If we assume the best in people, we can radically redesign our democracy and welfare states.
Rutger BregmanRead
So I think that good journalism helps you to zoom out, to focus on the structural forces that govern our lives. And I think that good journalism is also not only about the problems, but also about the solutions, and the people who are working on these solutions.
Interpretation
Good journalism provides a broader perspective on societal issues and highlights both challenges and solutions.
In this quote, Rutger Bregman emphasizes the role of journalism as not merely a tool for reporting problems but as a means to gain a deeper understanding of the systemic forces that shape human existence. It advocates for journalism that not only identifies issues but also tells the stories of those actively seeking solutions, thereby encouraging a more informed and engaged public.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of media literacy, one might use this quote to highlight the positive role of journalism in society.
If we assume the best in people, we can radically redesign our democracy and welfare states.
Since long workdays lead to more errors, shorter workdays could reduce accidents. Overtime is deadly. Tired surgeons have been found to be more prone to slip'ups, and soldiers who get too little shuteye are more prone to miss targets.
My hope is that the corona crisis will help bring us into a new age of cooperation and solidarity and a realization that we're in this together.
This is what a crisis does: It makes you question the status quo. That doesn't mean that after a crisis we move into some kind of utopia. But it is an opportunity for political change.
While it won't solve all the world's ills - and ideas such as a rent cap and more social housing are necessary in places where housing is scarce - a basic income would work like venture capital for the people.
Believing in the good of humanity is a revolutionary act - it means that we don't need all those managers and CEO's, kings and generals. That we can trust people to govern themselves and make their own decisions.
Reading is not simply an intellectual pursuit but an emotional and spiritual one. It lights the candle in the hurricane lamp of self; that's why it survives
It's quite fashionable to say that the educational system is broken. It's not broken. It's wonderfully constructed. It's just that we don't need it anymore.
Everyone [in higher education] was what I call drillers of deeper wells. These academics sit at the bottom of a deep well and they look up and see a sliver of the sky. They know everything about that little sliver of sky and nothing else. I scan all my horizons.
All learning begins when our comfortable ideas turn out to be inadequate.
If teachers and grammar school editors find my jawbreaker sentences shatter their mushmilk teeth, let them eat stale cake dunked in weak tea of their own ungodly manufacture.
Cultivation to the mind is as necessary as food to the body.
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