Quotes about majority
page 22

“Hardships have come. They have come from the inanimate universe in the form of floods, fires, frosts, accidents, diseases, droughts, storms, and the like; from other species, who were competitors or enemies; and from unbrotherly members of the same species. Some have survived, but the great majority have perished. Only a fraction, and generally an appallingly small fraction, of each generation of a species have lived to maturity.”

J. Howard Moore (1862–1916)

"The Factors of Organic Evolution", p. 35
The Universal Kinship (1906), The Physical Kinship

Universe, Disease

“I am an unhappy man. I am haunted by my inability to express the inexpressible, to come to terms with the unknown. The pursuit of beauty is, of course, a major psychological drive. It its various guises—which is to say, the urge to perfection, the yearning to merge with the eternal, the explorer’s restlessness, the realization of an Absolute created by ourselves, yet larger than our totality—it is perhaps the most important human thrust.”

Jack Vance Demon Princes

Source: Demon Princes (1964-1981), The Palace of Love (1967), Chapter 6 (p. 346)

Perfection, Beauty

“A pure Democracy, by which I mean a Society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the Government in person, can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction. A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of Government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party, or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is, that such Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives, as they have been violent in their deaths.”

James Madison (1751–1836) 4th president of the United States (1809 to 1817)

Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species of Government, have erroneously supposed, that by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions.
Federalist No. 10
1780s, Federalist Papers (1787–1788)

Democracy, Personality, Communication, Passion

“We are beginning to see that government by majorities means abandoning all the affairs of the country to the tide-waiters who make up the majorities in the House and in election committees; to those, in a word, who have no pinion of their own.”

Peter Kropotkin book The Conquest of Bread

Source: The Conquest of Bread (1892), Ch. 3 : Anarchist Communism, p. 81

Making love, Housing, Country

“Establishment necessarily involves a subtle corruption of the spirit of the church because it is safely embedded in the wider establishment of society, which includes the privileged and the powerful. … How can those Christians who see monetarism being so cruelly applied to the old, the sick, the homeless, women, the black community, and the young unemployed, lead a struggle against this injustice from within an established church subject to a Cabinet and a parliamentary majority composed of those very people who are responsible for implementing those very policies?”

Tony Benn (1925–2014) British Labour Party politician

Speech to St James's Church, Piccadilly (2 March 1983), quoted in The Times (3 March 1983), p. 14
1980s

People, Women, Communication

“Even relatively benign and temporary authoritarianism that rests upon elected power is being challenged. We are moving rapidly towards a situation where the pressure for the redistribution of political power will have to be faced as a major political issue. In a world where authoritarianism of the left or right is a very real possibility, the question of whether ordinary people can govern themselves by consent is still on trial—as it always has been, and always will be. Beyond parliamentary democracy as we know it, we shall have to find a new popular democracy to replace it.”

Tony Benn (1925–2014) British Labour Party politician

Speech to the Welsh Council of Labour (25 May 1968), quoted in The Times (27 May 1968), p. 2
1960s

World, Democracy, People, Question

“The next Labour Government can be content with nothing less than the elimination of poverty as a social problem. … The Labour movement was created to fight against a wealthy minority on behalf of a poor majority. Now it has a more complex and demanding task. It has to enlist the majority in a struggle on behalf of a poor minority, who on grounds of age or health or family circumstances or disgracefully low pay are unable to help themselves. No one has a right to expect a fair deal for himself unless he is prepared to work for one for others too.”

Roy Jenkins (1920–2003) British politician, historian and writer

Speech in Worsley, Lancashire (11 March 1972), quoted in The Times (13 March 1972), p. 4
1970s

Family, Help, Health, Problem

“I have never been emotionally a Europe man. I have been and remain fundamentally a Commonwealth man. I therefore cannot ignore the fact that the vast majority of Commonwealth countries now want Britain to stay in.”

Harold Wilson (1916–1995) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech to the Labour Party conference on Britain's membership of the EEC (26 April 1975), quoted in The Times (28 April 1975), p. 4
Prime Minister

Country

“All previous revolutions have been political—in them the have-not majority has attempted revengefully to pull down the economically advantaged minority. If realized, this historically greatest design revolution will joyously elevate all humanity to unprecedented heights.”

Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983) American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor and futurist

From 1980s onwards, Critical Path (1981)

“Campaign groups which used to oppose neo-Nazis realized that there weren’t sufficient Nazis to justify their business models. They decided that, henceforth, attacking parties such as Ukip should also come under their anti-fascist remit. Soon anybody who opposed supranational institutions or sought to restrict immigration found themselves labelled as beyond the pale. It meant that the views of the majority of the public — in Britain and elsewhere — effectively became defined as far right. In recent years this terminological mission-creep has morphed from being annoying to being disturbing. For if everybody is a fascist, then nobody is. And anyone who knows the scene across Europe will understand that we may well have need of these terms.”

Douglas Murray (1979) British political commentator and far-right activist

Source: "Right from wrong: a guide to the new European politics" https://www.spectator.co.uk/2019/08/right-from-wrong-a-guide-to-the-new-european-politics/, The Spectator, August 17, 2019

Business, Understanding

“The state is secular, but we are Christians. We respect the majority and minority, but Brazil is a Christian country. With all due respect, the Federal Supreme Court typified homophobia as if it were racism. Is it not time for an evangelical Christian in the Supreme Court?”

Jair Bolsonaro (1955) Brazilian president elect

On 13 June 2019. Bolsonaro Renews Call for Evangelical Christian on Brazilian Supreme Court https://riotimesonline.com/brazil-news/rio-politics/society/bolsonaro-says-it-is-time-for-an-evangelical-christian-on-brazilian-supreme-court/. The Rio Times (14 June 2019).

Time, Country

“We do agree with President Trump’s decision or proposal on the wall. The vast majority of potential immigrants do not have good intentions. They do not intend to do the best or do good to the US people. I would very much like the US to uphold the current immigration policy, because to a large extent we owe our democracy in the southern hemisphere to the United States.”

Jair Bolsonaro (1955) Brazilian president elect

In a Fox News interview on 18 March 2019. Bolsonaro backs Trump's border wall ahead of White House meeting https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/19/jair-bolsonaro-donald-trump-wall-immigration. The Guardian (19 March 2019).

Democracy, People, Decision

“If the vast majority of Muslims regard themselves as a separate nation having nothing in common with the Hindus and others, no power on earth can compel them to think otherwise. And if they want to partition India on that basis, they must have the partition, unless Hindus want to fight against such a division.”

Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India

Harijan, 18 April 1942. Quoted from Elst, Koenraad (2018). Why I killed the Mahatma: Uncovering Godse's defence. New Delhi : Rupa, 2018.
1940s

Fight, Thinking

“Here’s my attitude, and I’m sort of sorry to say this sometimes – but there are people who try and elevate film music - of all kinds – to being the great twentieth century classical music, and my opinion is it just isn’t. It’s very straightforward, major/minor or modal writing. The only time you get any kind of originality is usually in the timbres and the sounds and the mixture of elements. But to get through a scene it’s either happy, or sad – and it’s either going forward in action or it’s not – and it can be ironic, which means you’ve got to switch from major to minor frequently. But it’s not rocket science. It’s a lot of skills – a lot of political skills, frankly. It’s being in a room and playing off fifty opinions from studios, producers, directors, sometimes actors – and coming out the end with something that vaguely represents music. And frequently it doesn’t. The minute you try to get original or break the box – unless you’ve got either a very experimental or powerful director, it’s probably not going to happen.”

