no. 149

"New Year's eve is like every other night; there is no pause in the march of the universe, no breathless moment of silence among created things that the passage of another twelve months may be noted; and yet no man has quite the same thoughts this evening that come with the coming of darkness on other nights."

Hamilton Wright Mabie

no. 148

no. 147

"Here’s what you need to realise about anti-racism: It’s not about you. It’s not about your feelings as a white person. What you just said is that you’ll entertain the idea of listening to POC talk about ways they’ve been fucked over by whiteness, white privilege, and white people as long as they don’t hurt your feelings.

To put it another way: you’re saying that not having your feelings hurt is more important to you than actually trying to understand PoC’s experiences of enduring racism—which is, itself, perpetuating racism. No, maybe you didn’t partake in whatever act of racism we’re talking about in this very moment, but if you’re white, then you are benefiting from the systemic racism that allowed it to happen, whether you like it or not.

Yes, listening to the ways that your privilege fucks over other people is uncomfortable. Yes, it can be embarrassing & lead to feelings of guilt, but it is not up to People of Color to censor ourselves to spare your delicate fee-fees. If you truly want to be considered anti-racist, you need to deal with those feelings with other white people & not add to the burden of PoC’s experiences of racism by saying that you won’t take us seriously unless we’re ‘nice’ about the emotional & psychological violence that we endure simply by being PoC in a racist society.

So literally, all I want you to do is understand that being anti-oppression (of any kind) is about understanding how the oppressed group is affected & then countering those systems, activities, mindsets, etc. It’s not about you being comfortable, because if you’re doing it right, it’s not going to be comfortable. Period."

findalaska commenting at Clever girl

no. 146

"Parents are not interested in justice — they want QUIET!

Bill Cosby, from the film "Himself"

no. 145

"Marriage is a human right, not a reward for being heterosexual."

Phillip Gulley from pulpit of Mayflower Congregational Church.

no. 144

"Gross ignorance is 144 times worse than ordinary ignorance."

Bennett Cerf

no. 143 - Merry Christmas!

"Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas."

Calvin Coolidge

no. 142

“Even as an adult I find it difficult to sleep on Christmas Eve. Yuletide excitement is a potent caffeine, no matter your age.”

Carrie Latet

no. 141

“I find it ironic that Republicans have such disdain for the lazy, and yet their solution to everything is do nothing. Their answer to wealth inequality? Do nothing. Healthcare? Do nothing. Climate change? Nothing. Racism? Doesn’t exist. For a group of people so head over heels in love with self-reliance, they sure do recommend a lot of sitting on (one’s) ass.

If A Christmas Carol was performed by the Tea Party Dramatic Society, it would be a cautionary tale about how the hero, Scrooge — a blameless job creator — is turned into a socialist through the corrupting influence of Tiny Tim. And the play would end with a simple, plaintive question from Mr. Scrooge: ‘Just how much of my wealth does Mr. Tim think he’s entitled to?’

And that is the great Republican fallacy of this election: that our economic problem are due not to Wall Street’s gambling, but because too many Americans are lazy. But there are 16 million unemployed, and we only created 80,000 jobs last month. The problem isn’t laziness — it’s math.

This is where the Republican Party is now: in favor of people dying because they don’t have health insurance. In favor of letting people go unfed if they won’t work. And if they wanna work, but are Mexicans, in favor of putting up a fence that electrocutes them.”

BILL MAHER, Real Time

no. 140

"Do you think that your 16 year old daughter hasn’t masturbated already? Like, do you really think there’s anything in that scene that this chick hasn’t already tried when the lights go out at night, or in the bathroom, or in the tub, or with the shower head or something like that? I’m telling you, man, I’m not teaching this broad anything new. If I were to create a rating system, I wouldn’t even put murder right at the top of the chief offenses. I would put rape right at the top, and assault against women. Because it’s so insanely overused and insulting how much it’s overused in movies as a plot device, a woman in peril. That, to me, is offensive, yet that shit skates."

Kevin Smith (director) on the ridiculousness of movies about sex receiving NC-17 ratings while extremely violent movies get by with R ratings.

no. 139

"And I am pretty sure that’s the point of reading fiction — so someone else can say, in a way you never would have, something you recognize immediately."

Curtis Sittenfeld

no. 138

"To me, there is no greater act of courage than being the one who kisses first."

Janeane Garofalo.

no. 137

no. 136

"What am I in the eyes of most people - a nonentity, an eccentric, or an unpleasant person - somebody who has no position in society and will never have; in short, the lowest of the low. All right, then - even if that were absolutely true, then I should one day like to show by my work what such an eccentric, such a nobody, has in his heart. That is my ambition, based less on resentment than on love in spite of everything, based more on a feeling of serenity than on passion."

Vincent van Gogh, writing to Theo van Gogh, July 1882

"Irises"

no. 135

“[Women’s magazines]ignore older women or pretend that they don’t exist; magazines try to avoid photographs of older women, and when they feature celebrities who are over sixty, ‘retouching artists’ conspire to ‘help’ beautiful women look more beautiful, ie less than their age…By now readers have no idea what a real woman’s 60 year old face looks like in print because it’s made to look 45. Worse, 60 year old readers look in the mirror and think they are too old, because they’re comparing themselves to some retouched face smiling back at them from a magazine.”

Dalma Heyn

(via)

no. 134

"I don’t have an issue with what you do in the church but I’m going to be up in your face if you’re going to knock on my science classroom and tell me I got to teach what you’re teaching in your Sunday school. That’s when we’re going to fight… There’s no tradition of scientists knocking down the Sunday school door, telling the preacher ‘that might not necessarily be true.’ That’s never happened. There are no scientists picketing out front of churches. There’s been this coexistence forever, so to have religious communities knocking down the science door, there’s something wrong there."

