Melody

“America is the wealthiest nation on Earth, but its people are mainly poor, and poor Americans are urged to hate themselves. To quote the American humorist Kin Hubbard, 'It ain’t no disgrace to be poor, but it might as well be.' It is in fact a crime for an American to be poor, even though America is a nation of poor. Every other nation has folk traditions of men who were poor but extremely wise and virtuous, and therefore more estimable than anyone with power and gold. No such tales are told by the American poor. They mock themselves and glorify their betters. The meanest eating or drinking establishment, owned by a man who is himself poor, is very likely to have a sign on its wall asking this cruel question: 'if you’re so smart, why ain’t you rich?' There will also be an American flag no larger than a child’s hand – glued to a lollipop stick and flying from the cash register.

Americans, like human beings everywhere, believe many things that are obviously untrue. Their most destructive untruth is that it is very easy for any American to make money. They will not acknowledge how in fact hard money is to come by, and, therefore, those who have no money blame and blame and blame themselves. This inward blame has been a treasure for the rich and powerful, who have had to do less for their poor, publicly and privately, than any other ruling class since, say Napoleonic times. Many novelties have come from America. The most startling of these, a thing without precedent, is a mass of undignified poor. They do not love one another because they do not love themselves.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five

“In Chickasaw society, men condemned to death for their crimes were given a year to put their affairs in order. Women were seldom executed but were sometimes whipped, had their hair shorn, had their face scarred, or were exiled.  Despite being sentenced to death, those who were scheduled to die were free to come and go as they please, and it was considered a point of honor and spiritual obligation to report for execution before the year was up.  In many cases, a friend or family member was chosen to perform the execution so that the condemned man felt no hostility or malice at the moment of death.”
― Jim Barrow, Native American Mythology: Gods, Myths and Legends of the Five Civilized Tribes

“What I stand for is what I stand on.”
― Wendell Berry

“The body is not a thing, it is a situation: it is our grasp on the world and our sketch of our project”
― Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex