James Kavanaugh

There are Men too gentle to live among Wolves

My Easy God is Gone

I have lost my easy God- the one whose name I knew since childhood.

I knew his temper, his sullen outrage, his ritual forgiveness.

I knew the strength of his arm, the sound of his insistent voice.

His beard bristling, his lips full and red with moisture at the moustache,

his eyes clear and piercing, too blue to understand all, 

his face too unwrinkled to feel my child's pain.

He was a good God-so he told me-a long suffering and manageable one.

I knelt at his feet and kissed them,

I felt the smooth countenance of his forgiveness.

I never told him how he frightened me,

how he followed me as a child when I played with friends

or begged for candy on Halloween.

He was a predictable God.

I was the unpredictable one.

He was unchanging, omnipotent, all seeing...

I was volatile and helpless.

He taught me to thank him for the concern which gave me no chance to breathe...

for the love which demanded only love in return- and obedience.

He made pain sensible and patience possible and the future foreseeable.

He, the mysterious, took all mystery away...corroded my imagination...

controlled the stars and would not let them speak for themselves.

Now he haunts me seldom: some fierce umbilical is broken.

I live with my own fragile hopes and sudden rising despair.

Now I do not weep for my sins, I have learned to love them

and to know that they are the wounds that make love real.

His face eludes me...his voice, with all its pity, does not ring in my ear.

His maxims memorized in boyhood do not make fruitless and pointless my experience.

I walk alone, but not so terrified as when he held my hand.

I do not splash in the blood of his son nor hear the crunch of nails or thorns piercing protesting flesh.

I am a boy again- I whose boyhood was turned to manhood in a brutal myth.

Now wine is only wine with drops that do not taste of blood.

The bread I eat has too much pride for transubstantiation.

I too...and together the bread and I embrace, each grateful to be what we are...

each loving from our own reality.

Now the bread is warm in my mouth and I am warm in its mouth as well.

Now my easy God is gone. He knew too much to be real.

He talked too much to listen. He knew my words before I spoke.

I knew his answers as well...computerized and turned to dogma.

His stamp was on my soul, his law locked cross-like on my heart.

His imperatives tattooed on my breast, his aloofness canonized in ritual.

Now he is gone...my easy stuffy God...

God: the father-master, the mother-whiner...

the dull, whoring God who offered love bought by an infants fear.

Now the world is mine with all its pain and warmth, with its ever color and sound.

The setting Sun is my priest with the ocean for its alter.

The rising Sun redeems me with the rolling waves warmed in its arms.

A dog barks and I weep to be alive.

A cat studies me and my joy is boundless.

I lie on the grass and boy-like, search the sky.

The clouds do not turn to angels, the winds do not whisper of heaven or hell.

Perhaps I have no God.

What does it matter?

I have beauty and joy and transcending loneliness.

I have the beginning of Love...as beautiful as it is feeble...as free as it is human.

I have the mountains that whisper secrets held before men could speak.

I have the ocean that belches life on the beach and caresses it in the sand.

I have a friend who smiles when he sees me, who weeps when he hears my pain.

I have a future full of surprises, a present full of wonder.

I have no past. The steps have disappeared, the wind has blown them away.

I stand in the heavens and on earth, I feel the breeze in my hair.

I can drink to the North Star and shout on a bar-stool.

I can feel the teeth of a hangover, the joy of laziness...

the flush of my own rudeness, the surge of my own ineptitude.

I can know my gentleness as well...my wonder, my nobility.

I sense the call of creation, I feel its swelling in my hands.

I can lust and love, eat and drink, sleep and rise...

but my easy god is gone, and in his stead 

the mystery of loneliness and love.

With Cain
Come with Cain and Me East of Eden towards the sea
in desert lands called Nod where murderers live and lovers grown weary of Abel and his God.
The mark upon our face is sadness and horror is the color of our eyes.
We have seen sights too dark for sunlight, known pain unweepable by all the waters of the skies.
We are weary men...too mad for mothers to bear
too angry to suck soft breasts of flesh lest we bite them to be bathed in blood
and drink the redness sweet and fresh for thirst unquenchable in Adams wells.
We murdered for a fathers love...a trifling price for such a prize.
Now, cast from the gardens dullness, the honest wastes of Nod are Paradise
for men who took a brothers life to save their own.
He had no life to give...only dullness and duty with loins as empty as his face
and grinning lips that ate at a fathers table where appetite grows too stale to taste
ought but meat and wine of emptiness
and uttered words that lied like the eyes that laughed and only seemed to listen...
too stolid to hear anther's cries or even weeping.
Come with Cain and Me East of Eden towards the sea
in desert lands called Nod where murderers live and lovers grown weary of Abel and his God.
Abel, to weak to kill ought but the helpless animals in sacrifice,
his body too numb to know ought but the emptiness of a husbandman's life.
His passion planted like the corn and wheat
His love as lustless as a bleating lamb.
What life had he, this fair and docile man of no surprises?
too sweet to damn a soul to hell
too listless to hate the silent father whom he served with joy and comfort
 and combed his greying hair content to work and whistle like a boy
unaware that his blood boiled and spirit burned
that his heart pulsed with pain to make love possible.
I am glad the pale wretch is slain
that once before he died he saw the blood that dripped from my aching hands
  and washed the ground that he tilled and fed the corn of fertile lands
where hunger is only nourished
and bodies are only fed to fall in numbness like the animals made fat to die in dumbness.
Come with Cain and Me East of Eden towards the sea
in desert lands called Nod where murderers live and lovers grown weary of Abel and his God.
The lonely are here. They are kind.
Wandering men, but they are men strong enough to lift the weak and love them
silent enough to listen once again
 when the lights of paradise beckon the broken hearts that only wanted a father
to whisper his love if but for a moment
to look at a child and reverently to gather him in arms that all the ages ached for.
The desert days are torrid but the waters are sweet.
There are palm trees to challenge the suns cruelness till shadows come at night to thrill the poet
and rest the wanderer in the quiet coolness of peace and passion
 linked in a woman's arms strong enough to hold a mans heart,
gentle enough to touch the sadness on his face
wise enough to let him go apart to dream and wander.
There is silence in the land of Nod
and peace for lovers brave enough to kill.
Come beyond the garden of Abel and his God
where men not made for time lie still.