Neil deGrasse Tyson - Distinguished astrophysicist, prominent skeptic and host of the PBS show NOVA scienceNow on religion and education

(via)

no. 133

"Imagine a world in which generations of human beings come to believe that certain films were made by God or that specific software was coded by him. Imagine a future in which millions of our descendants murder each other over rival interpretations of Star Wars or Windows 98. Could anything —anything — be more ridiculous? And yet, this would be no more ridiculous than the world we are living in."

-Sam Harris

no. 132

"Science is far from a perfect instrument of knowledge. It’s just the best we have."

— Carl Sagan

no. 131

"This is not to suggest that all executives are psychopaths. It is to suggest that the economy has been rewarding the wrong skills. As the bosses have shaken off the trade unions and captured both regulators and tax authorities, the distinction between the productive and rentier upper classes has broken down. Chief executives now behave like dukes, extracting from their financial estates sums out of all proportion to the work they do or the value they generate, sums that sometimes exhaust the businesses they parasitise. They are no more deserving of the share of wealth they've captured than oil sheikhs."

George Monbiot, via

no. 130

"And this is one of the biggest problems with the GOP: they constantly push people who have more celebrity appeal than political experience to run for key government positions...then turn around and complain that government doesn't work correctly."

Pryme, discussing Michelle Bachmann's idea that Donald Trump would make a good vice president.

no. 129

"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing."

Albert Einstein

no. 128

"The story of the redemption will not stand examination. That man should redeem himself from the sin of eating an apple by committing a murder on Jesus Christ, is the strangest system of religion ever set up."

— Thomas Paine - English-born American author and revolutionary leader. Theodore Roosevelt called him a “filthy little atheist.” Actually a deist; wrote the definitive text of deism, The Age of Reason, which used reason to establish a belief in Nature’s Designer, but attacked Christianity as a system of superstition that “produces fanatics” and “serves the purposes of despotism.” In England, sellers of the book were jailed for blasphemy. In dating his letters, instead of “A.D.,” wrote “since the fable of Christ.”

(via)

no. 127

no. 126

"Biting is excellent; it's like kissing, only there's a winner"

Suranne Jones as "Idris" in the Doctor Who episode "The Doctor's Wife"

no. 125

"The worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time".

Winston Churchill's description of democracy.

no. 124

"We need to just accept that there is no social movement so intelligent and articulate that there won’t be at least one asshole in a Guy Fawkes mask there."

Josh Macedo

no. 123

"You know... If the only Black people I knew were Clarence Thomas, Michael Steele, Tom Sowell and Herman Cain? (IOW - If I were a Republican?) If THAT was the extent of my sample population?

I'd probably be racist too."

"Niceguy" Eddie

no. 122

"It's plain that a deep river of nostalgia flows through most fantasy novels and films, especially those that dwell lovingly on feudal tropes and images. Chosen Ones. Prophecies. Kingly lineages that deserve to inherit rulership, by right of blood alone.

Ponder that, a moment. Millions of contemporary citizens of a free and scientific civilization - heirs of Enlightenment revolutionaries - now yearn for elvish mystics and secretive mages who never publish or share knowledge, nor open schools, nor turn palantirs into internets, nor offer the flea-ridden peasants flush toilets, nor even teach the germ theory of disease. Hierarchy and overall changelessness are somehow portrayed as romantically attractive. And always, there's that notion of better/wiser times, somewhere in the past."

David Brin

As should perhaps be obvious, Brin does not approve.

no. 121

"Everything and anything can be sex positive. Sex positivity is about a state of mind, not what you do in bed — a fundamental acceptance of what other people do, even if it isn’t for you, without an extra scoop of judgment on top."

Sinclair Sexsmith

no. 120

no. 119

What is forgiveness you ask?

Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past.

It’s the realization that the past cannot be changed, and that only a release of it shall create a better future and present. It’s a realization that holding on to what could have been is costraining you from what is and what can be.

That’s why when you forgive someone you suddenly feel lighter. For the past is heavy, and when you let go of it you’re weightless.

Mary Jean “Lily” Tomlin

no. 118

"Sometimes the majority only means that all the fools are on the same side"

unknown

no. 117

"So if guns kill people, I suppose pencils misspell words, cars drive drunk, and spoons make people fat."

(via)

no. 116

"‘Cause the thing is, you and the guys you hang out with may not really mean anything by it when you talk about crazy bitches and dumb sluts and heh-heh-I’d-hit-that and you just can’t reason with them and you can’t live with ‘em can’t shoot ‘em and she’s obviously only dressed like that because she wants to get laid and if they can’t stand the heat they should get out of the kitchen and if they can’t play by the rules they don’t belong here and if they can’t take a little teasing they should quit and heh heh they’re only good for fucking and cleaning and they’re not fit to be leaders and they’re too emotional to run a business and they just want to get their hands on our money and if they’d just stop overreacting and telling themselves they’re victims they’d realize they actually have all the power in this society and white men aren’t even allowed to do anything anymore and and and…

I get that you don’t really mean that shit. I get that you’re just talking out your ass.

But please listen, and please trust me on this one: you have probably, at some point in your life, engaged in that kind of talk with a man who really, truly hates women–to the extent of having beaten and/or raped at least one. And you probably didn’t know which one he was.

And that guy? Thought you were on his side."

Kate Harding, (via)

no. 115

Shauna: I miss being little and loud, Lottie.
Lottie: If we can't be little any more, we'll make up for it by being louder.

