Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
The EU must be able to act with the speed and flexibility of a network, not the cumbersome rigidity of a bloc. We must not be weighed down by an insistence on a one size fits all approach which implies that all countries want the same level of integration. The fact is that they don't and we shouldn't assert that they do.
Showing your own righteousness by pointing out someone's unrighteousness, the race to the bottom, the transgressions getting smaller and smaller and smaller but still treated with the same level of intolerance and condemnation, all of that stuff, even as I say it I am talking about Twitter but I am thinking about Westboro.
Anyone who is humble but still super accomplished, super recognized, renowned, has status, and has every reason to not have to be humble if they don't want to, but they still choose to be humble because they value that humanity is connected - that we're all on the same level as humans - that humility is what wins my heart.
The original idea of blog publishing was that writer and reader would be on the same level. That it would be a conversation - not a lecture. People lost sight of that. We didn't. Kinja is designed to break down the walls of the ghettos. So that everybody - editor, writer, source, subject, expert, fan - can be a contributor.
Interestingly enough, there is a really different dynamic when you're directing something that somebody else has written compared to when you're directing something that you've written. And there's a good and a bad side to it. I think the bad side is that you never feel the same level of connection to the material - you just don't.
There's an apparent freedom, an apparent liberty of access to everything, but you can't use it because it's too much. Everything is at the same level. You even have fake news. You have to go through fake news to make up your mind. Facts and lies are treated as equal. There are even people who are against the idea of climate change.
Only the most unapologetic biblical fundamentalists, for instance, take every biblical injunction literally. If we all took all scripture at the same level of authority, then we would be more open to slavery, to the subjugation of women, to wider use of stoning. Jesus himself spoke out frequently against divorce in the strongest of terms.
I suspect that most people in the world will travel through or at least wish to travel through Miami in their lifetimes. I think it is on the same level as seeing the pyramids in Giza for many people. But, Miami is slippery: It is a place that is always that distant orgiastic green light while also being a hot, tropical, and very real place.
Obviously, guys don't deal with the same level of criticism if they show off their bodies. Russian President Vladimir Putin literally staged a goofy shirtless photo shoot to show the people of Russia how 'handsome' and 'fit' he is. No one questioned his ability to lead a country as a result, although a lot of people did crack jokes about it.