Freedom
Man does not want freedom...He only talks of it...
Satisfied to choose his slavery and to pay it homage
Freedom asks too much:
silence and strength
the death of empty alliances
...an end to ego baths.
Freedom confronts loneliness and lives with it...
makes more of larks than lust...builds no monuments to itself.
Freedom, content to live without goals, satisfied that living is enough,
scoffs at titles, laughs at greed...
too free to propose reforms.
Man does not want freedom.
He fears its demands
he only needs talk of it...
The free man has no such need.
But man can live without freedom
content to laugh at slavery
and to know today that yesterday's pain is gone.

To Love is not to possess...

“To love is not to possess,

To own or imprison,

Nor to lose one's self in another.

Love is to join and separate,

To walk alone and together,

To find a laughing freedom

That lonely isolation does not permit.

It is finally to be able

To be who we really are

No longer clinging in childish dependency

Nor docilely living separate lives in silence,

It is to be perfectly one's self

And perfectly joined in permanent commitment

To another--and to one's inner self.

Love only endures when it moves like waves,

Receding and returning gently or passionately,

Or moving lovingly like the tide

In the moon's own predictable harmony,

Because finally, despite a child's scars

Or an adult's deepest wounds,

They are openly free to be

Who they really are--and always secretly were,

In the very core of their being

Where true and lasting love can alone abide.”

Nathaniel Branden

Mental Health vs. Mysticism and Self-Sacrifice

Faith is the commitment of one's consciousness to beliefs for which one has no sensory evidence or rational proof.

When a man rejects reason as his standard of judgement only one alternative standard remains to him: his feelings.

A mystic is a man who treats his feelings as tools of cognition.

Faith is the equation of feeling with knowledge.

To practice the 'virtue' of faith one must be willing to suspend one's sight and one's judgment

...one must be willing to live with the unintelligible...

with that which cannot be conceptualized or integrated into the rest of one's knowledge,

and to induce a trance-like illusion of understanding.

One must be willing to repress one's critical faculty and hold it as one's guilt;

One must be willing to drown any questions that rise in protest...

...to strangle any trust of reason convulsively seeking to assert its proper function as the protector of one's life and cognitive integrity.

Counterfeit Individualism

As an ethical-political concept, individualism upholds the supremacy of individual rights...

the principle that man is an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others.

As an ethical-psychological concept, individualism holds that man should think and judge independently... valuing nothing higher than the sovereignty of his intellect.

Albert Camus

A novel is never anything but a philosophy put into images. And in a good novel, the whole of the philosophy has passed into the images. But if once the philosophy overflows the characters and action, and therefore looks like a label stuck on the work, the plot loses its authenticity and the novel its life. Nevertheless, a work that is to last cannot dispense with profound ideas. And this secret fusion between experiences and ideas, between life and reflection on the meaning of life, is what makes the great novelist. 

The realization that life is absurd cannot be an end, but only a beginning. This is a truth nearly all great minds have taken as their starting point. It is not this discovery that is interesting, but the consequences and rules of action drawn from it.  

Accepting the absurdity of everything around us is one step, a necessary experience: it should not become a dead end. It arouses a revolt that can become fruitful.

We turn our backs on nature; we are ashamed of beauty. Our wretched tragedies have a smell of the office clinging to them, and the blood that trickles from them is the color of printer's ink. 

Man cannot do without beauty, and this is what our era pretends to want to disregard. It steels itself to attain the absolute and authority; it wants to transfigure the world before having exhausted it, to set it to rights before having understood it. Whatever it may say, our era is deserting this world.  

O light! This is the cry of all the characters of ancient drama brought face to face with their fate. This last resort was ours, too, and I knew it now. In the middle of winter I at last discovered that there was in me an invincible summer.