Graeme Revell (1955) New Zealand musician

Time, Box, People, Music

“Origen taught that all souls were created at the beginning of creation as angelic spirits. In this condition they sinned and for their apostasy were transferred into material bodies. It was this view of preexistence which was proclaimed heretical. In any case, heresy thus condemned so long ago need not be regarded today as of major importance. Truth matters a great deal more and a condemned heresy may turn out to be a truth, as happened, for example, when a local church of Rome condemned Galileo’s heliocentric doctrine and forced him to recant. Galileo was right and the church in question was wrong. It is therefore quite legitimate for both clergy and laity of the Christian faith to preach and believe in both preexistence and reincarnation.”

Geoffrey Hodson (1886–1983) New Zealand occultist

Source: Reincarnation & Christianity https://www.theosophical.org/files/resources/articles/ReincarnationChristianity.pdf (1967)

Soul, Faith, Question, Truth

“The cases in which assistance is given to mankind by nature-spirits are few. The majority of such creatures shun the haunts of man, and retire before him, disliking his emanations and the perpetual bustle and unrest which he creates all around him.”

Charles Webster Leadbeater (1854–1934) English theosophist

Source: Invisible Helpers (1915), Ch. 4

Nature

“What makes karma a major problem for people is their inability to deal with it, to recognize their own responsibility for it, and to do something about it. Most people blame their problems on other people or on circumstances: it was their upbringing, the fact that their parents did not love them, or got divorced, or left them wanting, or that their husband left them, or did not leave them. All these experiences are shed onto someone else, but of course it is all to do with karma, our own responsibility.”

Benjamin Creme (1922–2016) artist, author, esotericist

The Art of Co-operation (2002)

People, Problem, Parent, Love

“Few could read from these pages without being changed. To some the extraordinary insights into world events will be of major interest, while to others the laying bare of the secrets of self-realization, the simple description of experienced truth, will be a revelation. To anyone seeking to understand the Laws of Life, these subtle and pregnant insights will take them quickly to the core of Life itself, and provide them with a simple path stretching to the mountain-top. The essential unity of all life is underscored in a clear and meaningful way. Never, it would appear, have the laws by which we live seemed so natural and so unconstraining.”

Benjamin Creme (1922–2016) artist, author, esotericist

Maitreya's Teachings - The Laws of Life (2005)

Law, Reading, Understanding, Mountain

“When the world stock markets collapse — as soon as it is obvious that they are on their final plunge — Maitreya will emerge. He will take up an invitation to appear on a major television network in the United States. The invitation has already been issued, but Maitreya will determine the timing of the interview. After the initial interview, all the networks will want to interview Him. However, He will not be introduced as Maitreya or the Christ, but simply as a man of extraordinary wisdom and love.”

Benjamin Creme (1922–2016) artist, author, esotericist

The Awakening of Humanity (2008)

Time, Appearance, Christ, World

“The majority of US agrees on need to address healthcare, climate change, corruption, etc. Divisions that lead to civil war are the fault of partisan pols seeking votes and a corporate-owned media establishment that pushes a war agenda and profits off controversy & divisiveness.”

Tulsi Gabbard (1981) U.S. Representative from Hawaii's 2nd congressional district

Twitter, https://twitter.com/TulsiGabbard/status/1103277298562842625 (6 March 2019) Twitter account, March 2019

War, Change

“I must admit, sir, that I have modified the verses a little, to allow for the new things I have learned, so I am an unreliable source of truth, sir, save in its most fundamental sense. Like a majority of poets, sir.”

Michael Moorcock (1939) English writer, editor, critic

Book 3 “A Rose Redeemed; A Rose Revived,” Chapter 1 “Of Weapons Possessed of Will” (p. 270)
The Elric Cycle, The Revenge of the Rose (1991)

Sense, Truth, Learning

“Prince Wilhelm seems to have a good deal of his grandfather about him. If his parents have aimed at training him to be a constitutional monarch ready to bow to the rule of a parliamentary majority they have failed.”

Alfred von Waldersee (1832–1904) Prussian Field Marshal

Waldersee in his diary, 6 December 1883, quoted in Walter R. Pierce, Herr und Heer: The German Social Democrats and the Officer Corps, A Reappraisal

Training, Parent

“We are living although the majority of the people do not realize it, in the midst of an immense revolution. What is radically wrong with our condition lies in the harsh contrast between rich and poor. This cannot go on forever, as we are human beings with human differences. No use is being made of religion, the only way towards alleviation and compensation; on the contrary, attempts are being deliberately made to excite the masses into asserting their equality with the middle and upper classes. The State contents itself with attempts to improve the material circumstances of the workers, with the only result that their covetousness has been intensified. The possibility of acquiring great sums of money by speculation has developed a fondness for luxury and enjoyment which has taken hold of wide circles. German family life is going to the dogs. Unfortunate marriages, divorces, youthful corruption, pleasure-seeking, the anxiety to seem richer than one is–all this is increasing terribly. In the lower classes of the great cities the demoralization has already reached a high degree … The unequal distribution of wealth with all its consequences must lead in the end to a catastrophe.”

Alfred von Waldersee (1832–1904) Prussian Field Marshal

Waldersee in his diary, 9 November 1890

Money, Family, Religion, Marriage

“I was upset that 26 Dems forced the other 200+ to vote for a pro-ICE provision at the last min without warning… We can have ideological differences and that’s fine. But these tactics allow a small group to force the other 200+ members into actions that the majority disagree with. I don’t think that’s right, and said as much in a closed door meeting.”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (1989) American politician

Twitter post, https://twitter.com/AOC (2 March 2019) Twitter Quotes (2019), March 2019

Thinking

“Our future is imperiled, our economy is fragile, and frontline communities are vulnerable to major threats from rising sea levels to lead in our water. A #GreenNewDeal is a common sense, moral solution to fix these issues with the urgency they demand.”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (1989) American politician

Twitter post, https://twitter.com/AOC (22 February 2019) Twitter Quotes (2019), February 2019

Future, Communication, Water, Sense

“Believing that slaves could not be enlightened without developing in them a longing for liberty, not a few masters maintained that the more brutish the bondmen the more pliant they become for purposes of exploitation. It was this class of slaveholders that finally won the majority of southerners to their way of thinking and determined that Negroes should not be educated.”

Carter G. Woodson (1875–1950) African-American historian and writer

The Education of the Negro Prior to 1861 (1915), Chapter 1

Way, Education, Thinking

“Feminism in the United States has never emerged from the women who are most victimized by sexist oppression; women who are daily beaten down, mentally, physically, and spiritually-women who are powerless to change their condition in life. They are a silent majority. A mark of their victimization is that they accept their lot in life without visible question, without organized protest, without collective anger or rage.”

Bell Hooks book Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center

p. 1 https://books.google.com/books?id=uvIQbop4cdsC&pg=PA1. Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (1984), Chapter 1: Black Women: Shaping Feminist Theory

Anger, Question, Rage, Life

“Our reprisal raids on North Vietnam hardly conformed to these standards. By our own account, in self-defense, we had already sunk three or four attacking torpedo boats in two incidents. In neither were our ships damaged nor any of our men hurt; indeed, one bullet imbedded in one destroyer hull is the only proof we have been able to muster that the second of the attacks even took place. To fly sixty-four bombing sorties in reprisal over four North Vietnamese bases and an oil depot, destroying or damaging twenty-five North Vietnamese PT boats, a major part of that tiny navy, was hardly punishment to fit the crime….”

