We’re the ones who lost. We’re the ones who took to the streets in the hope that if there were enough of us out there, things would change. We’re the ones you saw down from your balconies, the ones you were kind enough to throw water bottles to, and the ones you felt proud to see your son and daughter join. We’re the ones who chanted and got gassed, and we scattered, and...
This keeps happening, and I want to mention it. Every once in a while, as I am wont to do, I get into a bit of an argument or a conversational clash online. Often others get involved, people commenting, whether to attack what I’m saying or more stupidly, they go for an ad hominem attack, blissfully unaware that they’ve just dismissed themselves from any serious consideration. Often...
Bruno. Before he went back to Italy, to warn him not to go. To warn him of Mocenigo. Or, alternatively, in 1600 before they burned him, to tell him that a full four hundred years later, people would be reading his books, and there’d be a statue honouring him right where he was about to get burned. To tell the Nolan that his life’s work had not been in vain. That he would be loved, and...
In 2011, as we walked past Agouza on our march from Mohandessein, people cheered us on from their balconies. Families looked out of their windows, and they expressed both pride and joy, young men would stand with their mothers in balconies and ask them if they could go down and join us in our march, and the mothers would proudly send their sons down to join us, walk with us, chant with us, march...
You survived, and you’re sad. It’s easy to think that you’re sad because you survived, but that’s not quite true. It’s not like you don’t have better reasons to be sad, smarter reasons. You’re sad because others have died, and you’re sad for those that still suffer, and you’re sad because of how little has been achieved despite those great...
He cries, and there’s very little you can do to help. He cries, and it makes you feel useless. You try to console him; you smile at him, you make silly faces, you do whatever comes to mind. If it helps, it’s only for a brief moment, after which he continues to cry. He turns his head to the floor. He pushes his face against his mattress, trying to dull the pain. It doesn’t help...
I just caught up to the news that Tony Benn died. I don’t know much about Tony Benn, but what I knew of him caused me to respect him a great deal. The UK literally had to re-wire some laws because he was the first person in British history to refuse to go ‘up’ from the House of Commons to the House of Lords. His father had been a lord, and the lordship had gone to his brother...
We talk about losing faith in humanity because we see and do terrible things. But think of what that means. What are we comparing humanity to in order to be disappointed? Are we comparing it to the rest of the animal kingdom? For those of us that do, humanity will almost always be morally wanting, although creatively fascinating. But what else are we referring to? We are not referring to another...
Do yourself a favor and read a little about William James Sidis. He was born in 1898, and he got his name because his father, Boris Sidis, was invited to the USA by psychologist William James. He was a prodigy and probably the smartest man ever to have lived. He could speak several languages by the age of 5 and invented a language at the age of 8. He wrote prolifically but anonymously. He wrote...
You may not be real, but your choices are.
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