With rebellion, awareness is born.

A living man can be enslaved and reduced to the historic condition of an object. But if he dies in refusing to be enslaved, he reaffirms the existence of another kind of human nature which refuses to be classified as an object.

Life continues, and some mornings, weary of the noise, discouraged by the prospect of the interminable work to keep after, sickened also by the madness of the world that leaps at you from the newspaper, finally convinced that I will not be equal to it and that I will disappoint everyone—all I want to do is sit down and wait for evening. This is what I feel like, and sometimes I yield to it.  

The papers were always talking about the debt owed to society. According to them, it had to be paid. But that doesn't speak to the imagination. What really counted was the possibility of escape, a leap to freedom, out of the implacable ritual, a wild run for it that would give whatever chance for hope there was. Of course, hope meant being cut down on some street corner, as you ran like mad, by a random bullet. But when I really thought it through, nothing was going to allow me such a luxury. Everything was against it; I would just be caught up in the machinery again. -The Stranger

I, too, felt ready to start life all over again. It was as if that great rush of anger had washed me clean, emptied me of hope, and, gazing up at the dark sky spangled with its signs and stars, for the first time, the first, I laid my heart open to the benign indifference of the universe. To feel it so like myself, indeed, so brotherly, made me realize that I’d been happy, and that I was happy still. For all to be accomplished, for me to feel less lonely, all that remained to hope was that on the day of my execution there should be a huge crowd of spectators and that they should greet me with howls of execration. -The Stranger

Nothing is harder to understand than a symbolic work. A symbol always transcends the one who makes use of it and makes him say in reality more than he is aware of expressing

What, then, is that incalculable feeling that deprives the mind of the sleep necessary to life? A world that can be explained even with bad reasons is a familiar world. But, on the other hand, in a universe suddenly divested of illusions and lights, man feels an alien, a stranger. His exile is without remedy since he is deprived of the memory of a lost home or the hope of a promised land. This divorce between man and his life, the actor and his setting, is properly the feeling of absurdity.

Like great works, deep feelings always mean more than they are conscious of saying.

 

 

  

George Carlin

I don’t have pet peeves — I have major psychotic fucking hatreds!

A house is just a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get more stuff.

Religion has convinced people that there’s an invisible man…living in the sky, who watches everything you do every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a list of ten specific things he doesn’t want you to do. And if you do any of these things, he will send you to a special place, of burning and fire and smoke and torture and anguish for you to live forever, and suffer and burn and scream until the end of time. But he loves you. He loves you and he needs money.  

If it requires a uniform, it’s a worthless endeavor.

By and large, language is a tool for concealing the truth.

I think it’s the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and cross it deliberately.  

I would never want to be a member of a group whose symbol was a man nailed to two pieces of wood.

Have you noticed that most of the women who are against abortion are women you wouldn’t want to fuck in the first place? There’s such balance in nature.

I love and treasure individuals as I meet them; I loathe and despise the groups they identify with and belong to.

Property is theft. Nobody “owns” anything. When you die, it all stays here.

The real reason that we can’t have the Ten Commandments in a courthouse: You cannot post “Thou shalt not steal,” “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” and “Thou shalt not lie” in a building full of lawyers, judges, and politicians. It creates a hostile work environment.

Thou shalt keep thy religion to thyself.  

Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

The reason they call it the American Dream is because you have to be asleep to believe it.

Most people with low self-esteem have earned it.

Most people work just hard enough not to get fired and get paid just enough money not to quit.  

When you think about it, attention-deficit order makes a lot of sense. In this country there isn’t a lot worth paying attention to.

Capitalism tries for a delicate balance: It attempts to work things out so that everyone gets just enough stuff to keep them from getting violent and trying to take other people’s stuff.

“Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.”  

“Religion is like a pair of shoes.....Find one that fits for you, but don't make me wear your shoes.”

“The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. What do you get at the end of it? A Death! What’s that, a bonus? I think the life cycle is all backwards. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you’re too young, you get a gold watch, you go to work. You work forty years until you’re young enough to enjoy your retirement. You do drugs, alcohol, you party, you get ready for high school. You go to grade school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back into the womb, you spend your last nine months floating …and you finish off as an orgasm.”

“He - and if there is a God, I am convinced he is a he, because no woman could or would ever fuck things up this badly.”

“May the forces of evil become confused on the way to your house.”

“Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.”

“I'm completely in favor of the
separation of Church and State.
... These two institutions screw us up enough
on their own, so both of them together is
certain death.”

“I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions.”

“I don't like ass kissers, flag wavers or team players. I like people who buck the system. Individualists. I often warn people: "Somewhere along the way, someone is going to tell you, 'There is no "I" in team.' What you should tell them is, 'Maybe not. But there is an "I" in independence, individuality and integrity.'" Avoid teams at all cost. Keep your circle small. Never join a group that has a name. If they say, "We're the So-and-Sos," take a walk. And if, somehow, you must join, if it's unavoidable, such as a union or a trade association, go ahead and join. But don't participate; it will be your death. And if they tell you you're not a team player, congratulate them on being observant.”

