Author: Sofia Torrens

In the article “Beyond Red and Blue” by Thad Williamson, the fact that Democracy is failing is focused on, and addresses the things that people need to do in order to save it. I found that the point that our nation really needs to work on is the moral humility/ courage point. Williamson states that he means “awareness of the possibility that however deep one’s convictions, one might be wrong, that others views may have morally decent reasons for holding the views they hold” when talking about moral humility (p 7). I think that this is so important to our nation today due to the intense polarization between political parties, that impact how much our government can get done. People are so caught up in the mentality that the only right way is there way, and nobody will hear out the other side. This is key to Democracy, the art of compromising.

I find it very interesting how Williamson not only outlines what people should do to save and make Democracy better, but also discusses the problems that have led to the majority of the people’s frustration and dissatisfaction with the government today. Our political system is hyper competitive, and it makes it so the people in charge are not meeting the demands or needs of the people, instead they are trying to make sure their side stays on top. I think that this is a huge problem, and a major reason why people don’t really care about politics anymore because it’s about seeing who can get the farthest, not about who can do the most for the people, and I think that that is sad.

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After reading the chapter “Ingroups and Outgroups” by Howard and Jane Giles I thought that it was really interesting how there is so much that goes into defining a group and what goes into effectively communicating with other groups. One of the most interesting things I found about characterizing yourself into a group was the fact that there are ways to make it known that you are not part of a group. I had never really conceptualized the fact that some people in Europe don’t like to be called Europeans. I also thought that the majority of the things that the chapter talked about as being ‘valuable’ to know when communicating with other people in different groups to be common sense. I think that it is customary not to say slurs to people, or to question their eating habits. However, I know that throughout the rest of the world that might not be the case.

I think that this article has great intent because they are trying to teach us about how to better and more effectively communicate with people who are not in our ingroups. I think that the accommodation theory is more used today as more people are trying to erase the old ways of only talking to people who are in our ingroups. I find the whole concept of ingroups and outgroups to be fascinating, because it really is just human nature at the end of the day. I think that through consciously making sure to be inclusive and understanding to other people’s ingroups that you are not a part of can make intergroup interactions go a lot better.

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I attended the talk sponsored by Jepson “The Internet as a Weapon” by Yasha Levine. The overall premise of this talk was very interesting, and I was excited for it. Levine started with a video from the 1990’s that was used to show kids that their families needed to get access to the internet due to the endless possibilities. I thought that this was a great reminder as to how magical and amazing everyone thought the internet was about thirty years ago, and now we take it for granted so much. He then talked about how recently the government has been convinced that the internet has been hijacked and become weaponized. Some are even saying that what occurred with the 2016 elections should be considered an act of war.

One of the most important things that Levine said was the fact that our understanding and belief of the internet is based off of the false premise that the internet is some amazing wondrous thing that is only supposed to help us. He reminded the audience that the internet was created as a weapon for the government. Then he went into how the internet was made by a Pentagon program as a way to gain information about people to see who was more likely to be a resistant force. I thought that he was not the best at grasping the audience’s attention as he went through the history of the internet, and I felt that some of his points were lost because people were zoning out. But overall, I thought that this talk put a lot into perspective for me. Everyone recently has been up in arms about what the internet has become, but it has always been like this and we are just becoming more aware of it as the computers get smarter.

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In the talk that I went to on Tuesday November 12^th, 2019 the speaker Michelle Norris discussed her work with the Race Card Project. I really enjoyed this talk because Norris was taking a completely different approach to having those hard conversations about race in the US. She was explaining why she wanted to even do this project in the first place, and the was saying that she wanted to lubricate the conversation about race. The way that the Race Card Project worked was 200 post cards were sent out asking people do express race in only six words. Norris got a lot of things that she did not necessarily expect back. There were a lot of “no word for what I am” or “father was racist. I’m Not. Progress!”. All of these results were super interesting because people ended up writing a lot of things that they would probably never say in real life.

I really enjoyed this talk because it brought to light a lot more of the problems with how race is dealt with in this country, especially because most of what was being written on the race cards were things that people would not be comfortable to say out loud. One example that really stuck out to me was the example of a principal hiring a person named Jamal. This was because the principal wanted to promote more diversity in the school, and he assumed that Jamal was black due to his name. Then when he showed up, and he was not black the secretary said something along the lines of “oh I thought you would be taller”. To me this shows how we need a change in this country, which is why I respect what Michelle Norris is doing because she is trying to keep the conversation about race going, and change it for the better.

