#social

If there is ever a fascist takeover in America, it will come not in the form of storm troopers kicking down doors but with lawyers and social workers saying. "I'm from the government and I'm here to help. ↗

— Jonah Goldberg

#fascism #government #liberalism #political #politics

Crack-brained meddling by the authorities [can] aggravate an existing crisis. ↗

— Karl Marx

#regulation #socialism #communism

The argument has long been made that we humans are by nature compassionate and empathic despite the occasional streak of meanness, but torrents of bad news throughout history have contradicted that claim, and little sound science has backed it. But try this thought experiment. Imagine the number of opportunities people around the world today might have to commit an antisocial act, from rape or murder to simple rudeness and dishonesty. Make that number the bottom of a fraction. Now for the top value you put the number of such antisocial acts that will actually occur today. That ratio of potential to enacted meanness holds at close to zero any day of the year. And if for the top value you put the number of benevolent acts performed in a given day, the ratio of kindness to cruelty will always be positive. (The news, however, comes to us as though that ratio was reversed.) Harvard's Jerome Kagan proposes this mental exercise to make a simple point about human nature: the sum total of goodness vastly outweighs that of meanness. 'Although humans inherit a biological bias that permits them to feel anger, jealousy, selfishness and envy, and to be rude, aggressive or violent,' Kagan notes, 'they inherit an even stronger biological bias for kindness, compassion, cooperation, love and nurture – especially toward those in need.' This inbuilt ethical sense, he adds, 'is a biological feature of our species. ↗

— Daniel Goleman

#human-nature #social-intelligence #anger

Unity is a great thing and a great slogan. But what the workers’ cause needs is the unity of Marxists, not unity between Marxists, and opponents and distorters of Marxism. ↗

— Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

#democracy #freedom #history #hope #individualism

Oh, Vasu. People always talk; you have to learn to ignore them. ↗

— Farahad Zama

#social-life #life

If the economy is strained, then Social Security, like the rest of the government, will be, too. ↗

— Mark Dayton

#government #like #rest #security #social

Like any working mother I find it hard to have a social life. But my kids are so well adjusted. There isn't a brat bone in their body so I haven't done anything that bad. ↗

— Ruby Wax

#any #anything #bad #body #bone

Moral justification is a powerful disengagement mechanism. Destructive conduct is made personally and socially acceptable by portraying it in the service of moral ends. This is why most appeals against violent means usually fall on deaf ears. ↗

— Albert Bandura

#against #appeals #conduct #deaf #destructive

Corporations are social organizations, the theater in which men and women realize or fail to realize purposeful and productive lives. ↗

— Lester Bangs

#fail #lives #men #men and women #organizations

My mother wanted me to be friends only with children she considered socially suitable. ↗

— Brigitte Bardot

#considered #friends #me #mother #only