“Scratch any cynic and you will find a disappointed idealist.”  

“The very existence of flamethrowers proves that sometime, somewhere, someone said to themselves, 'You know, I want to set those people over there on fire, but I’m just not close enough to get the job done.” 

“Tell people there's an invisible man in the sky who created the universe, and the vast majority will believe you. Tell them the paint is wet, and they have to touch it to be sure.”  

“How come when it’s us, it’s an abortion, and when it’s a chicken, it’s an omelette?” 

“I don't know how you feel, but I'm pretty sick of church people. You know what they ought to do with churches? Tax them. If holy people are so interested in politics, government, and public policy, let them pay the price of admission like everybody else. The Catholic Church alone could wipe out the national debt if all you did was tax their real estate.”  

“I've begun worshipping the sun for a number of reasons. First of all, unlike some other gods I could mention, I can see the sun. It's there for me every day. And the things it brings me are quite apparent all the time: heat, light, food, and a lovely day. There's no mystery, no one asks for money, I don't have to dress up, and there's no boring pageantry. And interestingly enough, I have found that the prayers I offer to the sun and the prayers I formerly offered to 'God' are all answered at about the same 50% rate.”

“If someone with multiple personalities threatens to kill himself, is it considered a hostage situation?”

“People who see life as anything more than pure entertainment are missing the point.”

“When you're born into this world, you're given a ticket to the freak show. If you're born in America you get a front row seat.”  

“So I say, “Live and let live.” That’s my motto. “Live and let live.” And anyone who can’t go along with that, take him outside and shoot the motherfucker. It’s a simple philosophy, but it’s always worked in our family.”

“I tried to believe that there is a God, who created each of us in His own image and likeness, loves us very much, and keeps a close eye on things. I really tried to believe that, but I gotta tell you, the longer you live, the more you look around, the more you realize, something is fucked up.”  

“Oh Beautiful for smoggy skies, insecticided grain,
For strip-mined mountain's majesty above the asphalt plain.
America, America, man sheds his waste on thee,
And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea.”

“Never argue with an idiot. They will only bring you down to their level and beat you with experience.”

“Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed. Results like these do not belong on the résumé of a Supreme Being. This is the kind of shit you'd expect from an office temp with a bad attitude. And just between you and me, in any decently-run universe, this guy would've been out on his all-powerful ass a long time ago. And by the way, I say "this guy", because I firmly believe, looking at these results, that if there is a God, it has to be a man.
No woman could or would ever fuck things up like this. So, if there is a God, I think most reasonable people might agree that he's at least incompetent, and maybe, just maybe, doesn't give a shit. Doesn't give a shit, which I admire in a person, and which would explain a lot of these bad results.”

“It's important in life if you don't give a shit. It can help you a lot.”

“Conservatives want live babies so they can train them to be dead soldiers. ”  

“Everyone smiles in the same language.”

“People who say they don't care what people think are usually desperate to have people think they don't care what people think.”

“Think of how it all started: America was founded by slave owners who informed us, "All men are created equal." All "men," except Indians, niggers, and women. Remember, the founders were a small group of unelected, white, male, land-holding slave owners who also, by the way, suggested their class be the only one allowed to vote. To my mind, that is what's known as being stunningly--and embarrassingly--full of shit.”  

“We are a nation of sheep, and
someone else owns the grass.”

“You show me a lazy prick who's lying in bed all day, watching TV, only occasionally getting up to piss, and I'll show you a guy who's not causing any trouble.”

“I figured out years ago that the human species is totally fucked and has been for a long time. I also know that the sick, media-consumer culture in America continues to make this so-called problem worse. But the trick, folks, is not to give a fuck. Like me. I really don't
care. I stopped worrying about all this temporal bullshit a long time ago. It's meaningless. ”

“Religion is just mind control. ”

“There's a humorous side to every situation. The challenge is to find it.”  

“What if there were no hypothetical questions?” 

“But when you're in front of an audience and you make them laugh at a new idea, you're guiding the whole being for the moment. No one is ever more him/herself than when they really laugh. Their defenses are down. It's very Zen-like, that moment. They are completely open, completely themselves when that message hits the brain and the laugh begins. That's when new ideas can be implanted. If a new idea slips in at that moment, it has a chance to grow.”  

“Bullshit is truly the American soundtrack.” 

“Don't give your money to the church. They should be giving their money to you.”

“It turned out I was pretty good in science. But again, because of the small budget, in science class we couldn't afford to do experiments in order to prove theories. We just believed everything. Actually, I think that class was called Religion. Religion class was always an easy class. All you had to do was suspend the logic and reasoning you were being taught in all the other classes.”

“I am a personal optimist but a skeptic about all else. What may sound to some like anger is really nothing more than sympathetic contempt. I view my species with a combination of wonder and pity, and I root for its destruction. And please don't confuse my point of view with cynicism; the real cynics are the ones who tell you everything's gonna be all right.”  