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The “Fighting for the Vote” video showcased the long and grueling seventy-two-year long fight for women’s suffrage.  It all began with the Seneca Falls Convention lead by Elizabeth Cady Stanton which is where they discussed the Declaration of Sentiments that listed all of the grievance’s women had to endure and how to resolve them. They came to the notion about the right to vote and many people thought that it was too radicle, but they proceeded with it. They also talked about how before the Civil War the fight for rights was fought hand in hand with women and African Americans. After the Civil War, the suffrage movement took a very long time to come back into action. I found it very interesting how it took so long for the women to get the right to vote due to all of the obstacles the government was facing with the 13^th– 15^th amendments. I thought that it was very smart and unique of the women to tag along to public events with their own parades because it really got the word out and eventually got them the 19^th amendment, granting women the right to vote. The only disappointing thing about this victory is that the women who made it possible thought that there was going to be a huge change for women in America, but there was not and the battle for equality is still ongoing.

The ongoing battle for equality can be seen in the article “Would Women Lead Differently?” by Victoria Schein. This article discusses the fact that women are less likely to be in leadership positions compared to men, even though it has been proven that performance wise women and men are identical. The biggest problem that holds women back in leadership positions is the fact that they are expected to be the homemakers and raise the children. This is why women are seen to lead differently, due to the fact that they will create more of an interface between working and raising a family. I think that it is very hard to hold women to the standard of the past when more and more families have two working parents. I found that the conclusion of this article was very interesting because women do lead differently than men, but their differences arguably make them better. Women are said to be more gender blind in promotional decisions, and they are more devoted to enhancing the work and family interface. Although that is true, the fact that sex is still being considered as a factor when considering who will be a good leader and who will not is absurd to me.

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In the article “In Praise of Followers” Robert Kelley discusses and outlines the different types of followers, alienated, effective, sheep, survivors, etc. He outlines what each follower types motivations are and discuss how impactful or not impactful they are when following. Kelley also discusses the traits and qualities of a leader and outlines how a leader can cultivate effective followers. Kelley’s main argument throughout the article is the fact that people greatly overlook the follower role and lose out on maximizing productivity when not promoting effective followership. This comes back to the idea that in any situation the followers are just as, if not more, important than the leaders.

 

I find that Kelley makes a great point about people being effective followers only because they think that if they succeed and gain the trust of their peers then they will move up the corporate ladder. I find that especially in corporate settings people are always looking to get promoted and to not be a follower anymore. This seems like a positive feedback loop, because if you are moving up the corporate ladder, you will still be a subordinate to someone; it is very rare to become the CEO and have no boss.

 

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I found the Bad Ideas podcast to be very informative about Jim Jones and the life he led, especially with the Peoples Temple and Jonestown. I did not know that Jim Jones was so influential in Indiana in terms of his social work with desegregation and really making an effort to end the stigma that was then placed around African Americans. I found it very interesting how Jones was able to enact such great change, and then turn his power into something that was detrimental to people. At a time, the press loved what he was doing, and he could have continued down that path, still having power, but been a great social activist. I found that the description of how Jones came to be known as the cult leader was very similar to a charismatic leader.

Jones played into people’s fears and made them all feel loved and accepted which is how he got such a large following. I think that Jones also was extremely manipulative in the way that every move he made to get people to believe he was a miracle worker was calculated. I was also reminded of the leader follower relationship dynamic when listening to this podcast, it sounds like in the beginning the Peoples Temple was a place of temporary inequality where the leader would enlighten the subordinates to become like them, but in this case, Jones got power hungry. Another thing that I found really intriguing was the fact that they said that Jones was obsessed with Hitler and that is where he partially got the suicide pact idea from. I think that this is very contradictory of his socialist and utopian beliefs. This does make sense when comparing Jones’ leadership style and what his wishes for Jonestown were.

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I have always found the theory of groupthink to be very interesting, because you would like to think that in a group people would work better, however that is not the case. In a group people tend to hold back on saying what they actually think, because they don’t want to be the only member of the group with a dissenting opinion, and they tend to stop critically analyzing themselves because they blatantly believe everything being said in the group is true. What is interesting to me is the fact that when the group is presented with information that contradicts with the original set of policies that the group has agreed upon, they ignore them. Additionally, I did not realize that group think causes the members of the group to not think of the consequences of their actions, as well as what the reaction of their enemy would be.

