Mike > Mike's Quotes

“The more we live as 'free individuals' . . . the more we are effectively non-free, caught within the existing frame of possibilities--we have to be impelled or disturbed into freedom. . . . This paradox thoroughly pervades the form of subjectivity that characterizes 'permissive' liberal society. Since permissiveness and free choice are elevated into a supreme value, social control and domination can no longer appear as infringing on subjects' freedom: they have to appear as (and be sustained by) individuals experiencing themselves as free. There is a multitude of forms of this appearing of un-freedom in the guise of its opposite: in being deprived of universal healthcare, we are told that we are being given a new freedom of choice (to choose our healthcare provider); when we can no longer rely on long-term employment and are compelled to search for a new precarious job every couple of years, we are told that we are being given the opportunity to reinvent ourselves and discover our creative potential; when we have to pay for the education of our children, we are told that we are now able to become 'entrepreneurs of the self," acting like a capitalist freely choosing how to invest the resources he possesses (or has borrowed). In education, health, travel . . . we are constantly bombarded by imposed 'free choices'; forced to make decisions for which we are mostly not qualified (or do not possess enough information), we increasingly experience our freedom as a burden that causes unbearable anxiety. Unable to break out of this vicious cycle alone, as isolated individuals--since the more we act freely the more we become enslaved by the system--we need to be 'awakened' from this 'dogmatic slumber' of fake freedom.”
― Slavoj Žižek

“We repeat again: strength of character does not consist solely in having powerful feelings, but in maintaining one’s balance in spite of them. Even with the violence of emotion, judgment and principle must still function like a ship’s compass, which records the slightest variations however rough the sea.”
― Carl von Clausewitz

“War is merely the continuation of politics by other means”
― Carl von Clausewitz

“[...] to introduce into the philosophy of war itself a principle of moderation would be an absurdity”
― Carl Von Clausewitz, On War

“Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“Courage isn't having the strength to go on - it is going on when you don't have strength.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet. Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“If you want a thing done well, do it yourself.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“History is written by the winners.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and I have founded empires. But on what did we rest the creations of our genius? Upon force. Jesus Christ founded his empire upon love; and at this hour millions of men would die for him.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“You don't reason with intellectuals. You shoot them.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon's Memoirs

“A woman laughing is a woman conquered.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte, In the Words of Napoleon: A Collection of Quotations of Napoleon Bonaparte

“The best way to keep one's word is not to give it.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“Men are Moved by two levers only: fear and self interest.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“The world suffers a lot. Not because the violence of bad people. But because of the silence of the good people.”
― Napoleon

“China is a sleeping giant; let him sleep, for if he wakes, he will shake the World.”
― Napoleon

“When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“Ability is of little account without opportunity.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“Four hostile newspapers are more to be feared than a thousand bayonets..”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“Never tell your enemy he is doing the wrong thing.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“The hand that gives is among the hand that takes. Money has no fatherland, financiers are without patriotism and without decency, their sole object is gain.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“The enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan.”
― Prussian General Karl von Clausewitz, Vom Kriege, 1832

“The conqueror is always a lover of peace; he would prefer to take over our country unopposed.”
― Carl von Clausewitz, On War

“We feel free because we lack the very language to articulate our unfreedom.”
― Slavoj Žižek, Welcome to the Desert of the Real: Five Essays on September 11 and Related Dates

“The one measure of true love is: you can insult the other”
― Slavoj Zizek

“When we are shown scenes of starving children in Africa, with a call for us to do something to help them, the underlying ideological message is something like: "Don't think, don't politicize, forget about the true causes of their poverty, just act, contribute money, so that you will not have to think!”
― Slavoj Zizek

“If you have reasons to love someone, you don’t love them.”
― Slavoj Žižek

“The problem for us is not are our desires satisfied or not. The problem is how do we know what we desire.”
― Slavoj Žižek

“Happiness was never important. The problem is that we don't know what we really want. What makes us happy is not to get what we want. But to dream about it. Happiness is for opportunists. So I think that the only life of deep satisfaction is a life of eternal struggle, especially struggle with oneself. If you want to remain happy, just remain stupid. Authentic masters are never happy; happiness is a category of slaves.”
― Slavoj Žižek

“[T]his readiness to assume the guilt for the threats to our environment is deceptively reassuring: We like to be guilty since, if we are guilty, it all depends on us. We pull the strings of the catastrophe, so we can also save ourselves simply by changing our lives. What is really hard for us (at least in the West) to accept is that we are reduced to the role of a passive observer who sits and watches what our fate will be. To avoid this impotence, we engage in frantic, obsessive activities. We recycle old paper, we buy organic food, we install long-lasting light bulbs—whatever—just so we can be sure that we are doing something. We make our individual contribution like the soccer fan who supports his team in front of a TV screen at home, shouting and jumping from his seat, in the belief that this will somehow influence the game's outcome.”
― Slavoj Žižek