I. F. Stone (1907–1989) American investigative journalist and author

NPR: Excerpt: The Best of I.F. Stone (5 September 2006)

Hurt, Self-confidence, Relation ships, Flying

“Strangely, he wasn’t scared at all. He was even more coldly calm, calmly analytical. And he knew that he would have to be if he was to stand a chance to win this war. If he was to win it, his mind would have to be his major weapon; firearms might win a battle, but never the war.”

Fredric Brown book The Mind Thing

Source: The Mind Thing (1961), Chapter 18 (p. 555)

War, Chance

“Our culture is in large part a majority-takes-all, reward-and-punishment system of sexual preference. It expresses itself by not only marginalizing minority preferences but by obsessively associating them with immorality and perversion.”

Michael Nava (1954) American writer

Source: Non-fiction, Created equal: Why gay rights matter to America (1994), p.38

Parting

“If the world’s largest economy looked poised to show that kind of visionary leadership, other major emitters — like the European Union, China, and India — would almost certainly find themselves under intense pressure from their own populations to follow suit.”

Naomi Klein (1970) Canadian author and activist

The Game-Changing Promise of a Green New Deal, The Intercept, https://theintercept.com/2018/11/27/green-new-deal-congress-climate-change/ (27 November 2018)

World

“Guerrilla warfare is used by the side which is supported by a majority but which possesses a much smaller number of arms for use in defense against oppression.”

Ernesto Che Guevara book Guerrilla Warfare

Source: Guerrilla Warfare (1961), Ch. I: 1. Essence of Guerrilla Warfare

Support

“When you understand the basic change taking place in any one major area, it is easier to make sense of the others. This discovery of a new pattern transcends explanation. The shift is qual-itative, sudden, the result of neurological processes too rapid and complex to be tracked by the conscious mind. Although logical explanations can be laid out up to a point, the seeing of a pattern is not sequential but all-at-once. If a new concept does not click into place for you on first encounter, read on. As you move through the book you will come upon many related ideas, connections, examples, metaphors, analogies, and illustrative stories. In time, patterns will emerge, the shifts will occur. From the new perspective, old questions may seem suddenly irrelevant.”

Marilyn Ferguson (1938–2008) American writer

The Aquarian Conspiracy (1980), Chapter One, The Conspiracy

Time, Reading, Understanding, Question

“And if you’re like me and a million more people who are convinced that the case for cooperation is greater than any case put for separation then I say to you: hold your heads high. Show dignity and pride. Be confident. Let us have confidence that our values are indeed the values of the majority of the people of Scotland. That our principles of sharing and cooperation are far better and mean more to them than separation and splitting apart.”

Gordon Brown (1951) British Labour Party politician

Speech for a Better Together rally in Glasgow on the eve of the Scottish independence referendum, 17 September 2014
Post premiership

Self-confidence, Confidence, People

“Corporate tax rates must also be cut to increase incentives and the availability of investment capital. The Government has already taken major steps this year to reduce business tax liability and to stimulate the modernization, replacement, and expansion of our productive plant and equipment.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

1962, Address and Question and Answer Period at the Economic Club of New York (549)

Business

“He has used his platform to push out prejudice. I think it’s disgusting and I don’t think it deserves a place on a major news network…. incredibly irresponsible to even make such a statement while we are still burying people who were gunned down by a white supremacist.”

Tucker Carlson (1969) American political commentator

Jonathan Greenblatt, chief executive officer and national director of the Anti-Defamation League ([Associated Press, Fox’s Carlson calls white supremacy ‘a hoax.’, David, Bauder, August 7, 2019, https://www.apnews.com/e0f9f2ea88dc435db914c8e53dcaf59e])

Thinking, Making love, People

“Civilization slipped into its second dark age on an unsurprising track of blood, but with a speed that could not have been foreseen by even the most pessimistic futurist. It was as if it had been waiting to go. On October 1, God was in His heaven, the stock market stood at 10,140, and most of the planes were on time (except for those landing and taking off in Chicago, and that was to be expected). Two weeks later the skies belonged to the birds again and the stock market was a memory. By Halloween, every major city from New York to Moscow stank to the empty heavens and the world as it had been was a memory.”

Stephen King book Cell

Preface
Cell (2006)

God, Time, Waiting, Speed

“I understand how angry people are on both sides. There are some angry Leavers and there are some very angry Remainers too, particularly young people who feel their future has been taken away from them on the basis of a very narrow majority, where a significant majority of the electorate did not vote and many young people did not get an opportunity to vote.”

Vince Cable (1943) British Liberal Democrat politician

European elections 2019: Remainers are angry too, says Vince Cable https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48339921, BBC News, 20 May 2019 2019

Feeling, Future, People, Understanding

“Yesterday, when asked about reparations, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell offered a familiar reply: America should not be held liable for something that happened 150 years ago, since none of us currently alive are responsible… This rebuttal proffers a strange theory of governance, that American accounts are somehow bound by the lifetime of its generations. But well into this century, the United States was still paying out pensions to the heirs of Civil War soldiers. We honor treaties that date back some 200 years, despite no one being alive who signed those treaties… But we are American citizens, and thus bound to a collective enterprise that extends beyond our individual and personal reach.”

Ta-Nehisi Coates (1975) writer, journalist, and educator

Ta-Nehisi Coates Makes the Case for Reparations at Historic Congressional Hearing, Democracy Now (20 June 2019)

War, Personality

“First minister, last night you participated in the first major public debate on the future for Wales within the European Union. You went head-to-head with the voice of the far right. Do you think your performance helped or hindered the Welsh campaign on the EU?”

Leanne Wood (1971) Welsh Plaid Cymru politician

UKIP condemns Leanne Wood's 'far right' Farage jibe https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-35292163 BBC News (12 January 2016) 2016

Night, Future, Thinking, Help

“Scotland’s 62% vote to remain in the EU counted for nothing. Far from being an equal partner at Westminster, Scotland’s voice is listened to only if it chimes with that of the UK majority; if it does not, we are outvoted and ignored.”

Nicola Sturgeon (1970) First Minister of Scotland and leader of the Scottish National Party

Said in a statement https://news.gov.scot/speeches-and-briefings/first-minister-statement-brexit-and-scotlands-future to the Scottish Parliament on 24 April. Here are the five best quotes from Nicola Sturgeon's indyref2 update https://www.thenational.scot/news/17595363.here-are-the-five-best-quotes-from-nicola-sturgeons-indyref2-update/ (24 April 2019) on the National website. Retrieved 23 July 2019. 2019

“If we compare. e. g. the systems of classical mathematics and of intuitionistic mathematics, we find that the first is much simpler and technically more efficient, while the second is more safe from surprising occurences, e. g. contradictions. At the present time, any estimation of the degree of safety of the system of classical mathematics, in other words, the degree of plausibility of its principles, is rather subjective. The majority of mathematicians seem to regard this degree as sufficiently high for all practical purposes and therefore prefer the application of classical mathematics to that of intuitionistic mathematics. The latter has not, so far as I know, been seriously applied in physics by anybody.”

Rudolf Carnap (1891–1970) German philosopher

Rudolf Carnap (1939; 51), as cited in: Paul van Ulsen. Wetenschapsfilosofie http://www.illc.uva.nl/Research/Publications/Inaugurals/IV-10-Arend-Heyting.text.pdf, 6 november 2017.

Time, Mathematics

“Holiday varied the lyrics of this and other songs in her renditions of them; included are some of the major passages of some of the variants.”

