Kastel

“The moral attitudes of dominant and privileged groups are characterised by universal selfdeception and hypocrisy. The unconscious and conscious identification of their special interests with general interests and universal values, which we have noted in analysing national attitudes, is equally obvious in the attitude of classes. The reason why privileged classes are more hypocritical than underprivileged ones is that special privilege can be defended in terms of the rational ideal of equal justice only, by proving that it contributes something to the good of the whole. Since inequalities of privilege are greater than could possibly be defended rationally, the intelligence of privileged groups is usually applied to the task of inventing specious proofs for the theory that universal values spring from, and that general interests are served by, the special privileges which they hold.”
― Reinhold Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics

“The good of a book lies in its being read. A book is made up of signs that speak of other signs, which in turn speak of things. Without an eye to read them, a book contains signs that produces no concept; therefore, it is dumb.”
― Umberto Eco

“The basis of peace is for people to understand the pain of others.”
― Susan Southard, Nagasaki: Life After Nuclear War

“The waking have one world
in common. Sleepers
meanwhile turn aside, each
into a darkness of his own.”
― Heraclitus, Fragments