Scary Go Round

no.114

no. 113

"If an alien was looking down on us and inspecting our language, they would see that the worst thing we do on this planet is we torture, we kill, we abuse, we harm people… we’re cruel. And those are the things for which we should be ashamed. Amongst the best things we do is we breed children and we raise them, we make love to each other, we adore each other, we’re affectionate and fond of each other. Those are the good things we do. And they would say ‘How odd, that the language for the awful things is used casually all the time.’ ‘Oh the traffic was agony. It was hell, it was cruel. Oh, it was torture waiting in line!’ They’d say ‘You use words like torture! That’s the worst word!’ And yet if we use the f-word, which is the word for generating our species, for showing physical affection one to another, then we’re taken off air and accused of being wicked and irresponsible and a bad influence to children. Now, we’re part of this culture so we often don’t question it, but if you think of someone from outside it, it is very strange."

Stephen Fry

(via)

no.112

"Conservatives often say that America is a "Christian nation". Liberals find this exclusionary, and I agree that when it's used it's often to set Christians above those of other faiths. As offensive as this suggestion is, the primary sentiment I feel when I phrase "Christian nation" isn't anger, but sadness. Wouldn't it be wonderful if our laws and policies reflected Christ's compassion and concern for the poorest and most vulnerable among us? Wouldn't it be wonderful if our citizens showed some of the same love for one another that Christ held in His heart for all humankind? This may seem utopian. What troubles me isn't so much that we fall short. It's that most including most who call themselves Christian, do not even seem to want to try."

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend in "Failing America's Faithful". (p169)

no. 111

Fashion is one of the very few forms of expression in which women have more freedom than men. And I don’t think it’s an accident that it’s typically seen as shallow, trivial, and vain. It is the height of irony that women are valued for our looks, encouraged to make ourselves beautiful and ornamental… and are then derided as shallow and vain for doing so. And it’s a subtle but definite form of sexism to take one of the few forms of expression where women have more freedom, and treat it as a form of expression that’s inherently superficial and trivial. Like it or not, fashion and style are primarily a women’s art form. And I think it gets treated as trivial because women get treated as trivial.

Fashion is a Feminist Issue: Greta Christina

(via)

no. 110

no. 109

"Then, one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life…you give them a piece of you. They don’t ask for it. They do something dumb one day like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn’t your own anymore."

Neil Gaiman

no. 108

The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.

The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference.

The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference.

And the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.

Elie Wiesel

no. 107

"Well, of course, the biologist I suppose would say that like all breeds of animals, the basic instinct is to reproduce our kind, but I believe it's inherent in the concept that created our country - and in the individual Judeo-Christian religion - that man is for individual fulfillment; for our religion is based on the idea not of any mass movement but of individual salvation. Each man must find his own salvation; I would think that our national purpose in this country - and we have lost sight of it too much in the last three decades - is to be free - to the limit possible with law and order, every man to be what God intended him to be."

Ronald Reagan, from an interview with David Frost, 1968

Answers like this is why Boomers, one of the most selfish generations we've seen, loves Reagan. Self-involvement is king!

no. 106

“Make all politicians work for minimum wage and watch how fast things change.”

Jess

no. 105

"Just for anyone who is still wondering about the racist implications of this flag… here’s a fun fact. A lot more of these started popping up after Obama took office.

A more honest and open version of this sticker would read, when I look at all these black people all over the place in America, I realize that slavery wasn’t really worth it in the end.

Oh but it’s heritage, not hate. We don’t hate them. We just wish they weren’t here, you know, trying to be equal to us."

stfuconfederates, responding to the photo below.

Maybe it is about heritage. But it's also about racism, at least for some. The two don't necessarily apply to everyone who like the flag, but it applies to the flag itself, through simple usage and history. To deny this is like saying that the swastika is a religious symbol and so all that "extra" Nazi stuff doesn't really apply.

no. 104

Goodness gracious, my generation's lost
They burned down all our bridges before we had a chance to cross
Is it the winter of our discontent or just an early frost?

Goodness gracious, of apathy i sing
The babyboomers had it all and wasted everything
Now recess is almost over and they won't get off the swing

Goodness gracious, we came in at the end
No sex that isn't dangerous, no money left to spend
We're the cleanup crew for parties we were too young to attend

Kevin Gilbert in the song Goodness Gracious

no. 103

"The world is led by Alpha Males, but the machinery of the world turns on the bearing of the Beta Male."

Christopher Moore, in A Dirty Job

no. 102

"One of my favorite (I think original) quotes is to say that...
When you argue with a Liberal, he'll tell you why you're wrong; while if you argue with a Conservative, he'll show you why you're Liberal.

I post that (or some variant of it) on MMFA a lot. And the best part of that?

If a Liberal is arguing with a Conservative? Using this reasoning? THEY'RE BOTH RIGHT!"

"Niceguy" Eddie

no. 101

"God’s standards are absolute. They do not change."

my friend Gerald quoting that sunday's sermon on his Facebook page. I wanted to reply (but was too polite to do so), "it's a good thing that God's omniscient - he can afford to be absolute". I, personally, am not that sure of myself, nor should any non-God be.

no. 100

"Why do people say 'man up, grow some balls'? Balls are weak & vulnerable. If you wanna toughen up grow a vagina- those things can take a POUNDING."

unknown, (possibly Betty White), found here

no. 99

“It is poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.”

Mother Tereasa of Calcutta

no. 98

"Maturity is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter could be said to remedy anything."

Kurt Vonnegut.

