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All B Quotes

“But there is a fatality, a feeling so irresistible and inevitable that it has the force of doom, which almost invariably compels human beings to linger around and haunt, ghost-like, the spot where some great and marked event has given the colour to their lifetime; and, still the more irresistibly, the darker the tinge that saddens it.”

“But there is a great difference between Fanon's bloody knives and Sartre's bloody scalpel. True decolonization movements, from the American Patriots of the 1770s to the FLN in the 1950s, used actual violence to drive out their oppressors. Intellectuals who use the language of settler colonialism to critique their own society, in contrast, have no mass movement at their back. That has been the predicament of the ideology of settler colonialism from the beginning: everyone knows that calls to "eradicate," "kill," or "cull" settlers can only be metaphorical, so there is no need to put a limit on their rhetorical ferocity. But what if there were a country where settler colonialism could be challenged with more than words? Where all the evils attributed to it--from "emptiness" to "not-enoughness" to economic inequality, global warming, and genocide--could be given a human face? Best of all, what if that settler colonial society were small and endangered enough that destroying it seemed like a realistic possibility rather than a utopian dream? Such a country would be a perfect focus for all the moral passion and rhetorical violence that fuels the ideology of settler colonialism. It would be a country one could hate virtuously--especially if it were home to a people whom Western civilization has traditionally considered it virtuous to hate.”

“But there is a huge difference between, on one hand, admitting that there are severe difficulties, and, on the other, throwing our hands in the air and fatalistically declaring the problem to be unsolvable. We don't know that they are in solvable until we tried, and tried really hard. Given the magnitude of what's at stake, just giving up on the problem is in my opinion unacceptable. The extent to which we are currently neglecting the problem is shocking. Nick Bostrom, in a recent paper, illustrates this with a diagram showing how the number of academic publications on snowboarding outnumbers those on risks of human extinction by a factor of 20 or so, while those on dung beetles beat those on snowboarding by another factor of 2. This should not be taken as a suggestion that too much effort is spent on academic studies of snowboarding and dung beetles, but rather as an indication that current efforts into the study of existential risks to humanity could easily be significantly scaled up without major destruction to the current academic landscape as a whole.”

“But there is a huge difference between, on one hand, admitting that there severe difficulties, and, on the other, throwing our hands in the air and fatalistically declaring the problem to be unsolvable. We don't know that they are in solvable until we tried, and tried really hard. Given the magnitude of what's at stake, just giving up on the problem is in my opinion unacceptable. The extent to which we are currently neglecting the problem is shocking. Nick Bostrom, in a recent paper, illustrates this with a diagram showing how the number of academic publications on snowboarding outnumbers those on risks of human extinction by a factor of 20 or so, while those on dung beetles beat those on snowboarding by another factor of 2. This should not be taken as a suggestion that too much effort is spent on academic studies of snowboarding and dung beetles, but rather as an indication that current efforts into the study of existential risks to humanity could easily be significantly scaled up without major destruction to the current academic landscape as a whole.”

“But there is a light that goes deeper than the will, a light that lights up the darkness behind it: that light can change your will, can make it truly yours and not another's - not the Shadow's. Into the created can pour itself the creating will, and so redeem it!”

“But there is a way of despising the dandelion which is not that of the dreary pessimist, but of the more offensive optimist. It can be done in various ways; one of which is saying, "You can get much better dandelions at Selfridge's," or "You can get much cheaper dandelions at Woolworth's." Another way is to observe with a casual drawl, "Of course nobody but Gamboli in Vienna really understands dandelions," or saying that nobody would put up with the old-fashioned dandelion since the super-dandelion has been grown in the Frankfurt Palm Garden; or merely sneering at the stinginess of providing dandelions, when all the best hostesses give you an orchid for your buttonhole and a bouquet of rare exotics to take away with you. These are all methods of undervaluing the thing by comparison; for it is not familiarity but comparison that breeds contempt. And all such captious comparisons are ultimately based on the strange and staggering heresy that a human being has a right to dandelions; that in some extraordinary fashion we can demand the very pick of all the dandelions in the garden of Paradise; that we owe no thanks for them at all and need feel no wonder at them at all; and above all no wonder at being thought worthy to receive them. Instead of saying, like the old religious poet, "What is man that Thou carest for him, or the son of man that Thou regardest him?" we are to say like the discontented cabman, "What's this?" or like the bad-tempered Major in the club, "Is this a chop fit for a gentleman?" Now I not only dislike this attitude quite as much as the Swinburnian pessimistic attitude, but I think it comes to very much the same thing; to the actual loss of appetite for the chop or the dish of dandelion-tea. And the name of it is Presumption and the name of its twin brother is Despair. This is the principle I was maintaining when I seemed an optimist to Mr. Max Beerbohm; and this is the principle I am still maintaining when I should undoubtedly seem a pessimist to Mr. Gordon Selfridge. The aim of life is appreciation; there is no sense in not appreciating things; and there is no sense in having more of them if you have less appreciation of them.”

“But there is also my brain and it is gently, unobtrusively asking me questions that don’t require answers because the answers are already there: it won’t last; he’s just TOO perfect for me, TOO handsome, TOO sexy; I’m not the one for him, if such a person exists at all. Sooner or later it will come to an end because the feelings disappear, even the strongest ones. They are inexorably broken down by life’s worries and problems and the fears that come with them. But with Alex it will most likely happen sooner rather than later – he is just TOO seductive and virtually all women without exception look at him TOO greedily. When it’s all over, he’ll simply step over us and move on and I... I’ll be abandoned like an empty cigarette packet on a dirty pavement. I have no desire to fade away in the scorching sun, covered in dust and dripping wet with dirty rainwater.”

“But there is always a November space after the leaves have fallen when she felt it was almost indecent to intrude on the woods…for their glory terrestrial had departed and their glory celestial of spirit and purity and whiteness had not yet come upon them.”

“But there is another and greater distinction for which no truly natural or religious reason can be assigned, and that is the distinction of men into kings and subjects. Male and female are the distinctions of nature, good and bad the distinctions of heaven; but how a race of men came into the world so exalted above the rest, and distinguished like some new species, is worth inquiring into, and whether they are the means of happiness or of misery to mankind.”

“But there is another way. And that is to organize mass non-violent resistance based on the principle of love. It seems to me that this is the only way as our eyes look to the future. As we look out across the years and across the generations, let us develop and move right here. We must discover the power of love, the power, the redemptive power of love. And when we discover that we will be able to make of this old world a new world. We will be able to make men better. Love is the only way.”

“But there is hope. The United Nations did a study showing that small farms can feed the world. Small farms are more adaptable. They are less costly, because they don't need extremely expensive machinery, and less environmentally damaging, because they don't need to spray chemicals. And they provide greater local economic opportunities than large industrial farms do. Small farms have been proven to produce higher yields per acre and more nutrient-dense foods.”

“But there is more to a fine photograph than information. We are also seeking to present an image that arouses the curiosity of the viewer or that, best of all, provokes the viewer to think-to ask a question or simply to gaze in thoughtful wonder. We know that photographs inform people. We also know that photographs move people. The photograph that does both is the one we want to see and make. It is the kind of picture that makes you want to pick up your own camera again and go to work.”