 

I thought that the movie Thirteen Days gave a great insight into groupthink actually occurring in action. I think that the movie showed what a great deal of pressure Kennedy and his team were under to make a decision. I think it was really obvious that at times people wanted to voice their opinions that were disagreeing with the group, but they decided against it. I also found it interesting how they took everything that the CIA told them as the absolute truth, because in the end they ended up having false intelligence. I think that this is where the solutions that Janis outlined in his piece about pulling in outside information and experts who are not under the same amount of pressure that the team was under. The solutions outlined all make perfect sense to me, but I think that in a time a crisis, such as the Bay of Pigs incident, that there would not be enough time for all of the solutions to be put into place. So when do you pick and choose what solutions a group implements in a time crunch?

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I found Couto’s piece about transformational leadership to be very intriguing. What I liked most about it was the comparison of the original definition from Burns and the way that transformational leadership has evolved throughout the years by looking at Bass and his work. The main differences of the two perspectives on transformational leadership is that they are being dealt with in different contexts. Burns is dealing with leadership in terms of politics and social movements, where Bass is using executive leaders who become transforming leaders. Bass believes that the “direction of influence is one-way, unlike Burn’s treatment in which followers could transform leaders by the interaction of leaders and followers” (104). This made me think about how subjective transformational leadership is, it depends greatly on the context that you are looking at and what you would consider to be a social change.

I also enjoyed the transactional leadership article and found it very interesting that the best examples of transactional leadership are in settings where there is a specific outcome wanted. I thought that the was very well organized in that there were so many examples of transactional leaders in so many different fields, this really made me understand what exactly a transactional leader does. This article also cleared up the benefits of transactional leadership for me because in class I was thinking that it was very negative. I see that due to its adaptability to so many organizations, its simplicity, and its effectiveness, is why it is such a sought after trait of leaders in the business world.

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I found this talk by Derek Thompson very interesting. Thompson brought a very unique perspective to the digital age and the unique relationship technology and the economy have. His main point throughout the talk was that the way that digital apps, that actually make money, work is through advertising and how detrimental that is to the society. The first point that he made was the apps that we use that we pay them to provide us a service such as, Spotify, Uber, Lyft, Doordash, etc. are all losing billions of dollars a year; where the apps who charge you nothing to use them, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, etc. are raking in the money. This is all due to the fact that for the social media platforms that do not charge us any money they are selling our attention to advertisers.

Thompson said that the reason the advertising in these apps are detrimental is because it is in the economy of attention grabbing, saying that people will do whatever to grab your attention so they can then sell it to people who want your information. I thought that the example he used of the newspaper The Sun in the early 1800’s published a story about a scientist seeing ape looking people on the moon. This was a very fitting example because it was the first known example of fake news in the media. I thought that it was very interesting how Thompson explained that the economics of why that worked back then is the exact same reason as to why it works today.

I found his last point to be the most touching to me in the end, he was discussing how due to the fact that today’s youth has so much access to so much around the world- so people have so much to look at and figure out who they want to be. Thompson was saying that there is much more anxiety to be perfect because that is what other people are perceived as online, but in reality, people are more anxious because today it is much more possible to become your true self than in any other time.

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The idea of servant leadership is very interesting, as both readings discuss, it is more about first being a servant and wanting to serve and then coming into a leadership position. In Greenleaf’s article he discusses how a natural servant “is more likely to preserve and refine a particular hypothesis on what serves another’s highest priority needs than is the person who is the leader first and who later serves out promptings of conscience of in conformity with normative expectations” (84). I find it to be a unique take on what is most effective in leadership because this theory is more about how someone already wants to serve the people and the greater good before they have a leadership position, and how that is the better form of a leader. This reminded me of Donald Trump and how he does not fit the servant leader at all because he was not a servant first, he was a leader first; not to mention that he does not possess many of the characteristics of a servant leader.

I found that the 10 characteristics of a servant leader in Spears’ article were very similar to the traits of a charismatic leader as well as a humble leader. Through what we have been learning in class, I am finding that listening and empathy are two of the most important traits in effective leaders. What was also intriguing to me was the fact that in Spears’ article, he talks about the servant leader as becoming more common in companies and institutions, and this leaves me wondering if a servant leader is better suited for those types of leadership roles rather than political ones.

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I find it very interesting how Machiavelli is only focused on how to maintain power once one has it. The majority of the things that he talks about, acquiring new dominions, the civic principality, weather it is better to be feared or to be loved, etc. all have solutions that involve maintain a balance between good and evil so the public likes you but also fears you enough to listen to you. I found that this relates to the articles that we read for Tuesday about the leader and followers’ relationship and how truly important it really is. Although Machiavelli is focusing mostly on the prince in question, he is really talking about how to maintain power through leader and follower relationships.