Billie Holiday (1915–1959) American jazz singer and songwriter

Billie's Blues

Holiday

“A Jew brought up among Germans may assume German custom, German words. He may be wholly imbued with that German fluid but the nucleus of his spiritual structure will always remain Jewish, because his blood, his body, his physical-racial type are Jewish. … It is impossible for a man to become assimilated with people whose blood is different from his own. In order to become assimilated, he must change his body, he must become one of them, in blood. … There can be no assimilation as long as there is no mixed marriage. … An increase in the number of mixed marriages is the only sure and infallible means for the destruction of nationality as such. … A preservation of national integrity is impossible except by a preservation of racial purity, and for that purpose we are in need of a territory of our own where our people will constitute the overwhelming majority.”

Ze'ev Jabotinsky (1880–1940) Jewish leader

V. Jabotinsky, "A Letter on Autonomy", Evreiskaya zhizn, no. 6, June 1904.
Source: As translated in "Israel Among the Nations : Selection of Zionist Texts" (ed. Zvi Zohar; Jerusalem : World Zionist Organization, Organization Department, Research Section, 1966). Reprinted in L. Brenner, 51 Documents, Barricade Books, 2002, pp. 7–20.

Marriage, People, Change

“The mention made by Maulana Abdul Hai of Hindu temples turned into mosques, is only the tip of an iceberg, The iceberg itself lies submerged in the writings of medieval Muslim historians, accounts of foreign travellers and the reports of the Archaeological Survey of India. A hue and cry has been raised in the name of secularism and national integration whenever the iceberg has chanced to surface, inspite of hectic efforts to keep it suppressed. Marxist politicians masquerading as historians have been the major contributors to this conspiracy of silence.”

Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist

.... The vast cradle of Hindu culture is literally littered with ruins of temples and monasteries belonging to all sects of Sanatana Dharma - Buddhist, Jain, Saiva, Shakta, Vaishnava and the rest. ... The story of how Islamic invaders sought to destroy the very foundations of Hindu society and culture is long and extremely painful. It would certainly be better for everybody to forget the past, but for the prescriptions of Islamic theology which remain intact and make it obligatory for believers to destroy idols and idol temples.
Hindu Temples – What Happened to Them, Volume I (1990)

Chance, Silence, Cry, Travel

“Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts has one-upped socialists Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: She proposes to nationalize every major business in the United States of America. If successful, it would constitute the largest seizure of private property in human history.”

Elizabeth Warren (1949) 28th United States Senator from Massachusetts

Kevin D. Williamson, Elizabeth Warren’s Batty Plan to Nationalize . . . Everything https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/08/elizabeth-warren-plan-nationalize-everything-woos-hard-left/, National Review, Aug 16, 2018

Business, History, Success

“The major obstacle and most difficult challenge in pursuit of a genuinely loving and caring relationship is to overcome the seductive powers and the addiction to the content approach to entering, creating, and maintaining it. The elusive golden thread of understanding lies in the how, and not the what.”

Herb Goldberg (1937–2019) American psychologist

Specifically, as gender polarization in a relationship decreases, the experience of it improves. Without that rebalancing, even the most perfect content will unravel increasingly. Once the process is balanced, the magic of having ideal content is no longer necessary. The rebalancing process which creates a relationship free of polarizing gender defenses is clearly difficult and threatening initially in the same way that giving up an addiction seems to be. Once achieved however, a relationship free of distortion, false illusions, resentment, and hopelessness truly becomes possible.
What Men Still Don't Know About Transforming Their Relationships, pp. 194–198
What Men Still Don't Know About Women, Relationships, and Love (2007)

Love, Making love, Understanding

“Professor Lal was already a veteran whose major book, History of the Khaljis, was compulsory reading for students of medieval Indian history from the undergraduate class onwards. I still find it very useful when I teach any course on the Delhi sultanate. … Historiographically the book fell entirely and conspicuously in the genre of nationalist historiography whose hallmark was its challenge· to the portrayal of medieval Indian history as a story of unrelenting conflict between the medieval Muslim rulers and their Hindu subjects. History of the Khaljis is one of the best works in this genre: empirically sound, objective in its assessment of events and persons, non-judgemental in its evaluation of the motives of rulers or their opponents. The remarkable quality gave the book a long life in the discipline, even when newer problematiques of socio-economic history began to displace the ones of dynastic history that had remained the preoccupation of the earlier generation.”

K. S. Lal (1920–2002) Indian historian

Harbans Mukhia, Obituary, The Indian Historical Review http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/037698360102800245

Reading, History, Personality, Books

“The Republican party is the permanent, dominant party at the North, and it is vain to think that you can put it down. It is true that the Republican party hates slavery, and that it is to be the permanent, dominant party at the North; and the majority being equivalent to the whole, as I have already stated, we cannot doubt the result.”

Henry L. Benning (1814–1875) Confederate Army general

Speech to the Virginia Convention (1861)

Thinking, Hate

“There’s about 30 full time volunteers here who are really fighting to try to raise the level of true independent art and make a point that this festival has become dominated by real elitist force because they have a top-heavy bureaucrat, just like the American government, just like the major media conglomerates. The guys at the top who are all making a shit load of money and they’re driving the people below them into oblivion, into poverty.”

Lloyd Kaufman (1945) American film director

CraveOnline http://www.craveonline.com/film/articles/507781-exclusive-cannes-interview-lloyd-kaufman-on-nuke-em-high May 28, 2013 2013

Money, Time, People, Art

“Indian Gold, Indian tea and Indian petrol to the nation: When car manufacturer Hyundai made her brand ambassador for their Getz model, production capacity doubled. She had not yet won a major tournament, but her fame was spreading well beyond Asia: soon she would be on the front of Time magazine and selected by the New Statesman as one of 10 young people with the potential to change the world.”

Sania Mirza (1986) Indian tennis player

India's most wanted

Time, People, Cars, World

“A longtime member of the Congress Party, he was its president for a time. He had a doctorate in law from Cambridge. He was elected, with support from Congress and leftist groups, as ninth president of India, that role is largely ceremonial, though its powers include discretion in choosing a prime minister if no party has a parliamentary majority.”

Shankar Dayal Sharma (1918–1999) Indian politician

Shankar Dayal Sharma, 81, Former President of India

Support, Time, Law

“He was not a weak president and he did indulge in politics. He cautioned Prime Minister Morarji Desai on appointment of V. Shankar as principal secretary, Further, he vetoed the outgoing Prime Minister Morarji Desai’s proposal for a broadcast to the nation after his resignation from the post. He also warned the caretaker Charan Singh government not to take any major policy decision.”

Neelam Sanjiva Reddy (1913–1996) sixth President of India

Singh Hoshiar, in: Indian Administration http://books.google.co.in/books?id=rBcciYfcNQIC&pg=PA41, Pearson Education India, p. 41

Decision

“A majority of Indians considered him an embodiment of obscurantism and obstinacy who espoused antediluvian, regressive and protectionist fiscal measures which sparked off an inflationary spiral in the Sixties.”

Morarji Desai (1896–1995) Former Indian Finance Minister, Freedom Fighters, Former prime minister

Obituary: Morarji Desai

“A few months back Major Terry and his pet student, Drosen, had brought in a guy from San Diego to play chess with me. I’d had no idea that he was rated and was really good, so I’d beaten his ass real fast. He’d gotten all mad at Major Terry and Drosen for not telling him that I was as good as I was. He’d accused them of setting him up to publicly embarrass him. I’d had no idea what the big fuss was all about. I hadn’t even realized that there was such a thing as tournaments and championships for chess just like we had in wrestling. I’d quit playing chess at school after that incident. Now I only played at home with my dad’s older friends, Roberto and Salvador Montoya, who’d both been very good chess players in Mexico City. I beat Roberto almost all the time, but his older brother Salvador beat me pretty regularly. And I’d recently been told that Salvador had been so good that he’d once gone to Cuba to play and that he’d come in third among some of the best international players in the world.”