Happy Birthday, Mr. Vonnegut. We miss you.

no. 97

"When you cannot joke about the darkness of life, that’s when the darkness takes over."

Amanda Fucking Palmer

no. 96

“You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him.”

James D. Miles

no. 95

"Harry Potter is all about confronting fears, finding inner strength, and doing what is right in the face of adversity. Twilight is about how important it is to have a boyfriend."

— Stephen King

This quote may actually have been said by Andrew Futral.

no. 94

"Never grow a wishbone where your backbone ought to be."

Dorothy Parker

no. 93

“All that serves labor serves the nation. All that harms is treason. If a man tells you he trusts America, yet fears labor, he is a fool. There is no America without labor, and to fleece the one is to rob the other.”

Abraham Lincoln

no. 92

"Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure that you are not, in fact, just surrounded by assholes."

William Gibson

no. 91

"What if Hufflepuff is actually the stoner house at Hogwarts?

I mean, Hufflepuff. HUFF le PUFF.

They’re mostly considered nice and peaceful.

They live right by the kitchen.

Their head of house teaches herbology.

“Badger” is exactly the kind of animal a stoner would come up with.

Slytherins obviously do cocaine.

This is a legitimate theory - You know Cedrick Diggory was high most of the time - I mean you had to have been high to think opening the egg in a bath was a legit idea."

(assembled at)

no. 90

"So avoid using the word ‘very’ because it’s lazy. A man is not very tired, he is exhausted. Don’t use very sad, use morose. Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women - and, in that endeavor, laziness will not do."

Dead Poets Society

no. 89

"Do you think that your 16 year old daughter hasn’t masturbated already? Like, do you really think there’s anything in that scene that this chick hasn’t already tried when the lights go out at night, or in the bathroom, or in the tub, or with the shower head or something like that? I’m telling you, man, I’m not teaching this broad anything new. If I were to create a rating system, I wouldn’t even put murder right at the top of the chief offenses. I would put rape right at the top, and assault against women. Because it’s so insanely overused and insulting how much it’s overused in movies as a plot device, a woman in peril. That, to me, is offensive, yet that shit skates."

Kevin Smith (director) on the ridiculousness of movies about sex receiving NC-17 ratings while extremely violent movies get by with R ratings.

no. 88

“I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and I had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it"

Mark Twain

no. 87

"Where there is no imagination there is no horror."

Arthur Conan Doyle, Sr.

no. 86

"You can’t just sit there and put everybody’s lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love. You just can’t. You have to do things."

Stephen Chbosky, from The Perks of Being a Wallflower

no. 85

"To me, there is no greater act of courage than being the one who kisses first."

Janeane Garofalo.

no. 84

"I don’t have an issue with what you do in the church but I’m going to be up in your face if you’re going to knock on my science classroom and tell me I got to teach what you’re teaching in your Sunday school. That’s when we’re going to fight… There’s no tradition of scientists knocking down the Sunday school door, telling the preacher ‘that might not necessarily be true.’ That’s never happened. There are no scientists picketing out front of churches. There’s been this coexistence forever, so to have religious communities knocking down the science door, there’s something wrong there."

Neil deGrasse Tyson - Distinguished astrophysicist, prominent skeptic and host of the PBS show NOVA scienceNow on religion and education

(via)

no. 83

"Yes, it was a stupid thing to burn the Koran, but guess what? The lion’s share of the guilt should be laid on people who then kill over it. It’s like a violent, drunken father. When his kid sets him off and he beats the shit out of the kid, do you blame the kid for setting him off? No, you blame the father for being a violent drunk."

Bill Maher

no. 82

"Science is far from a perfect instrument of knowledge. It’s just the best we have."

Carl Sagan

no. 81

"Jesus wasnt born in America, but you dont see Republicans trying to keep him out of the government."

@ispyhannahclark (Hannah Clark)

no. 80

"Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity"

unknown, but they oughta be feted

no. 79

no. 78

"Well, yes, happines isnt happiness without a violin-playing goat".

Julia Roberts as Anna Scott in Notting Hill

no. 77

"Has anybody been watching the debates lately? You’ve got a governor whose state is on fire denying climate change. It’s true. You’ve got audiences cheering at the prospect of somebody dying because they don’t have healthcare and booing a service member in Iraq because they’re gay. That’s not reflective of who we are."

Barack Obama

Sadly, I suspect that it is who we are. We deserve whatever happens to us.

no. 76

no. 75

"Radio host Thom Hartmann notes that the astronomical salaries commanded by CEOs indicates (by simple supply/demand) some sort of shortage of qualified people. What quality is it that is in such shortage? Mr Hartmann speculates that the necessary characteristic which is in such short supply is sociopathy. One needs to know how to run a company AND to be able to destroy the environment and the lives of fellow human beings."

LarryHart, commenting on a post at Contrary Brin (see previous post)

no. 74

"But in rejecting one set of knowledge-limited meddlers -- 100,000 civil servants -- libertarians and conservatives seem bent on ignoring market manipulation by 5,000 or so aristocratic golf buddies, who appoint each other to company boards in order to vote each other titanic "compensation packages" while trading insider information and conspiring together to eliminate competition. Lords who are not subject to inherent limits, like each bureaucrat must face, or rules of disclosure or accountability. Lords who (whether it is legal or not) collude and share the same delusions."

