that we are half ourselves and half someone else's. Bakhtin uses this idea in relation to discourse, but taking it one step further brings you to the debate on whether language creates knowledge or knowledge creates language and, hence, how much this connects to language/knowledge creating/shaping reality. Or, at least, perception. Hopefully I am making sense here.

Now, that conflicts with the idea that focusing on myself and ignoring the establishment allows me to distance and separate myself from the establishment. The reason for this is because I cannot separate myself from the establishment--there is no sane part of me that is not influenced by what is around me, or, there might be a sane part of me, but it is impossible to separate out from the rest and any tools I use to do so are also infected by society (the establishment). Thus I find myself in a position of having to acknowledge my own relative powerlessness--that seems odd because here I am, harping away via text about all I believe and wish would change, but it is precisely in that harping that I find what little power I have.

I have to comment on the establishment, not necessarily to replace it with anything I create, but because every time I recognize another piece that in some way affects me (such as cultural ideals of beauty) I am able to name it, and in so doing overrule society's affect with my own language. This all serves the purpose of shaping my reality and allowing me the chance to stand outside society to whatever degree I am able on individual topics and do what I think is ultimately being urged with the idea of "focusing on me."

I've never attempted to actually articulate my own ideology or belief system via writing in a context such as this blog, so I apologize to everyone if this is confusing nonsensical or if I have totally misunderstood the comments providing the context for this discussion.

This is an uncomfortable ideology. I state that with absolute belief in what I'm saying here. I would never return any of the ideas or theories I have garnered in the past few years, but once one enters into a Foucaultdian post-modernist structure you cease to possess all the power needed within yourself to shape yourself (or the world around you). The reason for this is that all the world's structures don't exist on a linear continuum. I can't simply seek knowledge until I achieve some ultimate truth. Instead I must work within the grid of varying discourses/structures which are constantly affecting me as I affect them. Finding one answer does not mean finding all answers, therefore, and what was the answer at one point might change in the future as new knowledge is acquired. (For anyone who knows all of this already please don't think I am attempting to educate. I am simply providing explanation for those who don't.)

I cannot focus on myself then, because all that is me has been shaped by society. Unless I recognize the ways society has shaped me, is shaping me, or trying to shape me, I am unable to recognize where my self-awareness and own personal knowledge has come from. Hence my need to discuss the establishment and dive into the craziness that is society/culture.

No doubt there is a better way to go about all of this. I have never in my life done things the easy way. But as of yet I know not a way that allows me to name structures in society, recognize their affect on me and my personal beliefs, and struggle with that accordingly without using language--hence the majority of posts in this blog. My aims are often political, but outside the American realm of democratic vs. republican, liberal vs. conservative. My aims are actually to share whatever language I create in the hopes that it might spark more language (as it did in this case) which in turn might lead to what Nietzsche calls "unheard of combinations and metaphors." Gotta love Nietzsche.

So that's why I do what I do, and that is the ideology that drives me. The question I am still asking myself, though, is am I thinking things through or just enjoying my ability to think?

Ain't that one always the kicker.

And this all seems appropriate for the 200th post. Woo!