Victor Villaseñor (1940) American writer

Crazy Loco Love: A Memoir (2008)

School, Home, Time, World

“The artist is a magician… nothing short of extraordinary … this is a staggering exhibition by a major artist.”

Anish Kapoor (1954) British contemporary artist of Indian birth

Concrete playground on Kapoor’s first major exhibition in Australia.
Exhibition: Anish Kapoor

“His gifted voice could exfoliate the contrasting emotions of anguish and ecstasy with equal felicity; his impassioned rendition of both the major melodies like a Thodi or Kalyan in their multifarious variations and their minor counterparts like Bhoop or Abhogi with equal aplomb. In either case, one could only marvel at his unfailing deep, powerful and penetrating vocalism. Equally emphatic was the way he could throw away the values and sanctity of sweetness to unleash a flurry of rollicking bol-taans, an exquisite feat which was not easily fathomable by any other artiste in living memory.”

Bhimsen Joshi (1922–2011) Indian vocalist

Critique

Way, Memory

“If one analyses his career graph closely, one can understand that the arrow always pointed upwards. There were no major jumps, no deep plummeting…”

Rajinikanth (1950) Indian actor

Dr Gayathri Sreekanth, in her well researched biography of the actor titled, The Name is Rajinikanth. “
Decoding Rajinikanth

Understanding

“Think back through all the eras of history—the major ones, the tiny obscure ones known only to scholars. Can you think of a man, ever, who was capable of fashioning the future development of mankind to suit his own idea of it—no matter how noble that ideal may have been? Wouldn’t that be just another form of opinion control—no matter how splendid the conception?”

Mark Clifton book They'd Rather Be Right

Kennedy did not turn around.
“It takes a great deal of faith in mankind to keep from directing it the way we think it should go,” he said at last.
Source: They'd Rather Be Right (1954), p. 92.

History, Future, Thinking, Idea

“A highly competent Bitch often deprecates herself by refusing to recognize her own superiority…. Bitches are among the most unsung of the unsung heroes of this society. They are the pioneers, the vanguard, the spearhead. Whether they want to be or not this is the role they serve just by their very being. Many would not choose to be the groundbreakers for the mass of women for whom they have no sisterly feelings but they cannot avoid it. Those who violate the limits, extend them; or cause the system to break…. Their major psychological oppression is not a belief that they are inferior but a belief that they are not…. Like most women they were taught to hate themselves as well as all women. In different ways and for different reasons perhaps, but the effect was similar. Internalization of a derogatory self-concept always results in a good deal of bitterness and resentment. This anger is usually either turned in on the self —making one an unpleasant person or on other women — reinforcing the social cliches about them. Only with political consciousness is it directed at the source — the social system…. We must be strong, we must be militant, we must be dangerous. We must realize that Bitch is Beautiful and that we have nothing to lose. Nothing whatsoever.”

Jo Freeman (1945) writer, lawyer

The BITCH Manifesto (Fall, 1968, © 1969) http://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/bitch.htm, as accessed Aug. 22, 2010 (also published as Joreen, The Bitch Manifesto, in Notes From the Second Year (N.Y.: Shulamith Firestone & Anne Koedt, 1970))

Anger, Hate, Personality, Beauty

“My plan was not to be a celebrity. My plan was to be a singer and an entertainer. I wanted to go to NYU, major in musical theater, do Broadway, and come out with an album. Unfortunately, I started fucking up when I was in my teens.”

Nicole Richie (1981) American television personality, musician, actress, and author

Source: [Harper's Bazaar, Partners In Crime, Harper'sBazaar, 2008, http://www.harpersbazaar.com/magazine/cover/paris-nicole-feature-0607, html, 2008-03-06]

Music

“About mid-day, Kesselring telephones me and tells me that we shall probably have to wait three or four days before our large-scale counter-measures begin to get under way. Until then there can be no major shift of developments in our favour. Kesselring is nevertheless in good heart. He is assured and full of character in his estimate of the situation and there is not a trace of defeatism with him. He tells me also that the attitude of the civil population has somewhat improved under the influence of our propaganda.”

Albert Kesselring (1885–1960) German Luftwaffe Generalfeldmarschall during World War II

Joseph Goebbels, diary entry, April 1, 1945.

Way, Waiting, Heart

“I became a philosophy major literally to understand why I should put up with this shit.”

Art Spiegelman (1948) cartoonist from the United States

After taking all the difficult art classes, Spiegelman was required to take the easy ones to obtain an arts major. He discusses here switching instead to a philosophy major; as quoted in "Breakfast with the FT: Art Spiegelman 'Drawn from Memory'" in Financial Times (29 November 2008).

Understanding

“More over, Sai Baba was a celibate, remaining in one place, performing miracles, admonishing his disciples, and keeping a fire perpetually burning at Shirdi. The functions of a Guru, ascetic and saint, Sai Baba adds that of Avatar as many of his devotees and followers consider him as major incarnation of this age.”

Sai Baba of Shirdi (1836–1918) Hindu and muslim saint

Stated by Charles S.J.White.[Sinha, K.N., Sai Baba: A Ray from the Supreme, http://books.google.com/books?id=o7A_TxQzx8kC&pg=PA80, 1 January 1997, Abhinav Publications, 978-81-7017-349-6, 80–]

Age

“We are going through a crucial historical crisis in which each year poses more acutely the global problem of rationally mastering the new productive forces and creating a new civilization. Yet the international working-class movement, on which depends the prerequisite overthrow of the economic infrastructure of exploitation, has registered only a few partial local successes. Capitalism has invented new forms of struggle (state intervention in the economy, expansion of the consumer sector, fascist governments) while camouflaging class oppositions through various reformist tactics and exploiting the degenerations of working-class leaderships. In this way it has succeeded in maintaining the old social relations in the great majority of the highly industrialized countries, thereby depriving a socialist society of its indispensable material base. In contrast, the underdeveloped or colonized countries, which over the last decade have engaged in the most direct and massive battles against imperialism, have begun to win some very significant victories. These victories are aggravating the contradictions of the capitalist economy and (particularly in the case of the Chinese revolution) could be a contributing factor toward a renewal of the whole revolutionary movement. Such a renewal cannot limit itself to reforms within the capitalist or anticapitalist countries, but must develop conflicts posing the question of power everywhere.”

Guy Debord (1931–1994) French Marxist theorist, writer, filmmaker and founding member of the Situationist International (SI)

About the Situationist International movement
Report on the Construction of Situations (1957)

Dependency, Question, Country, Success

“His name was William Saroyan. He was the first writer I fell in love with, boyishly in love. I was held by his unaffected voice, his sentimentality, his defiant individualism. I found myself in the stories he told… I learned from Saroyan that you do not have to live in some great city — in New York or Paris — in order to write… When I was a student at Stanford, a generation ago, the name of William Saroyan was never mentioned by any professor in the English Department. William Saroyan apparently was not considered a major American talent. Instead, we undergraduates set about the business of psychoanalyzing Hamlet and deconstructing Lolita.”