David Brin, discussing the change (and failure) of American Conservatism.

no. 73

Hermione is not Chosen. That’s the best thing about her. Hermione is a hero because she decides to be a hero; she’s brave, she’s principled, she works hard, and she never apologizes for the fact that her goal is to be very, extremely good at this whole “wizard” deal. Just as Hermione’s origins are nothing special, we’re left with the impression that her much-vaunted intelligence might not be anything special, on its own. But Hermione is never comfortable with relying on her “gifts” to get by. There’s no prophecy assuring her importance; the only way for Hermione to have the life she wants is to work for it. So Hermione Granger, generation-defining role model, works her adorable British ass off for seven straight books in a row. Although she deals with the slings and arrows of any coming-of-age tale — being told that she’s “bossy,” stuck-up, boring, “annoying,” etc — she’s too strong to let that stop her.

In praise of Joanne Rowling’s Hermione Granger series by Sady Doyle

no. 72

"…there are a few other reasons why we clearly don’t get our morality from religion…even fundamentalists have to edit the books.

You come to the golden rule and you say, well this is truly wise…that’s why I’m reading the bible…but if you come something in Deuteronomy(22:13-21) like,

'If a woman’s not a virgin on her wedding night, you must take her to her father’s doorstep and stone her to death.'

…every fundamentalist Christian and Orthodox Jew…has figured out some way to ignore that…[which] proves that the guarantor of the wisdom found in scripture is not in scripture.

Maybe it’s in us."

— Sam Harris, lecturing on The Moral Landscape

(via)

no. 71

"An atheist doesn’t have to be someone who thinks he has a proof that there can’t be a god. He only has to be someone who believes that the evidence on the God question is at a similar level to the evidence on the werewolf question."

John McCarthy - American computer scientist, based at Stanford. Coined the term artificial intelligence; received the Turing Award in 1971 for his contributions to the AI field.

no. 70

"The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubts while the stupid ones are full of confidence.”

Charles Bukowski

no. 69

“When my husband died, because he was so famous & known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me — it still sometimes happens — & ask me if Carl changed at the end & converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage & never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don’t ever expect to be reunited with Carl. But, the great thing is that when we were together, for nearly twenty years, we lived with a vivid appreciation of how brief & precious life is. We never trivialized the meaning of death by pretending it was anything other than a final parting. Every single moment that we were alive & we were together was miraculous — not miraculous in the sense of inexplicable or supernatural. We knew we were beneficiaries of chance… That pure chance could be so generous & so kind… That we could find each other, as Carl wrote so beautifully in Cosmos, you know, in the vastness of space & the immensity of time… That we could be together for twenty years. That is something which sustains me & it’s much more meaningful…
 

The way he treated me & the way I treated him, the way we took care of each other & our family, while he lived. That is so much more important than the idea I will see him someday. I don’t think I’ll ever see Carl again. But I saw him. We saw each other. We found each other in the cosmos, and that was wonderful.“

Ann Druyan, talking about her husband, Carl Sagan

no. 68

"If you are trying to choose a boyfriend out of a herd of thousands, you may choose none of them. Or you see someone until someone better comes along. The term for this is ‘trading up.’ It can lead you to think that your opportunities are virtually infinite, and therefore to question what you have. It can turn people into products."

 “Looking for Someone” by Nick Paumgarten

This goes for boys, too. Duh.

no. 67

"Intelligent Design gets everything backwards, it's like saying our hands are miraculous because they fit so perfectly in our gloves."

@Monicks (Monica) 29 Jun via web

no. 66

"No matter how careful you are, there’s going to be the sense you missed something, the collapsed feeling under your skin that you didn’t experience it all. There’s that fallen heart feeling that you rushed right through the moments where you should’ve been paying attention.
Well, get used to that feeling. That’s how your whole life will feel some day.
This is all practice."

— Chuck Palahniuk (Invisible Monsters)

no. 65

"Don’t be afraid to be a fool. Remember, you cannot be both young and wise. Young people who pretend to be wise to the ways of the world are mostly just cynics. Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don’t learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us. Cynics always say no. But saying yes begins things. Saying yes is how things grow. Saying yes leads to knowledge. “Yes” is for young people. So for as long as you have the strength to, say yes."

— Stephen Colbert

no. 64

Female student: I do a lot of abstract art, and I don’t understand why we have to draw these boxes.

Professor: You know what I just heard? I just heard ‘I’m full of bullshit!’

atypicalartkid

no. 63

"People that are pro-life and pro-capital punishment, tell me, does it hurt being so stupid?"

wentzpete

no. 62

"Since her death in 1979, the woman who discovered what the universe is made of has not so much as received a memorial plaque. Her newspaper obituaries do not mention her greatest discovery. […] Every high school student knows that Isaac Newton discovered gravity, that Charles Darwin discovered evolution, and that Albert Einstein discovered the relativity of time. But when it comes to the composition of our universe, the textbooks simply say that the most abundant atom in the universe is hydrogen. And no one ever wonders how we know."

Jeremy Knowles, discussing the complete lack of recognition Cecilia Payne gets, even today, for her revolutionary discovery.

no. 61

"Pope says atheists pick & choose their morals. Correct. Today I will be frowning on child abuse & not having a problem with homosexuality."

mwyarbrough (Michael Yarbrough) via Tweetdeck

no. 60

"We must respect the other fellow`s religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart."

— H. L. Mencken

no. 59

"The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one."

