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Quote by Ellen Willis

“The will to power is the will to ecstasy is the will to surrender is the will to submit and, in extremis, to die. Or to put it another way, the rage to attain a freedom and happiness one's psyche cannot accept creates enormous anxiety and ends in self-punishing despair.”

Author

Ellen Willis

Ellen Willis was an accomplished American cultural critic and essayist, renowned for her insightful perspectives on popular music, film, and gender issues. Her writing career spanned over four decades, influencing countless readers. more

“To say that historical conditions made personal life possible, and with it the self-consciousness that allowed psychoanalysis to emerge, is to tell half the story: one also has to consider that the erotic impulse, ever pressing for satisfaction, had something to do with making the history that encouraged its expression.”

Made Self Stories Half Consciousness Conditions Expression Historical Satisfaction Impulse Personal Life Erotic Psychoanalysis Self Consciousness Half The Story

Author:Ellen Willis

“Individuals bearing witness do not change history; only movements that understand their social world can do that. Movements encourage solidarity; the moral individual is likely, all unwittingly, to do the opposite, for bearing witness is lonely: it breeds feelings of superiority and moralistic anger against those who are not doing the same.”

World Feelings Individual Social Can Do Moral Movement Lonely Opposites Witness Solidarity Superiority Bearing Witness

Author:Ellen Willis

“Individuals bearing witness cannot do the work of social movements, but they can break a corrosive and demoralizing silence.”

Individual Social Silence Break Movement Witness Social Movements Demoralizing Bearing Witness

Author:Ellen Willis

“Some conservatives have expressed outrage that the views of professors are at odds with the views of students, as if ideas were entitled to be represented in proportion to their popularity and students were entitled to professors who share their political or social values. One of the more important functions of college that it exposes young people to ideas and arguments they have not encountered at home is redefined as a problem.”