Richard Rodríguez (1944) American journalist and essayist

In my mind Saroyan belongs with John Steinbeck, a fellow small town Californian and of the same generation. He belongs with Thornton Wilder, with those writers whose aching love of America was formed by the Depression and the shadow of war. … Saroyan's prose is as plain as it is strong. He talks about the pleasure of drinking water from a hose on a summer afternoon in California's Central Valley, and he holds you with the pure line. My favorite is his novel The Human Comedy... In 1943, The Human Comedy became an MGM movie starring Mickey Rooney, but I always imagined Homer Macaulay as a darker, more soulful boy, someone who looked very much like a young William Saroyan... "Time Of Our Lives" (26 May 1997) http://www.cilicia.com/armo22_william_saroyan_6.html

Business, Love, Making love, Learning

“Both as ruling and ruled strata and both as a majority and minority, Protestants … have demonstrated a specific tendency toward economic rationalism.”

Max Weber book The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

This tendency has not been observed in the same way in the present or the past among Catholics, regardless of whether they were the dominant or dominated stratum or constituted a majority or minority. Therefore the cause of the different behavior must be mainly sought in the enduring inner quality of these religions and not only in their respective historical-political external situations.
Source: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905; 1920), Ch. 1 : Religious Affiliation and Social Stratification

“The mass-man is one who has neither the force of intellect to apprehend the principles issuing in what we know as the humane life, nor the force of character to adhere to those principles steadily and strictly as laws of conduct; and because such people make up the great and overwhelming majority of mankind, they are called collectively the masses.”

Albert Jay Nock (1870–1945) American journalist

The line of differentiation between the masses and the Remnant is set invariably by quality, not by circumstance. The Remnant are those who by force of intellect are able to apprehend these principles, and by force of character are able, at least measurably, to cleave to them. The masses are those who are unable to do either.
Source: Isaiah's Job (1936), II

Life, Making love, People, Law

“I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the civilized world: no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

Attributed in Shadow Kings (2005) by Mark Hill, p. 91; This and similar remarks are presented on the internet and elsewhere as an expression of regret for creating the Federal Reserve. The quotation appears to be fabricated from out-of-context remarks Wilson made on separate occasions: I have ruined my country. Attributed by Curtis Dall in FDR: My Exploited Father-in-Law, regarding Wilson's break with Edward M. House: "Wilson … evidenced similar remorse as he approached his end. Finally he said, 'I am a most unhappy man. Unwittingly I have ruined my country.'" A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit.… "Monopoly, Or Opportunity?" (1912), criticizing the credit situation before the Federal Reserve was created, in The New Freedom (1913), p. 185 We have come to be one of the worst ruled… Governments…. "Benevolence, Or Justice?" (1912), also in The New Freedom (1913), p. 201 The quotation has been analyzed in Andrew Leonard (2007-12-21), " The Unhappiness of Woodrow Wilson https://www.salon.com/2007/12/21/woodrow_wilson_federal_reserve/" Salon: I can tell you categorically that this is not a statement of regret for having created the Federal Reserve. Wilson never had any regrets for having done that. It was an accomplishment in which he took great pride. John M. Cooper, professor of history and author of several books on Wilson, as quoted by Andrew Leonard Misattributed

World, Country, Men

“His win today at the French Open, tying Pete Sampras’s record for major titles and the completion of a career grand slam firmly places him in a special place as the greatest player of all time. He has earned his place and he has proven he belongs. Roger is a champion for the ages.”

Roger Federer (1981) Swiss tennis player

Billie Jean King, winner of 39 Grand Slams, after Federer won the 2009 French Open Final http://sports.yahoo.com/ten/news?slug=reu-openfederergreat&prov=reuters&type=lgns

Time, Age

“What he’s done over the past five years has never, ever been done — and probably will never, ever happen again. Regardless if he won there or not, he goes down as the greatest ever. This just confirms it. Now that he has won in Paris, I think it just more solidifies his place in history as the greatest player that played the game, in my opinion. I’m a huge Laver fan, and he had a few years in there where he didn’t have an opportunity to win majors. But you can’t compare the eras. And in this era, the competition is much more fierce than Rod’s.”

Roger Federer (1981) Swiss tennis player

Pete Sampras, winner of 14 Grand Slams, after Federer winning 2009 French Open Final http://sports.yahoo.com/ten/news?slug=ap-frenchopen-sampras&prov=ap&type=lgns

Past, Game, Thinking, History

“My own opinion is enough for me, and I claim the right to have it defended against any consensus, any majority, anywhere, any place, any time. And anyone who disagrees with this can pick a number, get in line and kiss my ass.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

"Be It Resolved: Freedom of Speech Includes the Freedom to Hate," debate at University of Toronto, (2006-11-15). Hitchens argued the affirmative position. Info http://hhdce.sa.utoronto.ca/formaldebates_20062007.htm#20062007_3; video http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/1gmarchive/2007/03/free_speech_6.html. 2000s, 2006

Time, Kiss

“At the peremptory request of a large majority of the citizens of these United States, I, Joshua Norton, formerly of Algoa Bay, Cape of Good Hope, and now for the past nine years and ten months of San Francisco, California, declare and proclaim myself Emperor of these U. S., and in virtue of the authority thereby in me vested, do hereby order and direct the representatives of the different States of the Union to assemble in the Musical Hall of this city on the 1st day of February next, then and there to make such alterations in the existing laws of the Union as may ameliorate the evils under which the country is laboring, and thereby cause confidence to exist, both at home and abroad, in our stability and integrity.”

Emperor Norton (1811–1880) Self-proclaimed Emperor of the United States

Proclamation in the San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin (17 September 1859)

Home, Confidence, Law, Country

“Very often we will have the impression of having reached the end of the task, because we will find (or they will bring us) similar hairs of the one we seek; but since it is not known of any case where a hair has a knot in the middle without human hand intervention, we will almost always end up with the knot in question being a mere thickening of the caliber of the hair (although we do not know of any similar case) or a deposit of some silicate or any oxide produced by a long stay against a wet surface. It is probable that we will advance in this way through various sections of major and minor pipes, until we reach that place where no one will decide to penetrate: the main drain heading in the direction of the river, the torrential meeting of detritus in which no money, no boat, no bribe will allow us to continue the search.”

Julio Cortázar book Historias de cronopios y de famas

Historias de Cronopios y de Famas (1962)

