Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

“The leftist is anti-individualistic... He is not the sort of person who has an inner sense of confidence in his own ability to solve his own problems and satisfy his own needs.”
― Theodore Kaczynski

“It has been said that terror is the principle of despotic government. Does your government therefore resemble despotism? Yes, as the sword that gleams in the hands of the heroes of liberty resembles that with which the henchmen of tyranny are armed ... The government of the revolution is liberty's despotism against tyranny. Is force made only to protect crime”
― Maximilien Robespierre

“The reason all the 'intellectuals' â€� Sartre and Marx, Hemingway and Hellman â€� (. . .) are Leftists is that a defining characteristic of the 'intellectual' is the belief, stemming from inane notions of the perfectibility of man, that he can sit in a darkened room and purely by thinking, create a new heaven and a new earth, utopia, the eschaton immanentized. Rubbish, of course, but there you have it.”
― Markham Shaw Pyle

“We are often told that the poor are grateful for charity. Some of them are, no doubt, but the best amongst the poor are never grateful. They are ungrateful, discontented, disobedient, and rebellious. They are quite right to be so. Charity they feel to be a ridiculously inadequate mode of partial restitution, or a sentimental dole, usually accompanied by some impertinent attempt on the part of the sentimentalist to tyrannise over their private lives. Why should they be grateful for the crumbs that fall from the rich man’s table? They should be seated at the board, and are beginning to know it.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man Under Socialism

“Instead of feeling any need to persuade, people who are certain they are correct can impose their beliefs by force. In theocracies and autocracies, authorities censor, imprison, exile or burn those with the wrong opinions. In democracies the force is less brutish, but people still find means to impose a belief rather than argue for it.”
― Steven Pinker, Rationality

“As 1968 began to ebb into 1969, however, and as "anticlimax" began to become a real word in my lexicon, another term began to obtrude itself. People began to intone the words "The Personal is The Political." At the instant I first heard this deadly expression, I knew as one does from the utterance of any sinister bullshit that it was - cliché is arguably forgiven here - very bad news. From now on it would be enough to be a member of a sex or gender, or epidermal subdivision, or even erotic "preference," to qualify as a revolutionary. In order to begin a speech or ask a question from the floor, all that would be necessary by way of preface would be the words: "Speaking as a..." The could follow any self-loving description. I will have to say this much for the old "hard" Left: we earned our claim to speak and intervene by right of experience and sacrifice and work. It would never have done for any of us to stand up and say that our sex or sexuality pr pigmentation or disability were qualifications in themselves. There are many ways of dating the moment when The Left lost - or I would prefer to say, discarded its moral advantage, but this was the first time that I was to see the sellout conducted so cheaply.”
― Christopher Hitchens, Hitch 22: A Memoir

“If the political left weren't so joyless, humorless, intrusive, taxing, over-taxing, anarchistic, controlling, rudderless, chaos-prone, pedantic, unrealistic, hypocritical, clueless, politically correct, angry, cruel, sanctimonious, retributive, redistributive, intolerant, and if the political left wasn't hell-bent on expansion of said unpleasantness into all aspects of my family's life the truth is: I would not be in your life. If the democratic party were run by Joe Lieberman and Evan Bayh, if it had the slightest vestige of JFK and Henry "Scoop" Jackson I wouldn't be on the political map. If the American media were run by biased but not evil Tim Russert and David Brinkley types I wouldn't have joined the fight. You would not know who I am. The left made me do it, I swear, I am a reluctant cultural warrior.”
― Andrew Breitbart

“The most dangerous trap for feminists lies in thinking that our current political options are limited to two: on the one hand, a “progressiveâ€� variant of neoliberalism, which diffuses an elitist, corporate version of feminism to cast an emancipatory veneer over a predatory, oligarchic agenda; on the other, a reactionary variant of neoliberalism, which pursues a similar, plutocratic agenda by other means—deploying misogynist and racist tropes to burnish its “populistâ€� credentials. Certainly, these two forces are not identical. But both are mortal enemies of a genuinely emancipatory and majoritarian feminism. Plus, they are mutually enabling: progressive neoliberalism created the conditions for the rise of reactionary populism and is now positioning itself as the go-to alternative to it.”
― Cinzia Arruzza, Feminism for the 99%: A Manifesto

“They [feminists] share the instinct for tyranny and destruction - and they are filled with self-loathing. In the end, leftist feminists yearn to submit to, and submerge themselves within, a despotic monolith. Because they despise their own society and are bent on its destruction, they cannot concede that adversarial cultures may be more evil, because that would legitimize their own host society - and they can't allow that. It would rob them of the moral indignation -- and the identity of being victims -- that lies at the foundation of their politics of hate.”
― Jamie Glazov

“Leftists are brainless, rightists are heartless.”
― Sercan Leylek

“YOU DON’T HAVE TO ALWAYS TAKE SIDES!