-George Bernard Shaw

no. 58

"If all the atheists left the USA, it would lose 93% of the National Academy of Sciences but less than 1% of the prison population."

scott_hurst, 11:53 AM Dec 10th, 2010 via TweetDeck

no. 57

"As Bible-believing Baptists who hold to reformed theology, X and I believe that God is sovereign in choosing who will or will not believe in him, having chosen his people before the foundation of the world (see Ephesians 1), and that his selection is unbreakable and irresistible. If marriage is to mirror this principle, we believe that a woman has no right to select a husband for herself, but that she is to be chosen by a man and marriage is to be an unbreakable arrangement between the man and her father. Based on this reasoning, we have shunned a standard proposal and wedding ceremony, because if I had asked her to marry me (which I did not) then I would have given her the decision to marry me rather than selecting her and taking her myself. Furthermore, if we had exchanged conventional marriage vows, our union would have been based on X’s will and consent, which are not Biblical factors for marriage or salvation. Instead, I asked X’s father for his blessing in taking her hand in marriage. When he gave his blessing, X and I considered ourselves to be unbreakably betrothed in the sight of God. While we had initially intended to consummate our marriage after today’s symbolic ceremony, we instead did so secretly after private scripture reading, prayer, and mutual foot-washing."

This is some serious fucked-up bullshit. One of the primary reasons which I no longer consider myself to be a Christian has less to do with Biblical contradictions than it does with what utter assholes a majority of those who identify as Christians seem to be. If God truly will reward them, then fuck Him. If he will not, then why belong to the club?

(quote via)

no. 56

"Hitler is not an aberration in history; he is a cautionary tale."

Samurai Frog

no. 55

"I think it’s nice that Voldemort always waits until the end of the school year to try and kill Harry.

Despite his flaws, Voldemort really cares about Harry’s education."

Hannah

no. 54

"The first step towards getting somewhere is to decide that you are not going to stay where you are."

John Pierpont

no. 53

"Whoever controls the media, the images, controls the culture."

- Allen Ginsberg

no. 52

Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.

Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1927-2003) - former US Senator (D-NY) and sociologist. Quote sourced from Robert Sobel’s review of Past Imperfect: History According to the Movies.

no. 51

"Remember team, there is no 'I' in 'go fuck yourself!'"

Jerry Murphy

no. 50

"Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious."

Oscar Wilde

no. 49

"Against the assault of laughter nothing can stand."

Mark Twain

no. 48

"I think you're stating something we've discussed on this site before. That the Enlightenment experiment in both democracy AND in capitalism (two very different things) that made the 20th Century what it was--was essentially an experiment in ENGINEERING. A system--a sort of machine if you will--was CONSTRUCTED which magnificently channeled human motivation INTO self-sustaining, beneficent directions.

Now in the 21st century, the right-wing is cheerfully dismantling the Great Machine under the bizarre theory that because that machine worked so well, it has proven that human motivation NATURALLY tends toward self-sustaining, beneficent directions, and that machines actually get in the way of this process.

It's analogous to a claim that the functioning of the internal combustion engine proves that the best way to make use of hydrocarbons for motive power is uncontrolled explosions--that the engine itself is somehow retarding the process."

LarryHart commenting at Contrary Brin

no. 47

"Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live."

Oscar Wilde

no. 46

"Descartes popularized the idea that reality is limited to what we can measure. Economists have taken this error farther by thinking that value is the same as money, so they don't notice that many of the foundations of value and wealth in our society are declining.

...the dominant culture uses money not just to measure material value, but to measure human value and moral value: the more money that passes through your hands, the more successful and virtuous you are. By this logic, Jesus Christ was a parasite and Bernard Madoff was God."

via Ran Prieur, dated Oct 3, 2009, referring to an article at The Archdruid Report.

no. 45

"I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one. 'O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.' And God granted it."

Voltaire

no. 44

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals, now we know that it is bad economics."

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jan. 20, 1937

no. 43

"The current recession is a nightmare for people who have lost their jobs, homes, and savings; and it’s part of a continuing nightmare for the poor. That’s why we have to do all we can to get the economy back on track. But most other Americans are now discovering they can exist surprisingly well buying fewer of the things they never really needed to begin with."

Robert Reich

no. 42

"There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest."

Elie Wiesel

no. 41

"Last week, I listened to audiobooks while cleaning. My earbuds kept falling out while I was cleaning the bathroom, and I was reminded of something I read or heard someone say about listening to dharma tapes while driving. I wish I could remember the source and share it, but it escapes me in the moment. But in a nutshell, it was suggested that when we drive, we could just drive. Maybe it is not the time to listen to anything... maybe it is a gift of time with ourselves where we can be quiet and focus on the wheel beneath our hands and the pedals beneath our feet and the road ahead. As my earbuds kept falling out I thought about this... how I was trying to make cleaning 'not cleaning'"

from Zen Under the Skin via Zen Filter

no. 40

"People will now go to films with subtitles, you know. They're not afraid of them. It's one of the upsides of text-messaging and e-mail. Maybe the only good thing to come of it."

Kristen Scott Thomas

no. 39

"Ambition drove many men to become false; to have one thought locked in the breast, another ready on the tongue."

Sallust

no. 38

“The sad exhaustion of an event named to repeat itself forever.”

@ibogost summing up 9-11 in a single evocative phrase.

via Gerry Canavan

no. 37

"The poor have occasionally objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all."

G.K. Chesterton

no. 36

"You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people as you do."

Anne Lamott

no. 35

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."

William Pitt

no. 34

"People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them."

Dave Barry

no. 33

“When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they’re getting worried they wont like the truth"

Granny Weatherwax, from Terry Pratchett's Carpe Jugulum

no. 32

"The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk. Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of the world thinks we’re deaf, dumb and dangerous."

Garrison Keillor

(via)

no. 31

“Every atom in your body came from a star that exploded. And, the atoms in your left hand probably came from a different star than your right hand. It really is the most poetic thing I know about physics: You are all stardust. You couldn’t be here if stars hadn’t exploded, because the elements - the carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, iron, all the things that matter for evolution and for life - weren’t created at the beginning of time. They were created in the nuclear furnaces of stars, and the only way for them to get into your body is if those stars were kind enough to explode. So, forget Jesus. The stars died so that you could be here today.”

