Joseph

“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens

“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”
― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

“Fired by historical grievances and a sense of civilizational destiny, Xi’s China is brash but brittle, intrepid yet insecure. It is a would-be superpower in a hurry, eager to take on the world while wary of what may come. It demands to be seen, heard, and respected, but obstructs outsiders who try to peer past the pomp and propaganda. It exerts a global reach with economic and military might, even as its ruling party retreats into an ideological cocoon. Its choices are reshaping the world, and it behooves us to grasp why and how. Understanding this powerful, opaque, and restless China has become harder than ever, but this is why we must try.”
― Chun Han Wong, Party of One: The Rise of Xi Jinping and China's Superpower Future

“The professional elite also values hard work, of course—but it’s different. To working-class members of all races, valuing hard work means having the rigid self-discipline to do a menial job you hate for 40 years, and reining yourself in so you don’t “have an attitude” (i.e., so that you can submit to authority). Hard work for elites is associated with self-actualization; “disruption” means founding a successful start-up. Disruption, in working-class jobs, just gets you fired.”
― Joan C. Williams, White Working Class: Overcoming Class Cluelessness in America