#lis

The impotence of liberal humanism is a symptom of its essentially contradictory relationship to modern capitalism. For although it forms part of the ‘official’ ideology of such society, and the ‘humanities’ exist to reproduce it, the social order within which it exists has in one sense very little time for it at all. Who is concerned with the uniqueness of the individual, the imperishable truths of the human condition or the sensuous textures of lived experience in the Foreign Office or the boardroom of Standard Oil? Capitalism’s reverential hat-tipping to the arts is obvious hypocrisy, except when it can hang them on its walls as a sound investment. Yet capitalist states have continued to direct funds into higher education humanities departments, and though such departments are usually the first in line for savage cutting when capitalism enters on one of its periodic crises, it is doubtful that it is only hypocrisy, a fear of appearing in its true philistine colours, which compels this grudging support. The truth is that liberal humanism is at once largely ineffectual, and the best ideology of the ‘human’ that present bourgeois society can muster. The ‘unique individual’ is indeed important when it comes to defending the business entrepreneur’s right to make profit while throwing men and women out of work; the individual must at all costs have the ‘right to choose’, provided this means the right to buy one’s child an expensive private education while other children are deprived of their school meals, rather than the rights of women to decide whether to have children in the first place. ↗

— Terry Eagleton

#art

It always amazes me when taking off from a stormy airport, how once you reach a certain altitude and get through the clouds, the sun shines as brightly as ever. If we learn to choose the experience of joy in our bodies, minds, hearts, and spirits, we will move in tune with the universe and dance in a flow of light and love, and remain above the clouds. ↗

— Debra Moffitt

#bliss #debra-moffitt #happiness-in-hard-times #inner-joy #joy

I'd much rather buy an experience than something I can possess in the material world ↗

— Ashly Lorenzana

#experiences #life #materialism #money #spending

Sometimes I think it is my mission to bring faith to the faithless, and doubt to the faithful. ↗

— Paul Tillich

#existentialism #faith #faith

They said that I should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical politicians. Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my childlike faith in practical politics. ↗

— G.K. Chesterton

#idealism #ideals #politics #pragmatism #faith

A book is more than the sum of its materials. It is an artifact of the human mind and hand. ↗

— Geraldine Brooks

#materialism

Doubt is a question mark; faith is an exclamation point. The most compelling, believable, realistic stories have included them both. ↗

— Criss Jami

#convincing #doubt #faith #honesty #inspiration

I often wonder why the whole world is so prone to generalise. Generalisations are seldom if ever true and are usually utterly inaccurate. ↗

— Agatha Christie

#humour #hypocrisy #thoughts #hypocrisy

[Y]ou [man] are fool enough, it seems, to dare to war with [woman=] me, when for your faithful ally you might win me easily. ↗

— Aristophanes

#disagreement #foolishness #men #quarrel #wisdom

Because love stands above Darkness and Light. Because love is not sex or a shared faith, or "the joint maintenance of a household and the upbringing of children." Because love is also Power. And Light and Darkness, people and Others, morality and law, the Ten Commandments and the Great Treaty have damn all to do with it. ↗

— Sergei Lukyanenko

#love #unauthorized-personnel-permitted #faith