Money, Question, Way, Search

“In those days I had seen little further than the old school of political economists into the possibilities of fundamental improvement in social arrangements. Private property, as now understood, and inheritance, appeared to me, as to them, the dernier mot of legislation: and I looked no further than to mitigating the inequalities consequent on these institutions, by getting rid of primogeniture and entails. The notion that it was possible to go further than this in removing the injustice -- for injustice it is, whether admitting of a complete remedy or not -- involved in the fact that some are born to riches and the vast majority to poverty, I then reckoned chimerical, and only hoped that by universal education, leading to voluntary restraint on population, the portion of the poor might be made more tolerable. In short, I was a democrat, but not the least of a Socialist. We were now much less democrats than I had been, because so long as education continues to be so wretchedly imperfect, we dreaded the ignorance and especially the selfishness and brutality of the mass: but our ideal of ultimate improvement went far beyond Democracy, and would class us decidedly under the general designation of Socialists. While we repudiated with the greatest energy that tyranny of society over the individual which most Socialistic systems are supposed to involve, we yet looked forward to a time when society will no longer be divided into the idle and the industrious; when the rule that they who do not work shall not eat, will be applied not to paupers only, but impartially to all; when the division of the produce of labour, instead of depending, as in so great a degree it now does, on the accident of birth, will be made by concert on an acknowledged principle of justice; and when it will no longer either be, or be thought to be, impossible for human beings to exert themselves strenuously in procuring benefits which are not to be exclusively their own, but to be shared with the society they belong to. The social problem of the future we considered to be, how to unite the greatest individual liberty of action, with a common ownership in the raw material of the globe, and an equal participation of all in the benefits of combined labour. We had not the presumption to suppose that we could already foresee, by what precise form of institutions these objects could most effectually be attained, or at how near or how distant a period they would become practicable. We saw clearly that to render any such social transformation either possible or desirable, an equivalent change of character must take place both in the uncultivated herd who now compose the labouring masses, and in the immense majority of their employers. Both these classes must learn by practice to labour and combine for generous, or at all events for public and social purposes, and not, as hitherto, solely for narrowly interested ones. But the capacity to do this has always existed in mankind, and is not, nor is ever likely to be, extinct. Education, habit, and the cultivation of the sentiments, will make a common man dig or weave for his country, as readily as fight for his country. True enough, it is only by slow degrees, and a system of culture prolonged through successive generations, that men in general can be brought up to this point. But the hindrance is not in the essential constitution of human nature. Interest in the common good is at present so weak a motive in the generality not because it can never be otherwise, but because the mind is not accustomed to dwell on it as it dwells from morning till night on things which tend only to personal advantage. When called into activity, as only self-interest now is, by the daily course of life, and spurred from behind by the love of distinction and the fear of shame, it is capable of producing, even in common men, the most strenuous exertions as well as the most heroic sacrifices. The deep-rooted selfishness which forms the general character of the existing state of society, is so deeply rooted, only because the whole course of existing institutions tends to foster it; modern institutions in some respects more than ancient, since the occasions on which the individual is called on to do anything for the public without receiving its pay, are far less frequent in modern life, than the smaller commonwealths of antiquity.”

John Stuart Mill book Autobiography

Source: Autobiography (1873)
Source: https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/230/mode/1up pp. 230-233

Fight, Love, Fear, Problem

“I consequently remained long, and in a less degree have always remained, inexpert in anything requiring manual dexterity; my mind as well as my hands, did its work very lamely when it was applied, or ought to have been applied, to the practical details which, as they are the chief interest of life to the majority of men, are also the things in which whatever mental capacity they have, chiefly shows itself: I was constantly meriting reproof by inattention, inobservance, and general slackness of mind in matters of daily life. My father was the extreme opposite in these particulars: his senses and mental faculties were always on the alert; he carried decision and energy of character in his whole manner and into every action of life: and this, as much as his talents, contributed to the strong impression which he always made upon those with whom he came into personal contact. But the children of energetic parents, frequently grow up unenergetic, because they lean on their parents, and the parents are energetic for them.”

John Stuart Mill book Autobiography

Source: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/36/mode/1up pp. 36–37

Personality, Men, Children, Parent

“It seems to be a fact of life that human beings cannot continue to do wrong without eventually reaching out for some thin rationalization to clothe the obvious wrong in the beautiful garments of righteousness. The philosopher-psychologist William James used to talk a great deal about the stream of consciousness. He says that the very interesting and unique thing about human nature is that man had the capacity temporarily to block the stream of consciousness and place anything in it that he wants to, and so we often end up justifying the rightness of the wrong. This is exactly what happened during the days of slavery. Even the Bible and religion were misused to crystallize the patterns of the status quo. And so it was argued from pulpits across the nation that the Negro was inferior by nature, because of Noah’s curse upon the children of Ham. The apostle Paul’s dictum became a watchword: Servants, be obedient to your master. And then one brother had probably studied the logic of the great philosopher Aristotle. You know Aristotle did a great deal to bring into being what we know as formal logic, and he talked about the syllogism, which had a major premise and a minor premise and a conclusion. And so this brother could put his argument in the framework of an Aristotelian syllogism. He could say, All men are made in the image of God. This was the major premise; then came the minor premise: God, as everybody knows, is not a Negro. Therefore, the Negro is not a man. This was the type of reasoning that prevailed.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, Address to Cornell College (1962)

God, Clothes, Religion, Study

“An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history; conviction results from whatever offense or offenses two-thirds of the other body considers to be sufficiently serious to require removal of the accused from office.”

Gerald Ford (1913–2006) American politician, 38th President of the United States (in office from 1974 to 1977)

Remarks in the U.S. House of Representatives in an effort to impeach Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas (15 April 1970); recorded in the Congressional Record, vol. 116, p. 11913 and http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Senate_Impeachment_Role.htm. 1970s

Housing, History

“We've reached a truly remarkable situation: a grotesque mismatch between the American intelligencia and the American electorate. A philosophical opinion about the nature of the universe which is held by the vast majority of top American scientists, and probably the majority of the intelligencia generally, is so abhorrent to the American electorate that no candidate for popular election dare affirm it in public. If I'm right, this means that high office in the greatest country in the world is barred to the very people best qualified to hold it: the intelligencia, unless they are prepared to lie about their beliefs. To put it bluntly American political opportunities are heavily loaded against those who are simultaneously intelligent and honest.”

Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author

Richard Dawkins on militant atheism http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/richard_dawkins_on_militant_atheism.html, (February 2002)

Country, Intelligence, People, Nature

“I am certain that, at some time in the future, President Xi and I, together with President Putin of Russia, will start talking about a meaningful halt to what has become a major and uncontrollable Arms Race. The U.S. spent 716 Billion Dollars this year. Crazy!”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

Twitter 7:30 AM https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1069584730880974849?fbclid · (3 Dec 2018) 2010s, 2018, December

Future, Time

“Socialism, is in short a manifestation of mental illness or major character deficiency.”

Trevor Loudon New Zealand politician

"Are Socialists Psychos?" https://www.trevorloudon.com/2006/12/are-socialists-psychos/

“Now as long as the people having their stuff taken away from them are in the minority and the majority feels that they get to benefit from more said taken stuff, you'll always be able to win that decision through a popular vote and claim the moral high ground through democracy.”

Steven Crowder (1987) American actor

Democracy, People, Feeling, Decision

“Hardly anyone expected the American uprising to succeed. Thousands of colonists emigrated to Canada or hid in the woods, certain that the king's armies would tear the colonial regiments to shreds. Nor did a majority of the people support the struggle for independence, even in theory. Historians estimate that one-third favored independence, one-third favored retaining British ties, and one-third were indifferent.”

Marilyn Ferguson (1938–2008) American writer

The Aquarian Conspiracy (1980), Chapter Five, The American Matrix for Transformation

Indifference, Support, People, Tear

“In mathematics, as in any scientific research, we find two tendencies... [T]he tendency toward abstraction seeks to crystallize the logical relations inherent in the maze of material in a systematic and orderly manner. On the other hand, the tendency toward intuitive understanding fosters a more immediate grasp of the objects... a live rapport with them... which stresses the concrete meaning of their relations. ...[I]ntuitive understanding plays a major role in geometry. ...[S]uch concrete intuition is of great value not only for the research worker, but... for anyone who wishes to study and appreciate the results of research in geometry.”

David Hilbert Geometry and the Imagination

Preface
Geometry and the Imagination (1952)

Relation ships, Study, Mathematics, Understanding

“There has never been a time, until the last fifty years, when a majority of any population had regular and constant access to drama, and used this access. . . . It seems probable that in societies like Britain and the United States more drama is watched in a week or weekend, by the majority of viewers, than would have been watched in a year or in some cases a lifetime in any previous historical period. It is clearly one of the unique characteristics of advanced industrial societies that drama as an experience is now an intrinsic part of everyday life, at a quantitative level which is so very much greater than any precedent as to seem a fundamental qualitative change. Whatever the social and cultural reasons may finally be, it is clear that watching dramatic simulation of a wide range of experiences is now an essential part of our modern cultural pattern.”