“And here's something else, another problem you might have: Suppose your prayers aren't answered. What do you say? "Well, it's God's will." "Thy Will Be Done." Fine, but if it's God's will, and He's going to do what He wants to anyway, why the fuck bother praying in the first place? Seems like a big waste of time to me! Couldn't you just skip the praying part and go right to His Will? It's all very confusing.”

“I'm happy to tell you there is very little in this world that I believe in.”  

“If you can't beat them, arrange to have them beaten.”

“I don't have to tell you it goes without saying there are some things better left unsaid. I think that speaks for itself. The less said about it the better.”  

“Just cause you got the monkey off your back doesn't mean the circus has left town.”

“Catholic, which I was until I reached the age of reason”

“It's all bullshit, folks and it's bad for ya.”

“The decay and disintegration of this culture is astonishingly amusing if you are emotionally detached from it. I have always viewed it from a safe distance, knowing I don't belong; it doesn't include me, and it never has. no matter how you care to define it, I do not identify with the local group. Planet, species, race, nation, state, religion, party, union, club, association, neighborhood improvement committee; I have no interest in any of it. I love and treasure individuals as I meet them, I loathe and despise the groups they identify with and belong to.”  

“Do you know why hurricanes have names instead of numbers? To keep the killing personal. No one cares about a bunch of people killed by a number. '200 Dead as Number Three Slams Ashore' is not nearly as interesting a headline as 'Charlie kills 200.' Death is much more satisfying and entertaining if you personalize it.

Me, I'm still waitin' for Hurricane Ed. Old Ed wouldn't hurt ya, would he? Sounds kinda friendly. 'Hell no, we ain't evacuatin'. Ed's comin'!”

“Religion has what is EASILY the greatest bullshit story of all time.”

“I don't believe there's any problem in this country, no matter how tough it is, that Americans, when they roll up their sleeves, can't completely ignore.”  

“If we could only find out who's in charge, we could kill him.” 

“Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea you have freedom of choice. You don't. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land, they own and control the corporations that've long since bought and paid for, the senate, the congress, the state houses, the city halls, they got the judges in their back pocket, and they own all the big media companies so they control just about all of the news and the information you get to hear. They got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else. But I'll tell you what they don't want. They don't want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don't want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They're not interested in that. That doesn't help them.”

“This is a lttle prayer dedicated to the separation of church and state. I guess if they are going to force those kids to pray in schools they might as well have a nice prayer like this: Our Father who art in heaven, and to the republic for which it stands, thy kingdom come, one nation indivisible as in heaven, give us this day as we forgive those who so proudly we hail. Crown thy good into temptation but deliver us from the twilight's last gleaming. Amen and Awomen. ”

“Conservatives say if you don't give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they've lost all incentive because we've given them too much money.”

“Life is not measured by the breathes you take, but by the moments that take your breathe away.”

“The violence of the Left is symbolic, the injuries are not intended. The violence of the Right is real - directed at people, designed to cause injuries. Vietnam, nuclear weapons, police out of control are intentional forms of violence. The violence from the Right is aimed directly at people and the violence from the Left is aimed at institutions and symbols.”  

“[On school uniforms] Don't these schools do enough damage making all these kids think alike, now they have to make them look alike too? It's not a new idea, either. I first saw it in old newsreels from the 1930s, but it was hard to understand because the narration was in German.”

“What exactly is the free world, anyway? I guess it would depend on what you consider the non-free world. And I can't find a clear definition of that, can you? Where is that? Russia? China? For chrissakes, Russia has a better Mafia than we do now, and China is pirating Lion King DVDs and selling dildos on the Internet. They sound pretty free to me. Here are some more jingoistic variations you need to be on the lookout for; "The greatest nation on Earth; the greatest nation in the history of the world"; and "the most powerful nation on the face of the Earth." That last one is usually thrown in just before we bomb a bunch of brown people. Which is every couple of years.”

“The larger the group, the more toxic, the more of your beauty as an individual you have to surrender for the sake of group thought. And when you suspend your individual beauty you also give up a lot of your humanity. You will do things in the name of a group that you would never do on your own. Injuring, hurting, killing, drinking are all part of it, because you've lost your identity, because you now owe your allegiance to this thing that's bigger than you are and that controls you.”

“Abraham Maslow said that the fully realized person transcends his local group and identifies with the species. But the election of Ronald Reagan might've been the beginning of my giving up on my species. Because it was absurd. To this day it remains absurd. More than absurd, it was frightening: it represented the rise to supremacy of darkness, the ascendancy of ignorance.”

“A flag is supposed to represent everything that a country does. It doesn't only represent the good things. If you burn the flag, you're burning the flag for what you perceive to be the bad things the country has done. it's only a symbol. It's only a piece of cloth.”  

“Fuck the drug war. Dropping acid was a profound turning point for me, a seminal experience. I make no apologies for it. More people should do acid. It should be sold over the counter.” 

