Null States Quotes

“You’ll get used to it,” he says. “In any case, I find it interesting that you think of this as the past.”
“What do you mean?”
Suleyman gestures, drawing her gaze over the shacks of organic material, the sand-and-scrub wasteland, the distant evaporation plant, the images painted on brick that provide intel and entertainment. “This could just as easily be the future.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“Privacy is part of autonomy. Deciding what is reported and how much you spend on reporting it is part of governing.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“Voters lose interest, growing either complacent or frustrated.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“This is a micro-democracy, not a representative dictatorship.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“for the most part, refugees are recognized as a good bargain. Treat them well, and they will vote for you more loyally than citizens who were born in your centenal.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“It’s almost like we’re working against ourselves by helping them.” “They were elected,” Malakal reminds her. “Just because it’s democratic doesn’t make it right,” she shoots back at him;”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“She’s got a mouth full of something to say and looks sharp as a ship’s figurehead, cutting through the spray and the bullshit.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“You’ll see. These people, they don’t get their own way, they’re coming for the whole system.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“The problem with feeds, beyond all the obvious problems, I mean, is that they give us the illusion of a perfect truth, incontrovertible evidence, a flat, singular version of history. They are too easy to rely on, to believe in." She lightens her words with a smile and a half-shrug. "I practice sustaining my disbelief in objective, documentable truth.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“Sure, but…” Roz thinks about everything she uses Information for, all the time. “If you’re driving, and you come to an intersection, how do you know what vehicles might be approaching from either side?”
“Well, we try not to design blind intersections,” Maria says. “And we use mirrors.”
Mirrors! Ingenious. “You must have found it much easier than we did when Information went out during the elections,” Roz says, trying to offer Maria’s odd cult some credit.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“She’s still thinking in diplo-speak, though, and asks a question rather than answering directly.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“social capital pyramid scheme”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“but for the most part, refugees are recognized as a good bargain. Treat them well, and they will vote for you more loyally than citizens who were born in your centenal.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States

“The aftereffects of confiding something you shouldn't have, almost as bad as a hangover.”
― Malka Ann Older, Null States