Raymond Williams (1921–1988) philosopher

Television: Technology and Cultural Form

Life, Time, Parting, Change

“Let me be absolutely clear: in terms of potential deaths and the impact on our economy, the crisis we face from coronavirus is on the scale of a major war, and we must act accordingly. Nobody knows how many fatalities we may see, but they could equal or surpass the U.S. casualties we saw in World War II. It is an absolute moral imperative that our response -- as a government, as a society, as business communities, and as individuals -- meets the enormity of this crisis... If our neighbor or co-worker gets sick, we have the potential to get sick. If our neighbors lose their jobs, then our local economies suffer, and we may lose our jobs. If doctors and nurses do not have the equipment and staffing capacity they need now, people we know and love may die. The American people deserve transparency... We need daily information -- clear, science-based information -- from credible scientific voices, not politicians.”

Bernie Sanders (1941) American politician, senator for Vermont

2020

Science, Death, Business, War

“I want to stress that for the vast majority of the people of this country, we should be going about our business as usual.”

Boris Johnson (1964) British politician, historian and journalist

2020s, 2020 Source: As quoted in Coronavirus: Up to fifth of UK workers 'could be off sick at same time' https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-51718917, 3 March 2020, BBC News.

Business, People, Country

“The influence of literary theory on its related disciplines has prompted much debate about the notion of ‘authorship’. Yet the attraction of exploring architecture, or more specifically a building, through the life of its architect (author) remains a significant force in the construction of its histories. This is particularly the case when the architect has been identified as a major figure in the evolution of the architectural history. Conversely, buildings without architects are pushed to the sidelines of history.”

Dana Arnold (1961) Middlessex uni prof

Source: Reading Architectural History (2002), Ch. 2 : The authority of the author : Biography and the reconstruction of the canon

Life, Relation ships, History

“To my mind, the Agni Yoga teachings constitute one of the major attempts of Hierarchy to prepare humanity for the new age. They are entirely relevant to the present----and future time. The first book of the series, The Call, was given by Maitreya Himself, and was intended to alert disciples to the fact of His imminent return. The Master Morya, as I have said elsewhere, is one of the first group of Masters to be seen by humanity, and is the stimulus behind the occult groups of all kinds. His immediate task is to regenerate and purify the teaching of these groups... [The Agni Yoga Teachings were given] by mental telepathy through Helena Roerich (a disciple of the Master Morya) in Russian... My information is that The Call is His [Maitreya's] sole personal contribution to the Agni Yoga series.. The Call is also titled: Leaves of Morya’s Garden, I.”

Benjamin Creme (1922–2016) artist, author, esotericist

Source: Maitreya's Mission Vol. I (1986), p. 300/1

Time, Personality, Future, Books

“Once a virus gets into an intensive poultry shed it can move quickly through the flock, constantly replicating itself. Any "errors" or changes to the genetic code during replication don't get repaired: this is how the virus mutates and new variant strains emerge. The tragedy is that while intensive farms provide ideal conditions for the emergence of new aggressive disease strains, wild birds can then become infected too. Experience from the 2005 outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza (AI) H5N1 suggests that the disease is more likely spread along major road and rail routes than on the flight routes of migratory birds.”

Philip Lymbery book Farmageddon

Farmageddon (2014)

Bird, Error, Disease, Change

“The hope for real social transformation need not rest on circumstantial evidence. One major arena, health care, has already begun to experience wrenching change. The impending transformation of medicine is a window to the transformation of all our institutions. Here we can see what happens when consumers begin to withdraw legitimacy from an authoritarian institution. We see the rise of the autonomous health seeker, the transformation of a profession by its leadership, the impact of the new models from science, the way decentralized networks are effecting wide geographic change.”

Marilyn Ferguson (1938–2008) American writer

The Aquarian Conspiracy (1980), Chapter Eight, Healing Ourselves

Hope, Health, Way, Science

“We need a major shift in the U.S. approach toward Russia...The lives -- and even existence -- of future generations are at stake in the relationship between Washington and Moscow... The incessant drumbeat is in sync with what Martin Luther King Jr. called “the madness of militarism.”

Norman Solomon (1951) American journalist, media critic, antiwar activist

Hostile Propaganda: Contempt for diplomacy with Russia is now extreme (16 July 2018)

Future, Madness

“The oligarchy understands that a “divide-and-conquer” strategy gives them more room to get what they want without opposition... oligarchies cannot hold on to power forever... When a vast majority of people come to view an oligarchy as illegitimate and an obstacle to their wellbeing, oligarchies become vulnerable. As bad as it looks right now, the great strength of this country is our resilience. We bounce back. We have before. We will again. In order for real change to occur – in order to reverse the vicious cycle in which we now find ourselves – the locus of power in the system will have to change. The challenge we face is large and complex, but we are well suited for the fight ahead. Together, we will dismantle the oligarchy. Together, we will fix the system.”

Robert B. Reich (1946) American political economist

The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/the-system-is-rigged-but-we-can-fix-it/, Alternet, 24 March 2020

Understanding, Country, Bad luck, People

“The coronavirus has starkly revealed what most of us already knew: The concentration of wealth in America has created a health care system in which the wealthy can buy care others can’t. It’s also created an education system in which the super-rich can buy admission to college for their children, a political system in which they can buy Congress and the presidency, and a justice system in which they can buy their way out of jail... The system is rigged. But we can fix it... The great divide in American politics isn’t between right and left. The underlying contest is between a small minority who have gained power over the system, and the vast majority who have little or none. Forget politics as you’ve come to see it – as contests between Democrats and Republicans. The real divide is between democracy and oligarchy....”

Robert B. Reich (1946) American political economist

The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/the-system-is-rigged-but-we-can-fix-it/, Alternet, 24 March 2020

Democracy, Justice, Forgetting, Wealth

“But Confucianism was not merely the official philosophy of the Chinese administration. Confucius ideals were accepted by the majority of the Chinese people, and for over two thousand years deeply influenced their life and thought.”

Michael H. Hart book The 100

about Confucius, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History p. 29/30
Muhammad, Confucius

Life, People

“The facts are as exhaustive as they are exhausting. There’s one simple conclusion from all of this. We’ve been tricked. We’ve been told that America, like most other majority-white countries, deserves the title “developed economy.””

Mona Chalabi (1987) British data journalist

It does not. You cannot charge a woman $39.95 to hold the baby that she has just given birth to. You cannot constantly operate hospitals at close to capacity in order to maximize profits. The pursuit of private money in systems built for public good has not worked ethically or practically.
Coronavirus is revealing how broken America’s economy really is, 6 April 2020

Country

“The image of the enterprise as a place where employees can achieve personal fulfilment is therefore an essentially ideological invention. It conceals the real transformations that have taken place, namely that enterprises are replacing labour by machines, producing more and better with a decreasing percentage of the workforce previously employed, and offering privileges to a chosen elite of workers, which are accompanied by unemployment, precarious employment, de-skilling and lack of job security for the majority. The advance of technology has thus resulted in the segmentation and disintegration of the working class. An elite has been won over to collaboration with capital in the name of work ethic; the great mass of workers have become marginalized or lost their job security and serve as a reserve army for industry which wishes to be able to adjust its workforce rapidly according to fluctuations in demand.”

André Gorz (1923–2007) austrian philosopher

p. 66 https://books.google.com/books?id=WbpvDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA66 Critique of Economic Reason, 1988

Personality