“But there’s a reason. There’s a reason. There’s a reason for this, there’s a reason education sucks, and it’s the same reason that it will never, ever, ever be fixed. It’s never gonna get any better. Don’t look for it. Be happy with what you got. Because the owners of this country don't want that. I'm talking about the real owners now, the real owners, the big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don't. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the senate, the congress, the state houses, the city halls, they got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear. They got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying, lobbying, to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else, but I'll tell you what they don’t want: They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. Thats against their interests. Thats right. They don’t want people who are smart enough to sit around a kitchen table to figure out how badly they’re getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago. They don’t want that. You know what they want? They want obedient workers. Obedient workers. People who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork, and just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime and the vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it, and now they’re coming for your Social Security money. They want your retirement money. They want it back so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street, and you know something? They’ll get it. They’ll get it all from you, sooner or later, 'cause they own this fucking place. It's a big club, and you ain’t in it. You and I are not in the big club. And by the way, it's the same big club they use to beat you over the head with all day long when they tell you what to believe. All day long beating you over the head in their media telling you what to believe, what to think and what to buy. The table is tilted folks. The game is rigged, and nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care. Good honest hard-working people -- white collar, blue collar, it doesn’t matter what color shirt you have on -- good honest hard-working people continue -- these are people of modest means -- continue to elect these rich cocksuckers who don’t give a fuck about them. They don’t give a fuck about you. They don’t give a fuck about you. They don't care about you at all -- at all -- at all. And nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care. That's what the owners count on; the fact that Americans will probably remain willfully ignorant of the big red, white and blue dick that's being jammed up their assholes everyday. Because the owners of this country know the truth: it's called the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it.”
― George Carlin 

“Government want to tell you things you can't say because they're against the law, or you can't say this because it's against a regulation, or here's something you can't say because its a...secret; "You can't tell him that because he's not cleared to know that." Government wants to control information and control language because that's the way you control thought, and basically that's the game they're in.”  

“Trying to be happy by accumulating possessions is like trying to satisfy hunger by taping sandwiches all over your body.” 

“The God excuse, the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument.”  

“You know what I do? I steal things. Fuck 'em! I grab a handful of candy bars and six magazines and head for the gate.” 

“Political correctness is America's newest form of intolerance, and it is especially pernicious because it comes disguised as tolerance. It presents itself as fairness, yet attempts to restrict and control people's language with strict codes and rigid rules. I'm not sure that's the way to fight discrimination. I'm not sure silencing people or forcing them to alter their speech is the best method for solving problems that go much deeper than speech.”  

“I think the human race has squandered its gift, and I think this country has squandered its promise. I think people in America sold out very cheaply, for sneakers and cheeseburgers. And I don't think it's fixable” 

In 1942 there were 110,000 Japanese-American citizens, in good standing, law abiding people, who were thrown into internment camps simply because their parents were born in the wrong country. That's all they did wrong. They had no right to a lawyer, no right to a fair trial, no right to a jury of their peers, no right to due process of any kind. The only right they had was...right this way! Into the internment camps.

Yeup, sooner or later the people in this country are going to realize the government doesn't give a fuck about them. the government doesn't care about you, or your children, or your rights, or your welfare or your safety. it simply doesn't give a fuck about you. It's interested in it's own power. That's the only thing...keeping it, and expanding wherever possible.

“I love words. I thank you for hearing my words. I want to tell you something about words that I think is important. Words are my work, they’re my play. They’re my passion. Words are all we have really. We have thoughts, but thoughts are fluid. And, then we assign a word to a thought and we’re stuck with that word for that thought. So be careful with words. The same words that hurt can heal.”  

“This country was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free.” 

“There's also way too much religion in the South to be consistent with good mental health.”  

“As far as I'm concerned, humans have not yet come up with a belief that's worth believing.” 

Bill Hicks

The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. The ride goes up and down, around and around, it has thrills and chills, and it's very brightly colored, and it's very loud, and it's fun for a while. Many people have been on the ride a long time, and they begin to wonder, "Hey, is this real, or is this just a ride?" And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and say, "Hey, don't worry; don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride." And we … kill those people. "Shut him up! I've got a lot invested in this ride, shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry, look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real." It's just a ride. But we always kill the good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that? And let the demons run amok … But it doesn't matter, because it's just a ride. And we can change it any time we want. It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one. Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. Take all that money we spend on weapons and defenses each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would pay for many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.

