No us and them

Posted by Helen Douglas
On March 30, 2023

There is no us and them, only us. The white supremacy thing, the patriarchy thing, the class thing: binary structures of inequality and violence. The antidote? Affirming equality already here and getting ourselves together, mixing it up, messing with it. Laugh at it, blow kisses. These structures depend on division, difference. They need walls. They’re […]

Otherwise philosophy, Philosophy otherwise

Posted by Helen Douglas
On November 25, 2021

Levinasian philosophical practices Friday 26 November 2021, 1:00pm–6pm EST. Live-streaming on MS Teams 1:00pm: Welcome and Introduction 1:15pm (8:15 pm in South Africa): Helen Douglas, Philosophical Counsellor, Cape Town, South Africa, “Otherwise Philosophy or Philosophy Otherwise: Levinasian Philosophical Practices”. I’ll be talking about my counselling work as an interpersonal Levinasian practice of ethics and emancipation […]

Making sense

Posted by Helen Douglas
On November 17, 2020

Like consciousness is always consciousness of something (if you believe Husserl), making sense is always to someone, to some particular first-person singular. It’s interior, private, personal. That makes sense to me. But I have to ask you, Does this make sense to you?

Posted by Helen Douglas
On October 2, 2018

Last week, I had the pleasure of addressing a conference of family mediators in Cape Town on the topic of “Wisdom in mediation”. Two stories First story. An ethics professor once said to an undergraduate philosophy class, “If you believe that a professor of ethics is an ethical person, you are making a category mistake.” […]

underdog schmunderdog

Posted by Helen Douglas
On August 25, 2018

Beating the opponent at his own game. The pluck and courage of the underdog to outwit and overcome. Why does this strike everyone (I’m talking to you, Western culture) as a good trope? Underdog becomes top dog, it’s still a dog.

Posted by Helen Douglas
On September 6, 2017

What did it mean: to join the Party? Brecht says it best. I was not an exploiter, so I could grasp it. To dedicate oneself to a more human society. For justice and peace, bread and roses. Against exploitation and oppression. Against all odds. To understand the indivisibility of freedom. To adopt José Martí’s willingness to […]

QA 58. “But it doesn’t work like that!”

Posted by Helen Douglas
On May 12, 2017

Annals of philosophical counselling/practice with others “But it doesn’t work like that!” I say this in response to some proposed scheme or strategy of yours. I mean that, in terms of what you want to achieve, what you are doing seems either futile or malicious because you have a mistaken view about what’s going on. […]

Posted by Helen Douglas
On March 6, 2017

Between 1987 and 1990, my husband Rob and I ran a safe house for the liberation movement in apartheid South Africa. We were part of what we would later learn was named Operation Vula, short for Vul’indlela (“Open the road” in Zulu). Its aim was to infiltrate exiled leaders of the African National Congress/Umkhonto we […]

Posted by Helen Douglas
On January 17, 2017

South African Journal of Philosophy, 35 (2), 2016, pp 123–131. You can find it here or there. The self-confidence of the human being, freedom, has first of all to be aroused again in the hearts of these people. Karl Marx ABSTRACT: If a time of crisis calls for a new mode of thinking, philosophical practice […]

Posted by Helen Douglas
On July 18, 2016

For Nelson Mandela’s birthday, and because I’m reading Thula Simpson’s Umkhonto We Sizwe: The ANC’s Armed Struggle, thinking about and respecting the lives of everyone who stood against apartheid, those whose names are known or unknown, remembered or forgotten. Thinking that the aim of the struggle was peace, and how we’re not there yet. Thinking […]

No us and them

Otherwise philosophy, Philosophy otherwise

Making sense

QA 60. None the wiser (On the obligation and cultivation of wisdom)

underdog schmunderdog

QA 59. To be a comrade

QA 58. “But it doesn’t work like that!”

QA 57. “Need I remind anyone, again?”

New article: TO CHANGE OUR THINKING: PHILOSOPHICAL PRACTICE FOR DIFFICULT TIMES

QA 56. Four touchstones for thinking about peace