Daniel Miller > Quotes

“By ‘consumer society’, I mean one in which commodities are increasingly used to express the core values of that society but also become the principal form through which people come to see, recognise and understand those values.”
― Daniel Miller, Consumption and Its Consequences

“from the beginnings of history, we have used the critique of consumption to confirm ourselves as essentially good and moral beings. Once upon a more religious time it was common to translate this into an actual asceticism, and I still think it gives us reason to lash out against a consumption we can’t seem to control even in ourselves.”
― Daniel Miller, Consumption and Its Consequences

“Pogosto je tako. Teorija, filozofija, moderna umetnost, ekonomika in druga gibanja, ki uporabljajo obskurne abstrakcije, se lahko zlahka izrodijo v domišljave nebuloze in postajajo kruti peskovniki akademskih div in elit, ki so vajene tako navduševati kakor tudi ustrahovati.”
― Daniel Miller, Stuff

“If you want to know what the English really think about consumption, ignore what they say, but look at what they do.”
― Daniel Miller, Consumption and Its Consequences

“Actually I am even less inclined to go in that direction. It’s just another example of the same problem. This word ‘nature’, when used to imply outside of culture, is a mythic idyll. People who live close to the environment don’t try to live in harmony with nature, quite the opposite. A few generations ago we had far fewer means to resist nature, and the result was a very low life expectancy, much of which was spent wracked by disease. Death is natural, disease is natural; most nature programmes consist of one animal eating another one alive. We have known since Darwin that the morality underpinning evolution is survival of the fittest. The whole point of humanity as any kind of moral order is the struggle to overcome nature. So, for me, nature and morality are the very antithesis of each other.”
― Daniel Miller, Consumption and Its Consequences

“Texans are no longer comfortable with submitting their political will to a people who, they perceive, wouldn’t know liberty and good government if it jumped up and bit them in the ass. There is a precedent for this feeling in Texas. The Texas Declaration of Independence from Mexico specifically calls out the other Mexican States for their weakness in the face of Santa Anna’s tyranny.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“Social Security recipients, who have been forced to pay into this alleged retirement system, will have their benefits slashed, and those who are currently paying into the system will be forced to face the fact that they have been participating in a Ponzi scheme.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“This book is chock full of facts, figures, quotes, poll numbers, laws, and economic data but, to keep the subject matter accessible, it was necessary to streamline the work by omitting additional supporting evidence.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“All of us need to be reminded that the Federal Government did not create the States; the States created the Federal Government.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“The Supreme Court was not and never will be perfect. Some of the most heinous, morally reprehensible, logically flawed decisions have emanated from the Supreme Court. To imbue it with infallibility is to say that, when it upheld slave catching or when it upheld racial segregation, it was right.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“the people of Texas themselves must accept the process as democratic, consistent with existing law, and congruent with their understanding of the principles of self-government.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“Treason is a criminal act committed by an individual, not a political body and, therefore, cannot be committed by a State.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“I suspect the problem comes from the very word ‘consumption’. Originally, to consume something means to use it up, in effect to destroy stuff. We think of a fire consuming a house. Two centuries ago consumption was associated with the dread of tuberculosis, a wasting disease.”
― Daniel Miller, Consumption and Its Consequences

“      •   “Today I will just observe and listen.”       •   “Today I will trust that everything will work out well.”       •   “Today I will accept things as they are.”       •   “Today I will be aware of the beauty all around me.” I recommend affirmations”
― Daniel Miller, Losing Control, Finding Serenity: How the Need to Control Hurts Us and How to Let It go

“All of this is to buy the loyalty of the thumb-suckers, whiners, and social experimenters who refuse to produce, refuse to compete, and reject any notion of personal accountability.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“The people of Texas are tired of living under 180,000 pages of federal laws, administered by 440 separate federal agencies and 2.5 million unelected bureaucrats. The people of Texas are sick of having their lives dictated by politicians they didn’t elect forcing policies on them that they don’t want.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“The idea was that consumption was a symbolic system we use but we don’t understand, in the same way that we speak language clearly without being able to give a lesson in grammar.”
― Daniel Miller, Consumption and Its Consequences

“Given the nearly unrestricted power of lawmaking and taxation, they ensure that actual dissent is nearly nonexistent. Every citizen has become a federal lawbreaker and we are suffocated under a tax code that few have actually read and no one fully understands. Like the Sword of Damocles, federal retribution hangs over the heads of everyone, waiting to impale anyone who steps out of line.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“try:       •   “Today I will not resist or persist.”       •   “Today I will accept others for who they are.”       •   “Patience is a virtue.”       •   “Today I will just observe and listen.”       •   “Today I will trust that everything will work out well.”       •   “Today I will accept things as they are.”       •   “Today I will be aware of the beauty all around me.” I recommend affirmations that personally speak to you. These will allow you to start your day more serenely. If you encounter difficult moments during the day, repeat your affirmations to get you back on track. VERBAL DECONTROL CUES Short verbal cues are another effective way of relinquishing control. When you are faced with an issue and feel as if you are at an impasse, try saying “Release it,” “Let it go,” or “Just surrender to it.” Use cues that personally speak to you. These simple reminders quickly cut through the control urge by changing your focus and intensity. Later, when you revisit the issue, you may find that circumstances have changed.”
― Daniel Miller, Losing Control, Finding Serenity: How the Need to Control Hurts Us and How to Let It go

“The “United States are” was the clear intention at the founding of the Union, while “United States is” was a later usage adopted to reinforce a fallacy about the construction of the Union.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union

“The point I am making is that most of that extra consumption you fear will destroy the planet is not actually going to come from what you can claim to be surplus consumption, the hair gel and the jacuzzis. It will come from the provision of basic services that no one can call over-consumption. And we need to confront those, since they are a lot harder to curb.”
― Daniel Miller, Consumption and Its Consequences

“the States were the equivalent of modern-day nation-states with all the sovereignty and rights that implies.”
― Daniel Miller, Texit: Why and How Texas Will Leave The Union