• (On drug laws): Isn’t that weird, we’ve made nature against the law. That’s how un-natural we’ve become.
• “I do have a healthy skepticism, I think we all should. But I think if you listen closely enough, you’ll find that my message, if I as a joke-blower could be pompous enough to have one, is that we’re all alright and it’s gonna work out. I don’t find that cynical at all.”
• (On the effects of Magic Mushrooms): “Your mind completely opens up to the true nature of our existence, which is that we are not bodies, that we are pure, loving spirit created by God. That God is love and there is nothing but love, being all-encompassing, has no opposite. You are completely forgiven on all things, there’s nothing you’ve ever done that has ever swayed God’s pure and un-conditional love for you. And you realize that eternity and peace and heaven is our inheritance, all of us are going to make it there.”
• “The Greeks used to put a lot of bodily functions in their plays, and a lot of graphic sexual material, because they believed, that in performing that way it released the demons of shame from the audience, which is what I believe. Cuz I think we’re all pretty much the same, and we all have grown up with that shame-based thing that America deals with, right? And to sit there and hear someone talk about their love of having sex, whatever, makes you feel like you’re not alone, with what you think maybe are dark, twisted thoughts, cuz they’re not. We all share these thoughts. So that’s why I talk like I do, or did, before I retired tonight.”
• Here's how I feel about gays in the military: Anyone dumb enough to want to be in the military should be allowed in. End of fucking story. That should be the only requirement. I don't care how many push-ups you can do – put on a helmet, go wait in that fox hole. We'll tell you when we need you to kill somebody. I've been watching all these Congressional hearings and all these military guys and all the pundits going, "The esprit de corps will be affected, and we are such a mora …" Excuse me, but aren't you all a bunch of fucking hired killers? Shut up! You are thugs, and when we need you to go blow the fuck out of a nation of little brown people, we'll let you know.
• Go back to bed, America. Your government has figured out how it all transpired. Go back to bed, America. Your government is in control again. Here. Here's American Gladiators. Watch this, shut up. Go back to bed, America. Here is American Gladiators. Here is 56 channels of it! Watch these pituitary retards bang their fucking skulls together and congratulate you on living in the land of freedom. Here you go, America! You are free to do as we tell you! You are free to do what we tell you!  
• You ever look at their faces? "We're pro-life." Don't they look it? Don't they just exude joie de vivre?
• I'll show you politics in America. Here it is, right here. "I think the puppet on the right shares my beliefs." "I think the puppet on the left is more to my liking." "Hey, wait a minute, there's one guy holding out both puppets!" "Shut up! Go back to bed, America. Your government is in control. Here's Love Connection. Watch this and get fat and stupid. By the way, keep drinking beer, you fucking morons."
• The whole image is that eternal suffering awaits anyone who questions God's infinite love. That's the message we're brought up with, isn't it? Believe or die! Thank you, forgiving Lord, for all those options
• Oh, there's a threat to America! Yeah, yeah, yeah … back to that fucking COPS show. 'Cause I'll tell you who the threat to freedom … no, no, not to freedom. I'll tell you who the threat to the status quo is in this country: it's us. That's why they show you shows like fucking COPS. So you know that state power will win and we'll bust your house down and we'll fuckin' bust you anytime we want. That's the message
• I left in love, in laughter, and in truth and wherever truth, love and laughter abide, I am there in spirit.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

If a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes.

The history of free men is never really written by chance but by choice--their choice.

A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both.

I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its stupidity.

Don't join the book burners. Don't think you are going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed

No people on earth can be held, as a people, to be an enemy, for all humanity shares the common hunger for peace and fellowship and justice.

To be true to one’s own freedom is, in essence, to honor and respect the freedom of all others.

We seek peace, knowing that peace is the climate of freedom. And now, as in no other age, we seek it because we have been warned, by the power of modern weapons, that peace may be the only climate possible for human life itself.

With both sides of this divided world in possession of unbelievably destructive weapons, mankind approaches a state where mutual annihilation becomes a possibility. No other fact of today's world equals this in importance—it colors everything we say, plan, and do.

we now stand in the vestibule of a vast new technological age-one that, despite its capacity for human destruction, has an equal capacity to make poverty and human misery obsolete. If our efforts are wisely directed—and if our unremitting efforts for dependable peace begin to attain some success—we can surely become participants in creating an age characterized by justice and rising levels of human well-being.

To remain secure and prosperous themselves, wealthy nations must extend the kind of cooperation to the less fortunate members that will inspire hope, confidence and progress. A rich nation can for a time, without noticeable damage to itself, pursue a course of self- indulgence, making its single goal the material ease and comfort of its own citizens-thus repudiating its own spiritual and material stake in a peaceful and prosperous society of nations. But the enmities it will incur, the isolation into which it will descend, and the internal moral and physical softness that will be engendered, will, in the long term, bring it to disaster.

The unity of all who dwell in freedom is their only sure defense.

The day will come when the people will make so insistent their demand that there be peace in the world that the Governments will get out of the way and let them have peace.

A preventive war, to my mind, is an impossibility today. How could you have one if one of its features would be several cities lying in ruins, several cities where many, many thousands of people would be dead and injured and mangled, the transportation systems destroyed, sanitation implements and systems all gone? That isn't preventive war; that is war.

The hand of the aggressor is stayed by strength--and strength alone.

History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid.

War settles nothing.

 

By leadership we mean the art of getting someone else to do something that you want done because he wants to do it.