Did you know, that it is entirely possible to disagree with BOTH self-proclaimed nationalists & those deemed anti-nationals, BOTH right-wing & left-wing hardcores, BOTH ultra-religious people & atheists, BOTH vegans & meat-eaters, BOTH CrossFitters & non-CrossFitters, BOTH ‘cardio� & ‘non-cardio� folks, AND BOTH ‘low-carbers� & ‘high-carbers�?!

It’s called THINKING FOR YOURSELF! It gives you an identity. It‘s a highly pleasurable job too; it involves telling people off. I highly recommend it!”
― Dr. Deepak S. Hiwale aka 'Dr Dee'

“Yet only the economic in the narrow sense will allow us to get beyond the economic. By redeploying the resources capitalism has so considerately stored up for us, socialism can allow the economic to take more of a backseat. It will not evaporate, but it will become less obtrusive. To enjoy a sufficiency of goods means not to have to think about money all the time. It frees us for less tedious pursuits. Far from being obsessed with economic matters, Marx saw them as a travesty of true human potential. He wanted society where the economic no longer monopolised so much time and energy.

That our ancestors should have been so preoccupied with material matters is understandable. When you can produce only a slim economic surplus, or scarcely any surplus at all, you will perish without ceaseless hard labour. Capitalism, however, generates the sort of surplus that really could be used to increase leisure on a sizeable scale. The irony is that it creates this wealth in a way that demands constant accumulation and expansion, and thus constant labour. It also creates it in ways that generate poverty and hardship. It is a self-thwarting system. As a result, modern men and women, surrounded by an affluence unimaginable to hunter-gatherers, ancient slaves or feudal serfs, end up working as long and hard as these predecessors ever did.

Marx's work is all about human enjoyment. The good life for him is not one of labour but of leisure.”
― Terry Eagleton, Why Marx Was Right

“It is easier to attain Marx's goal, however, if you do not have to rely on everyone being morally magnificent all the time. Socialism is not a society which requires resplendent virtue of its citizens. It does not mean that we have to be wrapped around each other all the time in some great orgy of togetherness. This is because the mechanisms which would allow Marx's goal to be approached would actually be built into social institutions. They would not rely in the first place on the goodwill of the individual.... One would expect any socialist institution to have its fair share of chancers, toadies, bullies, cheats, loafers, scroungers, freeloaders, free riders and occasional psychopaths...Communism would not spell the end of human strife. Only the literal end of history would do that. Envy, aggression, domination, possessiveness and competition would still exist. It is just that they could not take the forms they assume under capitalism - not because of some superior human virtue, but because of a change of institutions. These vices would no longer be bound up with the exploitation of child labour, colonial violence, grotesque social inequalities and cutthroat economic competition. Instead, they would have to assume some other form. Tribal societies have their fair share of violence, rivalry and hunger for power, but these things cannot take the form of imperial warfare, free-market competition or mass unemployment, because such institutions do not exist among the Nuer or the Dinka. There are villains everywhere you look, but only some of these moral ruffians are so placed as to be able to steal pension funds or pump the media full of lying political propaganda. Most gangsters are not in a position to do so. Instead, they have to content themselves with hanging people from meat hooks. In a socialist society, nobody would be in a position to do so. This is not because they would be too saintly, but because there would be no private pension funds or privately owned media. Shakespeare's villains had to find outlets for their wickedness other than firing missiles at Palestinian refugees. You cannot be a bullying industrial magnate if there isn't any industry around.”
― Terry Eagleton, Why Marx Was Right

“First get to work; you can enjoy yourself afterwards! Such is the recurring, rhyming themesong that is passed down into the head, programming militarily the rhythm of the body’s movements. Such is, in its numbing insistance, the tune that orchestrates the retreat of nascent intelligence. And rest assured â€� it will be a different intelligence that ends up in charge over the frozen behavior of working hours, an intelligence in which heart counts the least and is petrified the most.”
― Raoul Vaneigem

“The economy has ceased hiding itself behind mystifying words like God, devil, fatality, grace, damnation, nature, progress, duty, and necessity, with which, over the years, it gave itself an inescapable credibility. It no longer troubles itself with the frilly liberals, it is no longer bothered by the leninists in blue jeans â€� it laughs at the idea of taking any great leaps while wearing fascist jackboots or socialist bootees. It’s so simple and obvious it stands naked, and its omnipresence makes it familiar and familial.

