“Choosing beauty over content (or choosing beauty as content) is always an act of sedition. If we accept the cant of official culture, we must believe that the beauty we steal from any man-made thing is stolen from its more virtuous and metaphysical backstory, wherein "real" beauty is said to reside.” IfsMenBelieveMadeSaidRealCultureAcceptingStealingOfficialsVirtuousMetaphysicalStolenCantReal BeautyMan Made Things Author:Dave Hickey
“The question, then, for Western companies, as much as for Western governments, is to decide whose side they are on: the Chinese officials who like to define their culture in a paternalistic, authoritarian way, or the large number of Chinese who have their own ideas about freedom.” WayIdeasGovernmentCultureSidesNumbersCompanyWesternChineseOfficialsLarge Numbers Author:Ian Buruma
“It might be crazy to expect a high government official to speak the truth. It might be crazy to believe that government policy will be something more than the handmaiden of the most powerful interests. It might be crazy to argue that we should preserve a tradition that has been part of our tradition for most of our history -- free culture. If this is crazy, then let there be more crazies. Soon.” IfsShouldBelieveHas BeensGovernmentMightCultureSpeakInterestPowerfulCrazyPolicyTraditionArguingPreservesOfficialsMost PowerfulSpeak The TruthBeing CrazyGovernment OfficialsGovernment Policy Book:Free Culture Source: Free Culture
“To write about the monstrous sense of alienation the poet feels in this culture of polarized hatreds is a way of staying sane. With the poem, I reach out to an audience equally at odds with official policy, and I celebrate our mutual humanness in an inhuman world.” WorldWayFeelsWritingCultureAudiencePolicyPoetHatredCelebrateOfficialsStayingMutualReach OutSaneOddsAlienationMonstrousInhumanHumanness Book:Always Beginning: Essays on a Life in Poetry Source: Always Beginning: Essays on a Life in Poetry