 

Bob Dylan

.."I danced my way from the Indian festivals in Gallup, New Mexico to the Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Louisiana with my thumb out, my eyes asleep, my hat turned up and my head turned on...I was drifting and learning new lessons. I was making my own depression. I rode freight trains for kicks and got beat up for laughs...cut grass for quarters and sang for dimes. Hitchhiked on 61,51,75,169,37,66,22, route 40 and Howard Johnson turnpike. Got jailed for suspicion of armed robbery, got held 4 hours on a murder rap, got busted for looking like i do, and i never done none of them things...Somewheres back i took the time to start writing, somewheres back i took the time to start singing, somewheres back i took the time to start writing, but i never did take the time to find out why i took the time to do those things...when they ask me why and where i got started, i gotta shake my head and weave my eyes and walk away dumbfounded...
I got recorded at Columbia after being wrote up in the Times and i still cant find the time to go back and see why and where i started doing what i'm doing. I can't tell you the influences because there's too many to mention and i might leave one out and that wouldn't be fair. Woody Guthrie, sure. Big Joe Williams, yeah. It's easy to remember those names, but what about the faces you can't find again...what about the curves and corners and cu-offs that drop out of sight and fall behind? What about the records you hear but one time? What about the coyotes call and the bulldog's bark what about the tomcats meow and milk cow's moo and the train whistle's moan? Open up your eyes and you're influenced and there's nothing you can do about it."
-BOB DYLAN (my life in a stolen moment)

"In later times my idols fell for i learned that they were only men and had reasons for their deeds which weren't mine, not mine at all. No more on them could i depend but what i learned from each forgotten god was that the battlefield was mine alone and only i could cast my stone and the symbols which by now had grown outa shape but strong in sight were seen by me in a sharper light and the symbol "beauty" still struck my guts but now with more a shameful sound and i rebelled twice as hard and ten times as proud and i walked my road and sung my song like an arch criminal who'd done no wrong and committed no crime but was screaming thru the bars at someone else's prison."

"But i'll wait though till your song is done cuz there's something about you but i don't know what...and i walked my road and sung my song like a scared poet walking on the shore kicking driftwood with my shadow afraid of the sea."
-BOB DYLAN (Joan Baez in Concert, Part 2 [jacket notes])

"i am still running i guess but my road has seen many changes for i've served my time as a refugee in mental terms and in physical terms and many a fear has vanished and many an attitude has fallen and many a dream has faded and i know i shall meet the snowy north again- but with changed eyes next time around to walk lazily down its streets and linger by the edge of the town, find old friends if they're still around, talk to the old people and the young people, running yes...but stopping for awhile embracing what i left and loving it- for i've learned by now never to expect what it cannot give me."

"Yes, I am a thief of thoughts, not i pray a stealer of souls. I have built and rebuilt upon what is waiting for the sand on the beach es carves many castles on what has been opened before my time...a word, a tune, a story, a line, keys in the wind to unlock my mind and to grant y closet thought backyard air...it is not of me to sit and ponder, wondering and wasting time...thinking of thoughts that haven't been thunk, thinking of dreams that haven't been dreamt, and new ideas that haven't been wrote and new words to fit into rhyme. if it rhymes it rhymes if it don't it don't. If it comes it comes, if it won't it won't. No, i must react and spit fast with weapons of words wrapped in tunes that've rolled thru the simple years teasing me to treat them right...to reshape them and restring them...to protect my own world from all those who'd eat it and hold it back from eating it's own food."

"...for all people laugh in the same tongue and cry in the same tongue...endless, endless, it's all endless and it's all songs...it's just one big world of song and they're all on loan if they're only turned loose to sing."
-BOB DYLAN (11 Outlined Epitaphs [liner notes])

"...never trust a cop in a raincoat...if by any chance you're caught naked in a parked car, quick, turn the radio on full blast and pretend that you're driving...when asked if you're a capitalist, rip open your shirt, sing buddy can you spare a dime with your right foot forward and proceed to chew up a dollar bill...Do not create anything, it will be mis-interpreted. It will not change. It will follow you the rest of your life...when asked what you do for a living say you laugh for a living...be suspicious of people who say that if you are not nice to them, they will commit suicide...beware of bathroom walls that've not been written on...when asked to give your real name...never give it."
-BOB DYLAN (Advice for Geraldine on her Miscellaneous Birthday)

"I will never chase a living soul into the prison grasp of my own self-love."

"...clink sings the tower, clang sang the preacher inside of the alter outside of the theater, mystery fails when treachery prevails the forgotten rosary nails itself to a cross of sand and rich men stare at their private owned murals...All is lost Cinderella...All is lost."
-BOB DYLAN (Some other kinds of Songs)

" My poems are written in a rhythym of unpoetic distortion divided by peirced ears, false eyelashes/subtracted by people constantly torturing each other. with a melodic purring line of descriptive hollowness-seen at times through dark sunglasses and other forms of psychic explosion, a song is anyting that can walk by itself/ i am called a songwriter, a poem is a naked person...some people say that i am a poet."
BOB DYLAN (bringing it all back home [jacket notes])

"...the songs on this specific record are not so much songs but rather excercises in tonal breath control...the subject matter-though meaningless as it is-has something to do with the beautiful strangers...the beautiful strangers, Vivaldi's green jacket and the holy slow train."
BOB DYLAN (Highway 61 Revisited [jacket notes])