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The Iconocast Episode 1

Submitted by the Iconocast Collective on March 4, 2010 – 3:08 pmView Comments
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This is the Iconocast Episode 1: An Interview with Nekeisha Alexis-Baker (aka, Who Would Jesus Subvert).

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In this episode, co-hosts Joanna Shenk and Mark Van Steenwyk interview Nekeisha Alexis-Baker (founder of JesusRadicals.com, activist, organizer, and thinker).

From JesusRadicals.com:

When Christians engage with the political arrangements of the world, be it communism, socialism, capitalist republics, they have often claimed that their political option is the Christian one, and demonized other arrangements. This is the nature of politics, to divide and conquer. Beyond this, when Christians engage in politics they often sell out the Gospels, particularly on the issue of violence. They claim that Jesus did not mean for politicians to love their enemies, only the average person, and even the average person does not have to do so under some circumstances. We believe this approach to politics gives too much to the nation-state and is not distinctively Christian. Following Jesus is not a vocation or something one does in one’s spare time. It is a total life commitment. If we are to engage in politics, we must do so as Christians, but without baptizing the political order or trying to make it Christian.
This is where anarchism may come in for Christians. Without claiming that anarchism is Christian or that one has to be an anarchist to be Christian, we claim that if Christians are to engage with the world, the best available option is anarchism because it opens up space for Christians to engage without selling out their primary allegiances and core commitments, especially to peacemaking and nonviolence. Yet violence is not the only issue at stake in politics. All governments operate on a model of ruling over people. But the Gospels claim that Christians should model Jesus’ suffering servanthood. These are fundamentally incompatible outlooks. Anarchism, at its best, is a commitment to systematically critiquing all structures that place one person or group in a position to dominate others or creation. So anarchism, as a political philosophy holds some promise for Christians because the two share a commitment to critiquing the power structures and working towards a more level playing field.
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About the Iconocast Collective

The Iconocast is twice-monthly podcast exploring the anti-imperial implications of Jesus' teachings within our modern imperial context. It the work of a number of collaborators, separated by hundreds (even thousands of miles) each engaged in thoughtful praxis. Go here to listen to the Iconocast on iTunes. You can also subscribe to the rss feed here.

  • Karah
    I love this. :)
  • Tim
    Thanks for this interview - I only wish you would have asked her if she can discern any reason why disenchanted white Evangelicals are flocking to "anarchistic" lifestyles.
  • It was actually something we wanted to ask her about, but we ran short of time. But that theme will, I believe, come out in upcoming interviews.

    Nevertheless, I'm not sure I'd use the word "flock." It is easy, these days, to get an inflated view of fringe movements. There may be a lot of activity on the web, but the movement towards anarchistic lifestyles (though I'm not sure I know what you have in mind when you say "lifestyle") is comparatively small.
  • I think, perhaps, the draw for white Evangelicals to anarchism is conversely proportional to the rise of Globalization and American imperialism. Evangelicalism in the US has been an ally to certain ideologies that nurture imperialistic or nationalistic sentiments. In the past 10 years we've seen a strong reaction against some of these things.

    Some reacted against the seeming republican nature of US evangelicalism by becoming democrats (if not in name, at least in action). Others shifted towards anarchism (depending upon whether or not you think the problem is republicans in particular or something larger). The antithesis to Empire, it seems to me, is anarchism (or something similar to anarchism). Just like the counter to consumerism is simplicity and localism, etc.
  • Great discussion. I think it is important that JM has expanded into this media form as well.
    I am not sure that Nekeisha was advocating the position that cities are inherently oppressive, but if she was, I must disagree.
    I rather like to think of them as liberating. She points out that cities draw on resources from outside and concentrate a lot of them. But people are not willing to give up resources without something in return. It is actually cities which have made agriculture more sustainable. With a larger market for their products, farmers are not forced to live at a level of sustainability. Instead they are able to produce surplus which is exchanged with city-zens for the intellectual and organizational goods and services which cities specialize in. Neither side is oppressed. Each side is made better off.
    In places where farmers do not have access to larger markets like cities, their surplus production finds no outlet, and hence they do not bother to produce as much. Then one bad crop can ruin them.
    Access to cities provides the farmer with the opportunity to sell today's bumper crop and to be able to buy from abroad when there is a bad year.
  • Chris Grataski
    Jurisnaturalist, I think you've dismissed Nekeisha's perspective too easily. There's a lot behind her critique, and I think its worth your time researching.

    The reasons why the city is an aberration can be found in precisely the sorts of reasons you site for how and why they are "liberating."

    When you write, "With a larger market for their products, farmers are not forced to live at a level of sustainability," do you mean to say "...forced to live at a level of subsistence"?
    I'm assuming you do.

    It is likely that Nekeisha's point is that living at the "level of subsistence" is actually more congruent with God's desire. The logic of "surplus" in Scripture is often associated with the logics of Empire and is quite the opposite of an embodied "manna" spirituality which lives from the provisions of God and the abundance of God's creation.

    And when you say, "Neither side is oppressed," I must say I can only cringe. Look down the corridors of history and let us know what you find.

    And when "one bad crop" ruins a farmer or farming community, we can hardly say it is bound up with their isolation from cities. Sounds more like bad farming to me, where there's little biodiversity, cultivation practices which make the plants more vulnerable, and the absence of knowledge (probably forgotten across generations) of wild plants which aren't susceptible to most "crop failure"-type situations. I'm not saying food crises don't happen, but they most definitely don't happen as a result of isolation from cities! More often, they are bound up with hubris, overdependence on a few "preferred" crops, overgrazing and overtaxing the land, and the need to produce food for people who desire more than the land can generate, faster than it wants to give it... people who've lost a connection with the land, usually due to the city-ization or "civilization" of the world.

    Also, when you say, "But people are not willing to give up resources without something in return," it sounds like you think that since this is "normal" it is good. Yuck.
  • It's sounds like you've got zero-sum equations set as the ideal; personally, I see non-zero sum equations, where both parties are better off, as a huge step beyond mere subsistence.

    Nevertheless, the critique is sound; not because JurisNaturalist's theory isn't sound, but because it's incomplete and doesn't address the fact that there are both elements in play in the real world.

    | | |
    Zero-sum Non-zero-sum Non/Zero-Sum
    subsistence we both gain we both gain (but I gain more)
    | | (and something is lost)

    I would argue that reality better maps to the third.

    Also, the definitions of capitalism that are being argued are pretty different; non-coercive exchange between equals for example, versus a system of oppression of exploitation (of _______).

    So.....yes.
  • My nifty little ASCII-graph didn't turn out so well, and it won't let me edit it. Sorry.
  • johnsob5
    What are the intellectual and organizational goods and services from cities that the farmers want?

    What is "a level of sustainability" that farmers are living at before access to a city market?
  • Chris
    BTW, at the top of the page the word "Iconcast" is missing the second "o."
  • Chris
    Great stuff! I think you've done a very nice job on your maiden voyage - it sounds professional. And of course the subject matter is very compelling.
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