#w

Could a government dare to set out with happiness as its goal? Now that there are accepted scientific proofs, it would be easy to audit the progress of national happiness annually, just as we monitor money and GDP. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#annually #audit #could #dare #easy

How do you make any sense of history, art or literature without knowing the stories and iconography of your own culture and all the world's main religions? ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#art #culture #history #how #iconography

People want the right to die at a time of their own choosing. Too many families have watched helplessly as a relative dies slowly, longing for death. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#death #die #dies #families #helplessly

But the single overwhelming reason why jails are bursting is longer sentences given for more crimes. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#crimes #given #jails #longer #more

Crime is only the worst example, but it is a paradigm for other Labour policy disasters. No one tells the voters that crime is falling: let them stay scared senseless. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#disasters #example #falling #labour #only

Is anyone serious about the politics of happiness? David Cameron dipped a toe in the water, using the word lightly, but denying the hard policies it implies. Labour shies away from it, but should take up the challenge. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#anyone #away #cameron #challenge #david

It is now possible to quantify people's levels of happiness pretty accurately by asking them, by observation, and by measuring electrical activity in the brain, in degrees from terrible pain to sublime joy. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#activity #asking #brain #degrees #electrical

I am young. I better show off what I have now. ↗

— Michelle Trachtenberg

#better #i #i am #now #off

My mother begged doctors to end her life. She was beyond the physical ability to swallow enough of the weak morphine pills she had around her. When she knew she was dying I promised to make sure she could go at a time of her choosing, but it was impossible. I couldn't help. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#around #begged #beyond #choosing #could

There is all the difference in the world between teaching children about religion and handing them over to be taught by the religious. ↗

— Polly Toynbee

#between #children #difference #handing #over