— Lawrence M. Krauss

(via)

no. 30

"He's nice now but he WAS an asshole. Just 'cause a piece of shit dries up and stops smelling, doesn't mean it's not still a piece of shit."

from Shit My Dad Says

no. 29

"The fact that the rioters have no programme is therefore itself a fact to be interpreted: it tells us a great deal about our ideological-political predicament and about the kind of society we inhabit, a society which celebrates choice but in which the only available alternative to enforced democratic consensus is a blind acting out. Opposition to the system can no longer articulate itself in the form of a realistic alternative, or even as a utopian project, but can only take the shape of a meaningless outburst. What is the point of our celebrated freedom of choice when the only choice is between playing by the rules and (self-)destructive violence?"

Slavoj Žižek

(via)

no. 28

"Reihan Salam says that cranky old white conservative nostalgics aren’t racists they’re just white people who are nostalgic for a whiter, more racist America."

Matthew Yglesias

no. 27

"What always gets me with these climate-change denialists is the rationale they use to decry the work of the IPCC and other scientific bodes and scientists: It’s not that merely that they’re wrong, it’s that they’re running a scam so that they can get rich. That’s right—a guy representing oil interests first and foremost is accusing climate scientists of trying to get rich from global-warming research. That’s like Madonna complaining that some homeless street musician with an open guitar case for people to toss change into is trying to fleece the public."

Kevin Beck

(via)

no. 26

"[W]hen you teach adults and children sex-negative messages, sex becomes an undifferentiated mass of “wrong.” If all sex is wrong, then why try to tease out good from bad, pleasurable from painful? When students are taught not to think about sex, they aren’t going to spend any time determining what they do and don’t want, or what they might be interested in. Of course, they’re going to have sex eventually, but when it happens will they be able to communicate at all through the veil of guilt, shame, and self-loathing that sex negativity encourage?”

Sex-Negative Education and the Spectre of Rape « Sex Positive Activism

no. 25

Notice how closely the current Republican party models itself on the “Lost Cause’ movement of the South and the Civil War.

You know those theories. The South never really lost the war. Slavery was never the real issue. Robert E Lee never really lost a battle. Reconstruction was a bad, bad thing. Etc.

Now with the GOP it’s a similar denial of reality. Reagan never raised taxes or caused deficits. These things happened TO him. W didn’t start wars, they were forced on him by a Congress who voted to go. The massive increase in the money supply wasn’t accomplished by GOP Fed Chairs appointed by GOP presidents. It just happened. The recession wasn’t caused by the banks’ worldwide distribution of fraudulent MBS but by the Community Reinvestment Act forcing lenders to give money to poor people at gun point.

It’s really a brilliant way to conduct yourself from a political scientist point of view. All it requires is absolute loyalty to a mythical set of facts and complete discipline within the leadership cadre.

bannedagain5446, commenting here

no.24

So what exactly happened in Universe 25? Past day 315, population growth slowed. More than six hundred mice now lived in Universe 25, constantly rubbing shoulders on their way up and down the stairwells to eat, drink, and sleep. Mice found themselves born into a world that was more crowded every day, and there were far more mice than meaningful social roles. With more and more peers to defend against, males found it difficult and stressful to defend their territory, so they abandoned the activity. Normal social discourse within the mouse community broke down, and with it the ability of mice to form social bonds. The failures and dropouts congregated in large groups in the middle of the enclosure, their listless withdrawal occasionally interrupted by spasms and waves of pointless violence. The victims of these random attacks became attackers. Left on their own in nests subject to invasion, nursing females attacked their own young. Procreation slumped, infant abandonment and mortality soared. Lone females retreated to isolated nesting boxes on penthouse levels. Other males, a group Calhoun termed “the beautiful ones,” never sought sex and never fought—they just ate, slept, and groomed, wrapped in narcissistic introspection. Elsewhere, cannibalism, pansexualism, and violence became endemic. Mouse society had collapsed.

Will Wiles, discussing the work of John B. Calhoun

(via)

no. 23

"A Criminal is a person with predatory instincts without sufficient Capital to form a Corporation."

Clarence Darrow

no. 22

"Not a single fuck was given today."

Caroline in Coed

no. 21

Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man.
Thomas Paine

no. 20

no. 19

"What is objectionable, what is dangerous about extremists, is not that they are extreme, but that they are intolerant. The evil is not what they say about their cause, but what they say about their opponents."

Robert F. Kennedy

no. 18

"There has been in our country a divorce of church and state. This follows a natural sequence of the declaration that 'governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed'. The priest was no longer a necessity. His presence was a contradiction of the principle on which the Republic was founded. He represented, not the authority of the people, but of some 'Power from on High', and to recognize this other power was inconsistant with free government. The founders of the Republic at that time parted company with the priests, and said to them: 'You may turn your attention to the other world - we will attend to the affairs of this'. Equal liberty was given to all. But the ultra-theologian is not satisfied with this - he wishes to destroy the liberty of the people - he wishes a recognition of his God as the source of authority, to the end that the church may become the supreme power."

Robert Ingersoll, God In The Constitution, 1890

no. 17

"I have long since come to believe that people never mean half of what they say, and that it is best to disregard their talk and judge only their actions."

Dorothy Day

no. 16

"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness."

John Kenneth Galbraith.

no. 15

"A CEO, a TeaParty activist, and a Union member sit at a table. In the middle of the table is a plate of a dozen warm, delicious cookies. The CEO takes 11, then whispers to the teapartier, "look out, that socialist guy wants to take a big piece of your cookie!"

