Source: Rot & Ruin
Discussion with Ela Bhatt, Founder, Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA)
Book 1, Chapter 8 “A Decision in Cold Blood” (p. 233)
The Land Leviathan (1974)
1790s, Farewell Address (1796)
Context: The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries, which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of Public Liberty.
“He who is affected by an insult is infected by it.”
Diary of an Unknown (1988)
“To fight the Empire is to be infected by its derangement”
VALIS (1981)
Context: To fight the Empire is to be infected by its derangement … Whoever defeats the Empire becomes the Empire; it proliferates like a virus … thereby it becomes its enemies.
“Customers are vermin. They infect companies with disease.”
He says this with complete solemnity. “A company is a system. It is built to perform a relatively small set of actions over and over, as efficiently as possible. The enemy of systems is variation, and customers produce variation. They want special products. They have unique circumstances. They try to place orders with after-sales support and they direct complaints to sales. My proudest accomplishment, and I am being perfectly honest with you here, Mr. Jones, is not the Omega Management System and it associated revenue stream—which, by the way, is extremely lucrative. It is Zephyr. A customer-free company. Listen to that, Mr. Jones. A customer-free company. In the early days, you know, we tried to simulate customers. It was a disaster. Killed the whole project. When we started again, I cut every department that had external customers. It was like shooting a pack of rabid dogs. Now, I’m not claiming Zephyr Holdings is perfect. But we’re getting there, Mr. Jones. We’re getting there.”
Q4/1: October, p. 105
Company (2006)
Manuscript from 1940, as translated in Writings of Leon Trotsky edited by George Breitman