 

I also found a lot of Machiavelli’s wording to be very interesting because when he was talking about weather being feared or loved is better, he said that the prince should “desire to be considered merciful and not cruel. He must, however, take care not to miss use this mercifulness” (119). This is Machiavelli’s way of saying that the leaders should have some compassion but not enough for the public to think that they are weak. I think that the way that he worded this, especially with the “to be considered” a very sly way of saying that the followers should be more or less tricked into thinking that the leader is merciful.

 

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I thought that this podcast was super interesting because they talked about theories, we have talked about in class but brought new perspectives that I had never really thought of before. What stuck out most to me was the idea that the great man theory really shows what people back then decided was important to focus on and record, and when we are going back and looking at women in history, we pick out those who have very similar traits as to those men who have been revered in history. This then gives us a false impression that there are only a few numbers of women doing things in history and the women in the podcast were talking about how important it is for us to broaden our criteria. I think that the newer approach to history that they were talking about, history from below or a people’s history, is a way that could improve the way we look at women in history.

One thing that shocked me that I had not realized, was the fact that the great man theory and the sexism that comes along with it has impacted facts that the collective people consider hard science. They were talking about how Charles Darwin’s theories about sexual and natural selection have a lot of gender biases in them- being that Darwin referenced women as “skirts”. Even though people have discredited the great man theory and think that they do not let it influence them in any way, things like Charles Darwin’s theories are still playing right into the great man theory and how the public thinks of women. This makes me think that it will be very hard for the world to escape the impact of the great man theory. At the end of the podcast the interview with Marilyn Ogilvie gives me hope because she discusses how she basically created a history of women in science that was not available at that time; and hopefully more people like her will tell the unheard stories of important women.

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It was very interesting and disturbing to have the comparisons of Donald Trump and the play Richard III by Shakespeare be so real. Throughout reading “Crooked Politics: Shakespeare’s Richard III and Leadership in 21st Century America” by Dr. Bezio I kept thinking back to the day in class when we talked about toxic charismatics. During class Trump did come to mind when thinking of examples of a toxic charismatic, but having all of Trump’s actions spelled out in front of me made me realize how he is not only is a toxic charismatic but that he also has characteristics of a tyrant. It amazes me how Trump can truly manipulate his audience to get people to like him and agree with what he is saying. I found it especially disturbing the comparison to Richard III’s cronies supporting him and praising him to Trumps staff and family, and how some of the public take the support as a cue to support him as well.

It is scary how many comparisons there are between Shakespeare’s play and what is currently occurring in US politics. Yet, I did find that there was a glimmer of hope when discussing how the way to bring Richard III down was through words, and there are opportunities to bring Trump down; weather it be in the 2020 election or through impeachment, people today have a lot more voice in politics, especially with social media. I also have hope for the women of this nation because so many women are getting more involved and have a real opportunity to enact change.

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After reading the two readings about MLK and his charisma, the idea that charismatic leaders do not fit one specific mold was really solidified for me. Although there are clear indicators from the six characteristics associated with charisma from the Riggio reading, MLK does not perfectly fit into the mold described. Obviously, King’s strong suit was his public speaking and ability to emotionally inspire a crowd, but he was not particularly self-confident. I think that King is mostly considered to be charismatic due to his relationship with his followers. He met them with the respect that they deserved and treated them as equals. His main goal was to inspire people rather than manipulate them into blindly believing what he was saying.  MLK prided himself on being able to teach people so they could ‘resocialize’ as a result of his preaching’s, therefore making them able to participate in the movement on their own. He was also concerned about how his actions would impact his followers and future leaders, which is why I think that so many people look to MLK’s leadership style.

I also found that Carson’s article was very interesting in the way that he described how MLK was not fond of the idea that he was considered charismatic. This made me think back to what we discussed in class, talking about all of the negative connotations that come with some of the characteristics of charismatic people. King did not want people to idolize him and think that he was the miracle that everyone was waiting for, and he especially did not want to manipulate people. I really liked the point made about how MLK was more of a role model and people had protests and sit ins on their own, not relating at all to MLK. I found this to be very interesting because King’s leadership in the Civil Rights Movement seems to be very circumstantial at this point, because Carson discussed how the social movement would have occurred without MLK, which is something that someone would never hear in the commonly told history of MLK.

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Hero: RBG

Leader: Michelle Obama

Role Model: Megan Rapinoe

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