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When people hurt bad enough, they’ll grab any idea to make their own lives better, no matter how illogical.
“They’re pandering to the people who were already hateful and looking for reason and protection to be so. I just didn’t realize there were so many of them. It makes me ashamed of Germany.
“The Nazis have made us scared of anger, made us believe that anger is bad. Anger is not bad. Anger is how we tell ourselves that we’ve been wronged, that we’ve been mistreated, and that it’s not okay. Anger is a beautiful emotion. We just need to express it properly.”
He kept his head down as he walked, not daring eye contact. He hunched his shoulders whenever he passed someone who was doing quite the opposite. Beware the ones that were happy, he knew. Beware the ones that felt invigorated. They were lethal.
“A country is only as strong as its most vulnerable people. And you, son, if you may forgive me for saying, are on the lowest rung of the ladder. You’re a canary, Bertie. Transvestites are the canaries of the world. You know from our own library that bad people always go after transvestites first, no matter the country or culture. They are the first ones removed when an environment turns poisonous. What makes it more worrisome is you represent everything. You represent housing and job security and access to healthcare. You represent workers’ rights and voting rights and full stomachs and
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If transvestites are under attack, then the whole of the country is on the brink of destruction. If transvestites are cared for, the rest of us are cared for. You touch everything a strong society has to offer.
They look for the first domino to knock down, the one people will give the least resistance to, the one they care about the least. And once they’ve done it, it might be too late for everyone else.”
“I’ve realized that the mind can do only two things: make us happy and keep us safe. But it can’t do both at the same time.”