Reduced to the final necessity of survival, the economy brings together all its past lies; the lie that there is no hope for humanity’s survival outside of the economy.”
― Raoul Vaneigem

“The real-world experiments of comparing socialist-communist countries and capitalist ones have been repeated on countless occasions, and the data could not be any clearer that socialist-communist societies produce poverty and misery and capitalist societies produce prosperity and happiness.”
― Gad Saad, The Saad Truth about Happiness: 8 Secrets for Leading the Good Life

“Not surprisingly, historically speaking, dictators have always despised the use of humor, precisely because they recognize that their hold over people is ultimately fragile, based on force and lies, and humor undermines their rule.”
― Gad Saad, The Saad Truth about Happiness: 8 Secrets for Leading the Good Life

“The values of the Left come and go like fashion trends. Every 3rd generation tie-dye shirts, Socialism, and bell bottoms come back into fashion.”
― A.E. Samaan

“The political establishment is vulnerable. And if we make our numbers count, we can change anything.”
― Nathan J. Robinson, Why You Should Be a Socialist

“It is worth stressing Marx's concern with the individual, since it runs clean contrary to the usual caricature of his work. In this view, Marxism is all about faceless collectives which ride roughshod over personal life. Nothing, in fact, could be more alien to Marx's thought. One might say that the free flourishing of individuals is the whole aim of his politics, as long as we remember that these individuals must find some way of flourishing in common. To assert one's individuality, he writes in The Holy Family, is “the vital manifestation of [one's] being." This, one might claim, is Marx's morality from start to finish.”
― Terry Eagleton, Why Marx Was Right

“The Fourth International, we answer, has no need of being “proclaimed.â€� It exists and it fights. It is weak? Yes, its ranks are not numerous because it is still young. They are as yet chiefly cadres. But these cadres are pledges for the future. Outside these cadres there does not exist a single revolutionary current on this planet really meriting the name. If our international be still weak in numbers, it is strong in doctrine, program, tradition, in the incomparable tempering of its cadres. Who does not perceive this today, let him in the meantime stand aside. Tomorrow it will become more evident.”
― Leon Trotsky

“Individual safety and prosperity at the expense of solidarity can only ever replicate capitalist hierarchies and the violent means imposing them. If you view your emancipation as separate from mine, we will forever be locked in an unwinnable competition.”
― Mychal Denzel Smith, Stakes Is High: Life After the American Dream

“How can you tell it’s the end of an era? When a suddenly intolerable present crystallizes in a short period of time what was so uneasily put up with in the past. And everyone is suddenly quite easily convinced that he or she is either going to be reborn in the birth of a new world, or die in the archaic netherworld of a society less and less adapted to the living.”
― Raoul Vaneigem

“The most heartening response came not from the book pages in the press
but from real incidents in the streets. The girl who was quietly reading Open
Veins to her companion in a bus in Bogotá, and finally stood up and read it
aloud to all the passengers. The woman who fled from Santiago in the days of
the Chilean bloodbath with this book wrapped inside her baby's diapers. The
student who went from one bookstore to another for a week in Buenos Aires's
Calle Corrientes, reading bits of it in each store because he hadn't the money to
buy it.
And the most favorable reviews came not from any prestigious critic but
from the military dictatorships that praised the book by banning it. For example,
Open Veins is unobtainable either in my country, Uruguay, or in Chile; in
Argentina the authorities denounced it on TV and in the press as a corrupter of
youth, As Blas de Otero remarked, "They don't let people see what I write
because I write what I see.”
― Eduardo Galeano, Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent

“Los estudiantes universitarios de hoy han vivido unos tiempos extraordinarios y, en consecuencia, muchos de ellos han desarrollado una extraordinaria pasión por la justicia social.”
― Jonathan Haidt, The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting up a Generation for Failure

“...the leftists sometimes assume that their moral beliefs about the way the world should be have a greater impact on reality than they actually do. For example, a secular leftist might oppose religion, and believe that the world would be a better place without it.”
― Avi Tuschman, Our Political Nature: The Evolutionary Origins of What Divides Us

“In practice, self-deceptive altruism allows leftist dictators to extol the egalitarian virtues of their ideology, while systematically violating every egalitarian promise.”
― Avi Tuschman, Our Political Nature: The Evolutionary Origins of What Divides Us

“Humans thrive -in every way: economically and in their pursuit of happiness- when given the freedom to instantiate their individuality. This is precisely why East Germany had walls meant to stop its citizens from fleeing to the West. Too many East Germans knew that if they could escape from the -utopian egalitarianism- of communism, they would flourish and be happy in the capitalist West. It is the same reason that for more than six decades Cubans have risked shark-infested waters to seek freedom and happiness on the shores of the United States. Political and economic systems that are antithetical to human nature inevitably produce unhappiness.”
― Gad Saad, The Saad Truth about Happiness: 8 Secrets for Leading the Good Life

“Truth is anti-fragile. It is not brittle. It does not shatter into a million pieces because of an -offensive and hurtful- joke. An individual with a strong personhood can laugh at others (in a playful manner) and laugh at himself. Humor is a test of anti-fragility and non-brittleness in a person and in a society. A society that can’t laugh at others and at itself in a good-humored way is on its way out.”
― Gad Saad, The Saad Truth about Happiness: 8 Secrets for Leading the Good Life