Joey Parton

“It is a mistake to believe we must know a thing to be influenced by it. It is a mistake to believe the thing must even be real.”
― Christopher Ruocchio, Empire of Silence

“Always forward, always down, and never left or right.”
― Christopher Ruocchio, Howling Dark

“Do not seek to find hope among your leaders. They are the repositories of poison. Their interest in you extends only so far as their ability to control you. From you, they seek duty and obedience, and they will ply you with the language of stirring faith. They seek followers, and woe to those who question, or voice challenge. ‘Civilization after civilization, it is the same. The world falls to tyranny with a whisper. The frightened are ever keen to bow to a perceived necessity, in the belief that necessity forces conformity, and conformity a certain stability. In a world shaped into conformity, dissidents stand out, are easily branded and dealt with. There is no multitude of perspectives, no dialogue. The victim assumes the face of the tyrant, self-righteous and intransigent, and wars breed like vermin. And people die.”
― Steven Erikson, Midnight Tides

“The most deadly seducers are the ones encouraging conformity. If you can only feel safe when everybody else feels, thinks and looks the same as you, then you're a damned coward...not to mention a vicious tyrant in the making.”
― Steven Erikson, The Bonehunters