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| Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg |
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| Justice Louis Brandeis |
“The greatest menace to freedom is an inert people,” and she [Ginsberg] advised people “to fight for the things you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you.”
--Justice Louis Brandeis & Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg
These more extreme authoritarian attacks on liberalism come in three basic kinds. Let’s call their believers for simplicity’s sake—and with the obvious understanding that they cross over and hybridize in many intricate ways—triumphalist authoritarians, theological authoritarians, and tragic authoritarians. The first attack liberal weakness; the second, liberal materialism; the last, liberal hubris.
"Clichés, stock phrases, adherence to conventional, standardized codes of expression and conduct have the socially recognized function of protecting us against reality..." ― Hannah Arendt
Consciousness is the bottom line reality. It is, I accept, a mystery, but it is one I have an immediate, direct awareness of – I am, in fact, immersed in it – and it is one that is inseparable from my having any experience at all.
Animal Farm & 1984
George Orwell
Until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.
And for the deeper dive, from "Understanding & Politics:"
The originality of totalitarianism is horrible, not because some new “idea” came into the world, but because its very actions constitute a break with all our traditions; they have clearly exploded our categories of political thought and our standards for moral judgment.
