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Quote by René Girard

“We didn't stop burning witches because we invented science; we invented science because we stopped burning witches.”

Quote by René Girard

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René Girard

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“Some people know that if they can only find the people responsible for all the chaos and punish them, stop them, kill them, then all will be well again. Hunting for scapegoats is always popular in times of serious trouble. So is hunting for the great leader who will restore prosperity and stability. Some people know that that's the answer. If they could just find the strong, powerful leader that they need, all would be well. And, unhappily for them, they do find such a leader. That leader has his own answers. He turns his true believers--his thugs--loose on those he chooses as scapegoats and he looks around for an external enemy to use as an even bigger scapegoat and a diversion from the reality that he doesn't really know what to do.... Sometimes the only thing more dangerous than frightened, confused, desperate people looking for solutions is frightened, confused, desperate people finding and settling for truly bad solutions.”

LeadershipPowerChaosLeadersIntoleranceScapegoatsDiversions
Author:Octavia E. Butler
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“The relationship between the rebel faction and the military and civilian bureaucratic cliques followed roughly the same pattern throughout the country, with the masses rebelling against the bureaucratic clique, followed by the bureaucratic clique's suppression of the rebels, and Mao alternatively playing the two sides off each other until he died and the rebel faction was vanquished forever. Mainstream public opinion has blamed all the evils of the Cultural Evolution on the rebel faction, but the vast majority of victims died while the rebel faction was suppressed under the new order of military and administrative bureaucratic control. The revel faction was indeed savage and cruel when it had the upper hand, but these periods covered only two years of the Cultural Evolution, and those who suppressed the rebels during the other eight years were even more savage, while the rebels were more brutally purged after the Cultural Revolution. The number of rebel faction victims and the degree of their persecution vastly outweighed those of the power-holders and royalist faction, but they became the scapegoats of the cultural revolution.”

Cultural RevolutionScapegoats
Book:The World Turned Upside Down: A History of the Chinese Cultural Revolution - Library Edition
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“We have men sold to build churches, women sold to support the gospel, and babes sold to purchase Bibles for the poor heathen, all for the glory of God and the good of souls. The slave auctioneer's bell and the church-going bell chime in with each other, and the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are drowned in the religious shouts of his pious master. Revivals of religion and revivals in the slave trade go hand in hand.”

SlaverySlaveOppressionPietySuperstitionSlave OwnersRevivals
Book:Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
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“The contents of Mr. Thorne's letter, as nearly as I can remember, were as follows: "I have seen your slave, Linda, and conversed with her. She can be taken very easily, if you manage prudently. There are enough of us here to swear to her identity as your property. I am a patriot, a lover of my country, and I do this as an act of justice to the laws.”

SlaveryPatriotismLawsSlavesSlave OwnersFugitive Slaves
Book:Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
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“It is due, however, to my mistress to say of her, that she did not adopt this course of treatment immediately. She at first lacked the depravity indispensable to shutting me up in mental darkness. It was at least necessary for her to have some training in the exercise of irresponsible power, to make her equal to the task of treating me as though I were a brute. My mistress was, as I have said, a kind and tender-hearted woman; and in the simplicity of her soul she commenced, when I first went to live with her, to treat me as she supposed one human being ought to treat another. In entering upon the duties of a slaveholder, she did not seem to perceive that I sustained to her the relation of a mere chattel, and that for her to treat me as a human being was not only wrong, but dangerously so. Slavery proved as injurious to her as it did to me. When I went there, she was a pious, warm, and tender-hearted woman. There was no sorrow or suffering for which she had not a tear. She had bread for the hungry, clothes for the naked, and comfort for every mourner that came within her reach. Slavery soon proved its ability to divest her of these heavenly qualities. Under its influence, the tender heart became stone, and the lamblike disposition gave way to one of tiger-like fierceness.”

SlaveryCorruptionAfrican AmericansBlacksSlavesSlave Owners
Book:Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
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“Mr. Thomas Lanman, of St. Michael's, killed two slaves, one of whom he killed with a hatchet, by knocking his brains out. He used to boast of the commission of the awful and bloody deed. I have heard him do so laughingly, saying, among other things, that he was the only benefactor of his country in the company, and that when others would do as much as he had done, we should be relieved of "the d-----d [n***ers].”

ViolenceMurderSlaveryAfrican AmericansBlacksSlavesSlave Owners
Book:Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
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