Take your pleasures where you may?

Unity and self-sacrifice, of themselves, even when fostered by the most noble means, produce a facility for hating. Even when men league themselves mightily together to promote tolerance and peace on earth, they are likely to be violently intolerant toward those not of a like mind.

The most effective way to silence our guilty conscience is to convince ourselves and others that those we have sinned against are indeed depraved creatures, deserving every punishment, even extermination.

Though they seem at opposite poles, fanatics of all kinds are actually crowded together at one end. It is the fanatic and the moderate who are poles apart and never meet. The fanatics of various hues eye each other with suspicion and are ready to fly at each other's throat. But they are neighbors and almost of one family. They hate each other with the hatred of brothers.

The fanatic cannot be weaned away from his cause by an appeal to his reason and his moral sense. He fears compromise and cannot be persuaded to qualify the certitude and righteousness of his holy cause. But he finds no difficulty in swinging suddenly and wildly from one holy cause to another. He cannot be convinced but only converted. His passionate attachment is more vital than the quality of the cause to which he is attached.

\ufffd Eric Hoffer, The True Believer

Post #195,608 by marlowe 2/20/05 11:42:23 AM Reply	Take your pleasures where you may? Some people chortle over freedom loving Shia Arabs getting murdered by dead end Baathists, others get their glee from incidents of petty vandalism. Each to his own. Me, I get my jollies from seeing genocidal dictators overthrown and democracies established. Empowerment of the common folk makes me hot. I like the way it makes the hypocrites squirm. I'm kinky that way. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Well, pardon us for winning the election. Memo to Democrats and to the Left: hatred is not a substitute for vision. "All the news you wish would go away" [link\|http://marlowe-essays.blogspot.com/2005/01/what-we-need-prescription-for-our.html\|http://marlowe-essay...tion-for-our.html] - What We Need - a prescription for our times [link\|http://marlowe-essays.blogspot.com/2005/01/where-i-stand-proverbs-and-axioms-for.html\|http://marlowe-essay...d-axioms-for.html] - Where I Stand - Proverbs and axioms for the real world
Post #195,616 by rcareaga 2/20/05 1:31:05 PM Reply	ObSentient LRPD We're not going to play any mature games, are we?
Post #196,003 by jb4 2/22/05 5:34:31 PM Reply	You're 2-for-2 in the oxymoron dept. "freedon-loving Shia Arabs"?!? Who you crappin'? It is to laugh. I assume these are the same "freedom-loving Shia Arabs" who incarcerated what was it 70 Americans for 444 days...another one of your incessant rants, IIRC. jb4 shrub\ufffdbish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT
Post #196,177 by Ashton 2/24/05 6:14:13 AM Reply	Ah, you mean Unity and self-sacrifice, of themselves, even when fostered by the most noble means, produce a facility for hating. Even when men league themselves mightily together to promote tolerance and peace on earth, they are likely to be violently intolerant toward those not of a like mind. The most effective way to silence our guilty conscience is to convince ourselves and others that those we have sinned against are indeed depraved creatures, deserving every punishment, even extermination. Though they seem at opposite poles, fanatics of all kinds are actually crowded together at one end. It is the fanatic and the moderate who are poles apart and never meet. The fanatics of various hues eye each other with suspicion and are ready to fly at each other's throat. But they are neighbors and almost of one family. They hate each other with the hatred of brothers. The fanatic cannot be weaned away from his cause by an appeal to his reason and his moral sense. He fears compromise and cannot be persuaded to qualify the certitude and righteousness of his holy cause. But he finds no difficulty in swinging suddenly and wildly from one holy cause to another. He cannot be convinced but only converted. His passionate attachment is more vital than the quality of the cause to which he is attached. \ufffd Eric Hoffer, The True Believer
Post #196,259 by a6l6e6x 2/24/05 7:57:20 PM Reply	That's a Bingo! Alex The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt. -- Bertrand Russell

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