Dustin Sullivan

“Our little tribal circles, bound by social contracts and selfish mutual need. Everyone working in their own greedy self-interests and huddling together with their tribe, at war with all those outside who they regard as barely human. What breaks a human mind out of that iron cage of mistrust, is a sacrifice. The martyr who gives up everything, who abandons all personal gain, who lays down his life for the good of those outside his group. He becomes a symbol all can rally around. So instead of trying to make a selfish, violent primate somehow empathize with the whole world, which is impossible, you only need to get him to remember and love the martyr. As one is forgotten, another must replace it.”
― David Wong, This Book Is Full of Spiders

“there's so much out there to hate, why would you go out of your way to hate something you love?”
― Jason Hartley, The Advanced Genius Theory: Are They Out of Their Minds or Ahead of Their Time?

“God’s grace comes to us unmerited, the theologians say. But the grace we could extend to one another we consider it best to withhold in very many cases, presumptively, or in the absence of what we consider true or sufficient merit (we being more particular than God), or because few gracious acts, if they really deserve the name, would stand up to cost-benefit analysis. This is not the consequence of a new atheism or a systemic materialism that afflicts our age more than others. It is good old human meanness, which finds its terms and pretexts in every age. The best argument against human grandeur is the meagerness of our response to it, paradoxically enough.”
― Marilynne Robinson, What Are We Doing Here?

“Dean, people don't like...fragility. It makes them nervous. They're scared thinking things just happen. They think there's always something you can do to keep monsters from getting under the bed.”
― Linda Holmes, Evvie Drake Starts Over