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“Each day, even each hour of each day, replaces and makes irrelevant the time before, and the events of our lives make sense only in relation to a perpetually updating timeline of news content.”
― Beautiful World, Where Are You
― Beautiful World, Where Are You
“Racism is apparently a card to be played; much like the joker, it’s a
very versatile card that can be used in any situation that might require
it. Only non-white people ever play this card to excuse their own
personal failings - even those of us that are materially successful.
Humans racialised as white cannot play the race card - just like they
cannot be terrorists - so European national empires colonising almost
the entire globe and enacting centuries of unapologetically and openly
racist legislation and practices, churning out an impressively large body
of proudly racist justificatory literature and cinema and much else has
had no impact on shaping human history, it has really just been black
and brown people playing cards.”
― Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire
very versatile card that can be used in any situation that might require
it. Only non-white people ever play this card to excuse their own
personal failings - even those of us that are materially successful.
Humans racialised as white cannot play the race card - just like they
cannot be terrorists - so European national empires colonising almost
the entire globe and enacting centuries of unapologetically and openly
racist legislation and practices, churning out an impressively large body
of proudly racist justificatory literature and cinema and much else has
had no impact on shaping human history, it has really just been black
and brown people playing cards.”
― Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire
“That's the thing about work, if it was any good you'd do it for free.”
― Beautiful World, Where Are You
― Beautiful World, Where Are You
“Maybe we're just born to love and worry about the people we know, and to go on loving and worrying even when there are more important things we should be doing. And if that means the human species is going to die out, isn't it in a way a nice reason to die out, the nicest reason you can imagine? Because when we should have been reorganising the distribution of the world's resources and transitioning collectively to a sustainable economic model, we were worrying about sex and friendship instead. Because we loved each other too much and found each other too interesting. And I love that about humanity, and in fact it's the very reason I root for us to survive - because we are so stupid about each other.”
― Beautiful World, Where Are You
― Beautiful World, Where Are You
“Why can’t you just get over it? It’s all in the past.’
These two statements often run together. Apparently, history is not
there to be learned from, rather it’s a large boulder to be gotten over.
It’s fascinating, because in the hundreds of workshops I’ve taught on
Shakespeare no one has ever told me to get over his writing because
it’s, you know, from the, erm, past. I’m still waiting for people to get
over Plato, or Da Vinci or Bertrand Russell, or indeed the entirety of
recorded history, but it seems they just won’t. It is especially odd in a
nation where much of the population is apparently proud of Britain’s
empire that critics of one of its most obvious legacies should be asked
to get over it, the very same thing from the past that they are proud of.
But anyway, let’s imagine for a second that humanity did indeed ‘get
over’ - which in this case means forget - the past. Well, we’d have to
learn to walk and talk and cook and hunt and plant crops all over again,
we’d have to undo all of human invention and start from . . . when?
What period exactly is it we are allowed to start our memory from?
Those that tell us to get over the past never seem to specify, but I’m
eager to learn. In reality, of course, they just don’t want to have any
conversations that they find uncomfortable.”
― Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire
These two statements often run together. Apparently, history is not
there to be learned from, rather it’s a large boulder to be gotten over.
It’s fascinating, because in the hundreds of workshops I’ve taught on
Shakespeare no one has ever told me to get over his writing because
it’s, you know, from the, erm, past. I’m still waiting for people to get
over Plato, or Da Vinci or Bertrand Russell, or indeed the entirety of
recorded history, but it seems they just won’t. It is especially odd in a
nation where much of the population is apparently proud of Britain’s
empire that critics of one of its most obvious legacies should be asked
to get over it, the very same thing from the past that they are proud of.
But anyway, let’s imagine for a second that humanity did indeed ‘get
over’ - which in this case means forget - the past. Well, we’d have to
learn to walk and talk and cook and hunt and plant crops all over again,
we’d have to undo all of human invention and start from . . . when?
What period exactly is it we are allowed to start our memory from?
Those that tell us to get over the past never seem to specify, but I’m
eager to learn. In reality, of course, they just don’t want to have any
conversations that they find uncomfortable.”
― Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire
Oli’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Oli’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
145 books
|
142 friends
202 books
|
35 friends
1,181 books
|
89 friends
536 books
|
100 friends
41 books
|
51 friends
30 books
|
149 friends
83 books
|
77 friends
547 books
|
56 friends
More friends…
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