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Quote by Tamuna Tsertsvadze

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The Prison of Deviants

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Tamuna Tsertsvadze

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“We may take it that the world is undoubtedly itself [i.e., is indistinct from itself], but, in any attempt to see itself, as an object, it must, equally, undoubtedly act so as to make itself distinct from and therefore false to itself. In this sense, in respect to its own information, the universe must expand to escape the telescopes through which we, who are it, are trying to capture it, which is us.”

“Our society suffers from a crisis of connection, a crisis of solidarity. We live in a culture of hyper-individualism. There is always a tension between self and society, between the individual and the group. Over the past sixty years we have swung too far toward the self. The only way out is to rebalance, to build a culture that steers people toward relation, community, and commitment—the things we most deeply yearn for, yet undermine with our hyper-individualistic way of life.”

“Just tell me who the hell am I? What powers did I, do I hold? What right have I to say “my” or “mine” or “me” — all honey- glazed, all bullet-proofed and worshipful of any gangster “I”? The key to the Dollar Store hangs on my belt. Yes, “my” again. And what of roof, of bread, of loving laughter? What’s in? My vinyl favorite Booker Little, vintage, soothes me. He jars our ears with trumpet joy and stuff freed folks stash in cabinets. Never one to make too much of why we love and what, I love my powers. I might put you in my will.”

“I wanted to be true to whatever inner logic there was in myself. I didn’t want to be true to any one group of people in the world. I wanted to be true to my own anger. I’ve always been afraid of belonging to groups. I don’t want to be a Democrat or a Republican or a Communist or a Fascist, or—just an all-American. I wanted to be, as far as I can be, myself, and find out what I think, and get it out in the open and then intellectualize about it. And see what I think.”

“Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water. Men feel sexual desire: well, there is such a thing as sex. If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never to mistake them for the something else of which they are only a kind of copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find until after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country and to help others do the same.”