Plato\'s Cave and the Ghetto

Plato's Cave And The Ghetto

For over two millennia, Plato's allegory of the Cave has been a classic allegory for ignorance, enlightenment, and education for Western Civilization. It seems to penetrate to the heart of a primordial human dilemma. Viniece's comment that "The ghetto is the cave. Education is the light…" expresses a current human dilemma, urban poverty and destitution. Thesis: The cave and the ghetto both represent ignorance and fear of the unknown, which are remedied by exploration and inquiry.

Plato's Allegory

In Plato's Republic, Socrates asks Glaucon to imagine a cave inhabited by prisoners who have been restrained since childhood. Behind the prisoners is a fire and in front of the prisoners is a wall, the only thing they ever see because their head is restrained in place. (516a) Between the prisoners and fire is a walkway through which people walk carrying things on their heads. The prisoners believe that the shadows that these figures project on to the wall to be the actual figures.

The Ghetto as the Cave

Just as the Cave deceives its inhabitants as to the true nature of things, the Ghetto also deceives its inhabitants as to the true nature of life. Inhabitants of the ghetto are faced with a never-ending "surround of force," particularly the forces of "…hunger, isolation, illness, landlords, police, abuse, neighbors, drugs, criminals, and racism, among many others" (2). The impression that inhabitants get from this environment is that life is cruel and violent. They also get the impression that other people, especially strangers, are to be feared rather than understood, befriended and utilized

What is worse than the "surround of force" itself is the inhabitants' response to those forces. Their state of mind is that of defense, struggle, and survival amidst these hostile forces. They can never be caught looking passive or vulnerable or soft. They are perpetually beset by these ubiquitous, suffocating forces that require their full attention and caution. In short, they never have time to think and they spend their live their lives for others.

The Exit from the Cave

In the second section of the allegory, Socrates adds that, one day, a prisoner is freed from restraint and permitted to look behind him at the walkway and the figures casting the shadows. (516b) He posits that such a prisoner would not initially recognize the figures from their shadows because he has never seen the actual figures before. (516b) However, the freed prisoner, once out of the cave, would gradually see more actual things around him, eventually seeing the sun, the light of which is the source of all real things, just as the light of the fire was the source of the shadows of real things. (516b)

The Exit from the Ghetto

Just as the prisoner is freed from the illusion imposed by the cave through his journey to the surface and his glimpse of the sun, Viniece Walker was freed from the fear imposed by the ghetto through education and the contemplation of what she had learned. This is why Viniece says that "Education is the light." (7). An education in the Humanities, "…the study of human constructs and concerns," is useful for people in the Ghetto because their problems, "the surround of force," are caused primarily by humans. (3). The humanities help them understand this "surround of force" are a foundation for…learning to reflect on the world instead of just reacting to whatever force is turned against you." (5).

Just as their problems are caused by humans, their problems can also be solved by humans. This fact is exemplified by the existence of politics, where people learn to befriend and utilize people who would otherwise do them harm. Skill at politics, as Shorris noted, is what distinguished the rich from the poor: "Rich people know…how to negotiate instead of using force. They know how to use politics to get along, to get power. (5).

The Return to the Cave

In the third section of the allegory, Socrates speculates on what would happen if this former prisoner were to return to the cave. Having seen the light, he will have been happy for his edification and piteous of those stuck in the cave, believing their lives dark and ignorant. If he were to return to the cave, he would not be as content as he was when he was previously imprisoned there. The prisoners would not understand his discontent, as the cave is all they have ever known. He would plead with the prisoners look at their life from a different perspective, to see the light instead of the shadows. However, the prisoners would not desire to adopt a different perspective and would even despise him for his strange beliefs. (517a)

Converting the Ghetto

Just as the prosletyzing former prisoner is met with obstinate resistance and disbelief by the inhabitants of the cave, an educated person extolling the virtues of education to inhabitants of the Ghetto will also be met with resistance and disbelief. However, Niece's statement about the light can get people in the ghetto to recognize that their experience of the world has been a lie and that the truth of life is much sweeter. It indicates that the forces that assail, poverty, marginalization, and violence, are not facts of life. Rather, these forces are transient. The environment of the ghetto is not only unnatural, but deceptive, just as the Cave was.