Pakistan has to export a lot of uneducated people, many of whom have become infected with the most barbaric reactionary ideas.
Interpretation
This quote highlights the challenges faced by Pakistan regarding education and the consequences of a poorly educated populace.
Christopher Hitchens' quote reflects on the impact that a lack of education can have on society, particularly in Pakistan. He suggests that the export of uneducated individuals not only hampers personal and national development, but can also lead to the proliferation of dangerous and reactionary ideologies. This observation serves as a critique of systemic educational failures and warns about the broader implications for social stability and progress.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion about the importance of education in national development.
In a public dialogue with Salman in London he [Edward Said] had once described the Palestinian plight as one where his people, expelled and dispossessed by Jewish victors, were in the unique historical position of being 'the victims of the victims': there was something quasi-Christian, I thought, in the apparent humility of that statement.
What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
Never ask while you are doing it if what you are doing is fun. Don't introduce even your most reliably witty acquaintance as someone who will set the table on a roar.
[E]xceptional claims demand exceptional evidence.
The worst days are when you feel foggy in the head - chemo-brain they call it. It's awful because you feel boring. As well as bored. And stupid. And resigned.
Let me tell you something: for hundreds of thousands of years, this kind of discussion would have been impossible to have, or those like us would have been having it at the risk of our lives. Religion now comes to us in this smiley-face, ingratiating way β because itβs had to give so much more ground and because we know so much more. But youβve got no right to forget the way it behaved when it was strong, and when it really did believe that it had God on its side.
An awful lot of people come to college with this strange idea that there's no longer segregation in America's schools, that our schools are basically equal; neither of these things is true.
To educate the intelligence is to expand the horizon of its wants and desires.
What distinguishes a great mnemonist, I learned, is the ability to create lavish images on the fly, to paint in the mind a scene so unlike any other it cannot be forgotten. And to do it quickly. Many competitive mnemonists argue that their skills are less a feat of memory than of creativity.
I had a lot of really terrible advice early in my writing career, and I cheesed off people without even knowing it, all the while thinking I was implementing good advice. Well, what can you do about it? Next.
What's done to children, they will do to society.
The real safeguard of democracy is education.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.