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Kids, you tried your best and you failed miserably. The lesson is: never try. The Simpsons, Homer’s advice
Activism doesn’t give up. Activism doesn’t fall silent. Activism doesn’t rely on the opiate of hope. Woody Allen once said, ‘I felt a lot better when I gave up hope’. Real activism has little time for identity politics, which like exceptionalism can be fake. These are distractions that confuse and sucker good people. John Pilger, Socialism Chicago 2009, ‘Power Illusion and America’s Last Taboo’; viz also website
Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. William Morris, Hopes and Fears for Art, 1882
Read everything, listen to everybody, don’t trust anything unless you can prove it with your own research. Bill Cooper, The Hour of Our Time, cited The Legacy of William Cooper
In matters of religion and matrimony I never give any advice; because I will not have anybody’s torments in this world or the next laid to my charge. Lord Chesterfield, 1694-1773
Listen to the people who love you. Believe that they are worth living for even when you don’t believe it. Seek out the memories depression takes away and project them into the future. Be brave; be strong; take your pills. Exercise because it’s good for you even if every step weighs a thousand pounds. Eat when food itself disgusts you. Reason with yourself when you have lost your reason. Andrew Solomon, The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression
Beware the irrational, however seductive. Shun the ‘transcendent’ and all who invite you to subordinate or annihilate yourself. Distrust compassion; prefer dignity for yourself and others. Don’t be afraid to be thought arrogant or selfish. Picture all experts as if they were mammals. Never be a spectator of unfairness or stupidity. Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will supply plenty of time for silence. Suspect your own motives, and all excuses. Do not live for others any more than you would expect others to live for you. Christopher Hitchens
I believe that the universe was formed around 15 billion years ago and that humans have evolved from their apelike ancestors over the past few million years. I believe we are more likely to live a good life if all humans try to work together in a world community, preserving planet earth. When decisions for groups are made in this world, I believe that the democratic process should be used. To protect the individual, I believe in freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom from religion, freedom of inquiry, and a wall of separation between church and state. When making decisions about what is right or wrong, I believe I should use my intelligence to reason about the likely consequences of my actions. I believe that I should try to increase the happiness of everyone by caring for other people and finding ways to cooperate. Never should my actions discriminate against people simply because of their race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, or national origin. I believe that ideas about what is right and wrong will change with education, so I am prepared to continually question ideas using evidence from experience and science. I believe there is no valid evidence to support claims for the existence of supernatural entities and deities. I will use these beliefs to guide my thinking and my actions until I find good reasons for revising them or replacing them with other beliefs that are more valid. Ronald P Carver
Ah! realise your youth while you have it. Don’t squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless, or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing ... Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to ... Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but youth. Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
The only thing to do with good advice is to pass it on. It is never of any use to oneself. Oscar Wilde
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. Steve Jobs
This above all: to thine own self be true
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man. William Shakespeare, Hamlet I iii 78
... drinking, fencing, swearing
Quarrelling, drabbing – you may go so far. ibid. II i 25-26, Polonius to Reynaldo with mission to spy on Laertes
I am myself indifferent honest. But yet I could accuse me of such things, that it were better my mother had not borne me. I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious; with more offences at by beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves all; believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery. ibid. III i 123-140, Hamlet to Ophelia
Have more than thou showest,
Speak less than thou knowest,
Lend less than thou owest,
Ride more than thou goest,
Learn more than thou trowest,
Set less than thou throwest,
Leave thy drink and thy whore,
And keep in-a-door,
And thou thalt have more
Than two tens to a score. William Shakespeare, The History of King Lear I iv @114, Fool’s advice
Take heed o’ th’ foul fiend; obey thy parents; keep thy word justly; swear not; commit not with man’s sworn spouse: set not thy sweet heart on proud array. ibid. III iv @71 Edgar
One that slept in the contriving of lust, and waked to do it. Wine loved I deeply, dice dearly, and in woman out-paramoured the Turk. False of heart, light of ear, bloody of hand; hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in prey. ibid. III iv @80 Edgar
Keep thy foot out of brothel, thy hand out of placket, thy pen from lender’s book, and defy the foul fiend. ibid. III iv @87 Edgar
Do it first. Do it yourself. And keep on doing it. Scarface 1932 aka The Shame of the Nation starring Paul Muni & George Raft & Ann Dvorak & Karen Morley & Osgood Perkins & C Henry Gordon & Vince Barnett & Boris Karloff & Purnell Pratt & Tully Marshall et al, director Howard Hughes, advice in car
This country you gotta make a da money first. Then when you get the money you get the power. Then when you get the money, then you get the woman. Scarface 1983 ***** starring Al Pacino & Michelle Pfeiffer & Steven Bauer & Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio & Robert Loggia & Miria Colon & F Murray Abraham et al, director Brian de Palma, Tony to Chico
Be yourself, don’t take anyone’s shit, and never let them take you alive. Gerard Way
Don’t let anyone fuck you in the ass. Ray Donovan: A Mouth is a Mouth s1e2 starring Liev Schreiber & Paul Malcomson & Jon Voight & Eddie Marson & Dash Mihok & Steven Bauer et al, Mickey to grandson
59th Rule of Acquisition: free advice is rarely cheap. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine s2e7: Rules of Acquisition, Quark
Who the President turns to for advice will have profound consequences for us all. The future of human life on the planet may depend on it. Horizon: The President’s Guide to Science, BBC 2008
Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way. And don't pray when it rains if you don't pray when the sun shines. Richard Nixon
Remember, always give your best. Never get discouraged. Never be petty. Always remember, others may hate you. But those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them. And then you destroy yourself. Richard Nixon