Al Owski > Recent Status Updates

“The fact that human beings have created, and daily create, this self-directed system through which they divest themselves of their innermost identity is... only because there is obviously in modern humanity a certain tendency toward the creation, or at least the toleration, of such a system.”

“...one of the most important differences between the post-totalitarian system and classical dictatorships, in which this line of conflict can still be drawn according to social class. In the post-totalitarian system, this line runs de facto through each person, for everyone in his own way is both a victim and a supporter of the system.”

“"But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well" (Matt. 6:33).
The sole meaning of life is to serve humanity by contributing to the establishment of the kingdom of God, which can only be done by the recognition and profession of the truth by every human being.
"...for behold, the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:20-21)”

“A man cannot be placed against his will in a situation opposed to his conscience... And therefore knowing that your position is repugnant to your heart and your head, and to your faith, and even to the science in which you believe, you cannot help reflecting upon the question whether in retaining it, and above all trying to justify it, you are doing what you ought to do.”

“ it draws everyone into its sphere of power, not so they may realize themselves as human beings, but so they may surrender their human identity in favor of the identity of the system, that is, so they may become agents of the systems general automatism... so they may participate in the common responsibility for it, so they may be pulled into and ensnared by it, like Faust by Mephistopheles”

“Individuals need not believe all these mystifications, but they must behave as though they did, or they must at least tolerate them in silence... For this reason, however, they must live within a lie. They need not accept the lie. It is enough for them to have accepted their life with it and in it. For by this very fact, individuals confirm the system, fulfill the system, make the system, are the system.”

“Because the regime is captive to its own lies, it must falsify everything. It falsifies the past. It falsifies the present, and it falsifies the future. It falsifies statistics.”

“Ideology, in creating a bridge of excuses between the system and the individual, spans the abyss between the aims of the system and the aims of life. It pretends that the requirements of the system derive from the requirements of life. It is a world of appearances trying to pass for reality.”

“This system serves people only to the extent necessary to ensure that people will serve it. Anything beyond this, that is to say, anything which leads people to overstep their predetermined roles is regarded by the system as an attack upon itself.”

“Ideology is a specious way of relating to the world. It offers human beings the illusion of an identity, of dignity, and of morality while making it easier for them to part with them. As the repository of something supra-personal and objective, it enables people to deceive their conscience and conceal their true position and their inglorious modus vivendi, both from the world and from themselves.”

“Of course, one pays dearly for this low-rent home: the price is abdication of one's own reason, conscience, and responsibility, for an essential aspect of this ideology is the consignment of reason and conscience to a higher authority. The principle involved here is that the center of power is identical with the center of truth.”

“when people are being uprooted and alienated and are losing their sense of what this world means, this ideology inevitably has a certain hypnotic charm. To wandering humankind it offers an immediately available home: all one has to do is accept it, and suddenly everything becomes clear once more, life takes on new meaning, and all mysteries, unanswered questions, anxiety, and loneliness vanish.”

“And all the wise men left Ivan's kingdom; only the fools remained.”

“When he had read the Sermon on the Mount, which had always touched him, he saw in it for the first time today not beautiful abstract thoughts, setting forth for the most part exaggerated and impossible demands, but simple, clear, practical laws. If these laws were carried out in practice (and this was quite possible) they would establish perfectly new and surprising conditions of social life,”

“For many centuries people who were considered criminals have been tortured. Well, and have they ceased to exist? No; their numbers have been increased not alone by the criminals corrupted by punishment but also by those lawful criminals, the judges, prosecutors, magistrates, and jailers, who judge and punish.”

“...to take up this so-called punishment and correction as a profession, and have themselves become utterly corrupt, and go on unceasingly depraving those whom they torment... The answer he could not find was the same that Christ gave to Peter. It was that we should forgive always an infinite number of times because there are none who have not sinned themselves, and therefore none can punish or correct others.”

“It became clear to him that all the dreadful evil he had been witnessing in prisons and jails and the quiet self-satisfaction of the perpetrators of this evil were the consequences of people trying to do what was impossible; trying to correct evil while being evil themselves; vicious men were trying to correct other vicious men...”

“All these people were evidently invulnerable and impregnable to the simplest feelings of compassion only because they held offices. As officials they were impermeable to the feelings of humanity, as this paved ground is impermeable to the rain. Perhaps these governors... police officers are needed, but it is terrible to see people deprived of the chief human attribute, that of love and sympathy for one another.”

“they considered not men and their duty towards them but only the office they themselves filled, and held what that office demanded of them to be above human relations. "That's what it is... If one acknowledges but for a single hour that anything can be more important than love for one's fellowmen, even in some one exceptional case, any crime can be committed without a feeling of guilt."”

“"All this comes," Nekhlyudov thought, "from the fact that all these people, governors, inspectors, police officers, and men, consider that there are circumstances in which human relations are not necessary between human beings.”

“He conducted them in the usual manner and could not foresee that two such strong men... would not be able to stand it [the heat] and die. No one is guilty and yet men have been murdered by these people who are not guilty of their murder.”

“You throw a word at me, and I give you two in return; you give me a blow, and I give you two. No, lad! Christ, when He walked on earth, taught us fools something very different.... If you get a hard word from anyone, keep silent, and his own conscience will accuse him. That is what our Lord taught. If you get a slap, turn the other cheek.”

“From the moment Pierre had witnessed those terrible murders committed by men who did not wish to commit them, it was as if the mainspring of his life, on which everything depended and which made everything appear alive, had suddenly been wrenched out and everything had collapsed into a heap... his faith in the right ordering of the universe, in humanity, in his own soul, and in God, had been destroyed.”

“One set of people have suggested, another set have proposed, a third have reported, a fourth have decided, a fifth have confirmed, a sixth have given the order, and a seventh set have carried it out... they shoot and hang people by hundreds and thousands, or massacre millions in war, or break their hearts in solitary confinement, and ruin their souls in the corruption of a soldier’s life, and no one is responsible.”

“But most striking of all is the contradiction between the Christian law of the brotherhood of all people existing in the conscience and the necessity under which all men are placed by compulsory military service of being prepared for hatred and murder – of being at the same time a Christian and a gladiator.”

“If there were no external means of dulling their sensibilities, half of humankind would shoot themselves without delay, for to live in opposition to one’s reason is the most intolerable condition. And that is the condition of all people of the present day. All people of the modern world exist in a state of continual and flagrant antagonism between their conscience and their way of life.”

“Christians... we aid one another, learn from one another, draw ever closer to one another to our mutual happiness, and find in this closeness the whole meaning of life! – and tomorrow some crazy ruler will say some stupidity, and another will answer in the same spirit, and then I must go expose myself to being murdered, and murder people – who have done me no harm – and more than that, whom I love.”

“Creating change isn't our real challenge. Creating consensus is, the kind of national consensus that makes real change possible. That needs to be our number one goal: creating a significant majority in America that emotionally identifies with basic American values. We need to drive people away from the subconscious artifacts of fear and threat that the Republicans have constructed...”

“This isn't 1950. It isn't even twenty years ago. It's now, and right now... despite all the noise and confusion... a majority of Americans inherently recognize our core values... things like the principles of justice and opportunity fair play... that they do understand. Not every body, that's for sure, but a lot more than 51 percent... and that's our future, bringing those people on board.”

“Basically, the Republican Party has managed to emotionally unite every White person who feels left out or left behind in America. And we have helped the Republicans. ... It's the assumption that our endless goal is to win that thin slice of America that tips us to 51 percent. It's the same subconscious idea that a lot of us cling to that demographics will fix everything, that we just need to wait for the babies.”