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Quote by Carmen Maria Machado

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Her Body and Other Parties: Stories

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Carmen Maria Machado

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“Sometimes at midnight, in the great silence of the sleep-bound town, the doctor turned on his radio before going to bed for the few hours’ sleep he allowed himself. And from the ends of the earth, across the thousands of miles of land and sea, kindly, well-meaning speakers tried to voice their fellow-feeling, and indeed did so, but at the same time proved the utter incapacity of every man truly to share in suffering that he cannot see.”

EmpathyExistentialismAlbert CamusThe Plague
Book:The Plague
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“Like metaphor, paradox as a habit of mind preserves us from simplistic linearity and literalism and keeps us attentive to the complex ways in which, so often, the opposite is also true. This habit of mind is deeply biblical; indeed, to listen for the uses of paradox in Jesus’ recorded teachings is to recognize how it always points us to a higher plane of understanding. To grasp paradox is a prerequisite not only for fathoming spiritual truths (and every spiritual tradition resorts to paradox to get at what is true as if there is no more direct route to truth), but also for thinking complexly and compassionately about this-worldly issues that affect us daily: how the rich may be poor; how power is a form of vulnerability; how saying no may be a way of saying yes.”

WritingPoetryLanguageEmpathyParadoxMarilyn Chandler Mcentyre
Book:Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies
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“My short-term goals are to defend and even strengthen elements of state authority which, though illegitimate in fundamental ways, are critically necessary right now to impede the dedicated efforts to "roll back" the progress that has been achieved in extending democracy and human rights. State authority is now under severe attack in the more democratic societies, but not because it conflicts with the libertarian vision. Rather the opposite: because it offers (weak) protection to some aspects of that vision. Governments have a fatal flaw: unlike the private tyrannies, the institutions of state power and authority offer to the despised public an opportunity to play some role, however limited, in managing their own affairs. That defect is intolerable to the masters, who now feel, with some justification, that changes in the international economic and political order offer the prospects of creating a kind of "utopia for the masters," with dismal prospects for most of the rest. It should be unnecessary to spell out here what I mean. The effects are all too obvious even in the rich societies, from the corridors of power to the streets, countryside, and prisons. For reasons that merit attention but that lie beyond the scope of these remarks, the rollback campaign is currently spearheaded by dominant sectors of societies in which the values under attack have been realized in some of their most advanced forms, the English-speaking world; no small irony, but no contradiction either.”

EmpathyHealth CareWelfareSolidarityWelfare StateMutual Aid
Book:Chomsky On Anarchism
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“He can’t tell if Hal is sad. He is having a harder and harder time reading Hal’s mind or whether he’s in good spirits. This worries him. He used to be able to sort of pre-verbally know in his stomach generally where Hal was and what he was doing, even if Hal was far away and playing or if Mario was away, and now he can’t anymore. Feel it. This worries him and feels like when you’ve lost something important in a dream and you can’t even remember what it was but it’s important. Mario loves Hal so much it makes his heart beat hard. He doesn’t have to wonder if the difference now is him or his brother because Mario never changes.”

EmpathyInfinite JestMario Incandenza
Author:David Foster Wallace
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“Good conversation comes form just such flexibility. As observations come up, it meanders, following a course that tends in a particular direction, but moves responsively in new directions as associations are triggered, words are paused over to consider their implications, examples are invented, connections are made. Like jazz, it is a work of improvisation that entails listening intently for what the others are doing and moving with them. The curiosity which sustains that intensity pauses at every turn to notice what's happening, to raise new questions and pursue them. In a gentle pursuit of ideas, it makes room for the unexpected. Exercised in this way, curiosity becomes an avenue of grace. Conversation pursued in this spirit is full of surprise. It connects one idea or thought or analogy with another in ways that could not have been predicted.”

CommunityConversationEmpathyCuriosityHospitalityMarilyn Chandler Mcentyre
Book:Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies
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