He hated it when adults told him he only felt the way he did because he was young. As if being young was like being insane or drunk, like the convictions he held were hallucinations caused by a mental illness that could only be cured by waiting five years.
Interpretation
This quote expresses frustration with the dismissive attitudes of adults towards the beliefs and feelings of youth.
Cory Doctorow highlights the often patronizing perception that young people's thoughts and feelings are invalid or irrational simply because of their age. He argues against the notion that maturity necessarily brings clarity, suggesting instead that youthful convictions have merit and should not be dismissed as mere folly or temporary insanity.
In practice
In discussions about generational differences, this quote could be used to highlight the importance of valuing youth perspectives.
Content isn't king. If I sent you to a desert island and gave you the choice of taking your friends or your movies, you'd choose your friends -- if you chose the movies, we'd call you a sociopath. Conversation is king. Content is just something to talk about.
... the Kindle is a "roach motel" device: its license terms and DRM ensure that books can check in, but they can't check out.
Right, and you point out something important which is that people who don’t want to pay, people who are pirates, don’t get bothered by the DRM, they go out and buy the cracked books or download the cracked books for free. It’s only people who are foolish enough to pay for them that get locked into these platforms.
Don't surrender all your joy for an idea you used to have about yourself that isn't true anymore.
The goal of forecasting is not to predict the future but to tell you what you need to know to take meaningful action in the present
Don't find fault, find a remedy.
One's self-satisfaction is an untaxed kind of property which it is very unpleasant to find deprecated.
The common man is not concerned about the passage of time, the man of talent is driven by it.
Let us be silent, that we may hear the whispers of the gods.
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