‘First
to you who are currently successful: you who made it mouthing phony,
ill-written, unutterably boring, lying, arse-licking speeches. Lend an unctuous
ear – it may prove expedient.
And
you out of office need not look so pious. Sincerity, sensitivity or honesty did
not cost you election. Had you possessed any of these qualities you would never
have stood. Only the scum of a society could bother to fashion a career so
ruthlessly opportunist, so intellectually parasitic, so spiritually
unrewarding.
Platitudes.
This indignation doesn’t bruise your egotism, this rage prompts no
self-assessment, nor costs you votes. Philosophers, poets, authors, dramatists,
artists and tele-pundits have interminably exposed the vileness of your
methods, the sordidness of your ambitions. The masses, whom you despise, hold
your profession beneath contempt.
And still you survive.
You
think that Parliament is the greatest institution in the world. Parliament!
Parliament: bloated with fat, pompous, dying alcoholics who babble on with:
here, here, honourable member, procedural motions, precious amendments, last
ditch filibustering … Parliament: the gulch parting promise from achievement.’
Mundane quote for the
day: ‘Consider
what value, what meaning is enclosed even in the smallest of our daily habits,
in the hundred possessions which even the poorest beggar owns: a handkerchief,
an old letter, the photo of a cherished person. These things are part of us,
almost like limbs of our body; nor is it conceivable that we can be deprived of
them in our world, for we immediately find others to substitute the old ones,
other objects which are ours in their personification and evocation of our
memories.’ – Primo Levi, If This Is A Man
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