David Brin

no. 14

"Things that sparkle and glow always cast a shadow somewhere"

Lion-san

no. 13

“Whatsoever you do to the least of my people, that you do unto me.”

(Matthew 25:40)

no. 12

"The young man who has not wept is a savage, and the older man who will not laugh is a fool."

George Santayana, Dialogues in Limbo (1926), ch 3

no. 11

"I don’t care what Karl Marx thought of universal healthcare. I am in favor of it. The fact that you think Karl Marx was in favor of universal healthcare does nothing to prove your case that America should not have it. You have to come up with an argument other than someone you don’t like did the same thing, and since that person did other things you don’t like also, this thing must be wrong."

John Myste, commenting at Right Wing Nutjob.

no. 10

"There is a clear double standard when it comes to men, women, and hair removal. Now, perhaps you think shaving and waxing is a vapid issue to bring up, considering the more serious double standards of pay inequity, sexuality, and the like. But the fact is, spending the better part of your life having to shave huge areas of your body just to be considered not disgusting is a big deal."

— Jessica Valenti, He’s a Stud, She’s a Slut, and 49 Other Double Standards Every Woman Should Know.

(via)

no. 9

"Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim."

George Satayana, Vol. I, Reason in Common Sense

no. 8

"There will be no change in direction until we hit bottom, until the economy and state of the nation literally cannot get any worse. This is no different than the Gilded Age, and it will end the same way. There is no point at which common sense or the Democratic Party or the American public or the media are going to turn back from the post-1980 Beltway elite consensus politics of Government is the Problem, free market worship, and tax cuts piled upon tax cuts. This is it. If the most liberal candidate who could plausibly be elected is an Eisenhower Republican trying to outflank the GOP on austerity, things aren't going to improve until we are indisputably and comprehensively screwed."

Ed, at Gin and Tacos

no. 7

"And it all starts when we say no. We can say no. When someone instructs us to lose weight, to shave, to straighten our hair, to get “in shape”, to wear makeup, to wear less makeup, to dress appropriately, to dress more stylishly, no not that stylishly, to stop standing out, to stop making noise, to stop being so damn large, to stop making excuses, to stop fighting, to just get along, to just do what we tell you, to just buy into this commercial weight-loss plan, to just take these pills, to just have this cosmetic surgery, to just follow instructions, to just know that we’re doing this for your own good, to never walk alone, to never walk alone in that outfit, to never draw attention, because no one wants to see that, because no one wants to see your body, because no one wants to see you.

You can tell them no, and refuse to say more on the subject. No is always an option. It’s a small word, a difficult word, a word that speaks volumes in a single syllable, and one that gets easier to say the more you do it. It’s part of your arsenal, whether you realize it or not, and it’s a powerful weapon.

You can say no.

You don’t have to explain it.

You don’t have to apologize for it.

You can just

say

no."

Leslie, at Two Whole Cakes

(via)

no. 6

“It’s criminal that so little is asked of people who are getting so much. I don’t mind paying more. I really don’t mind paying more taxes. I’d rather pay for taxes than cut ‘Reading is Fundamental’ or Head Start or some of these programs that are really helping kids. This is the greatest country in the world; is it really that much worse if you pay 6% more in taxes? Give me a break. Look at what you get for it: you get to be American.”

Matt Damon, who's my new hero

no. 5

"If Jesus Christ himself (I don't believe, but whatevs) returned to earth and preached the same proto-Communism as he did 2,000 years ago, the "Christian Right" would nail him up all over again."

Screamin' Demon, commenting at Gin And Tacos

no. 4

“Is rioting the correct way to express your discontent?”

“Yes,” said the young man. “You wouldn’t be talking to me now if we didn’t riot, would you?”

The TV reporter from Britain’s ITV had no response. So the young man pressed his advantage. “Two months ago we marched to Scotland Yard, more than 2,000 of us, all blacks, and it was peaceful and calm and you know what? Not a word in the press. Last night a bit of rioting and looting and look around you.”

Eavesdropping from among the onlookers, I looked around. A dozen TV crews and newspaper reporters interviewing the young men everywhere.

an exchange between a young Londoner and a television reporter on MSMNC.

no. 3

"Conservatives built this monster. It didn’t just wander out of the woods one day, or land here from another planet. The Wingnut Base—whatever teabagger, Colonial Williamsburg camouflage they’re sporting this week, and however hard the media tries to pretend they aren't who we know they are—was manufactured by the Conservative Movement to win elections. Made right here in the U S of A out of spare parts left over from the Segregationist South, Right-wing fundamentalism, Bircher paranoia and general Archie Bunker pig-ignorance. Conservatives built the unholy thing, programmed it, wounded it up and sent it out to do their bidding. And everyone knows it."

Driftglass (via)

no. 2

"Our secular and religious fundamentalists come out of this twisted yearning for the apocalypse and belief in the “chosen people.” They advocate, in the language of religion and scientific rationalism, the divine right of our domination, the clash of civilizations. They assure us that we are headed into the broad, uplifting world of universal democracy and a global free market once we sign on for the subjugation and extermination of those who oppose us."

Chris Hedges

no. 1

"Voter fraud is rare, has little ability to affect election results, and when it's caught, it's punished severely. Voter suppression happens all the time, has the potential to change election results, is rarely caught and lightly punished. Clearly, the only logical thing to do is force through ever-stricter Voter ID laws while turning a blind eye to outright vote suppression attempts."

source, in comment at August 01, 2011 at 03:45 PM