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“You painted a naked woman because you enjoyed looking at her, put a mirror in her hand and you called the painting “Vanity,” thus morally condemning the woman whose nakedness you had depicted for you own pleasure.”
― John Berger, Ways of Seeing

“The people copy their rules, just as children ape their parents. Violence is a symptom of a dysfunctional system, where people have no patience for or confidence in due process. The poor don't believe they can get justice from the courts, because usually they can't; the elite know the system is rigged because they rigged it. The ones at the top keep the door shut because they don't want to share the spoils of office. Actual violence, or the thread of it, helps to keep the populace in check, just as poverty does.”
― Helon Habila, The Chibok Girls: The Boko Haram Kidnappings and Islamist Militancy in Nigeria

“At night I dream that you and I are two plants
that grew together, roots entwined,
and that you know the earth and the rain like my mouth,
since we are made of earth and rain.”
― Pablo Neruda, Regalo de un Poeta

“Why can't people just sit and read books and be nice to each other?”
― David Baldacci, The Camel Club