[I]n a place with absolutely no private or personal life, with the incessant worship of a mediocre career-sadist as the only culture, where all citizens are the permanent property of the state, the highest form of pointlessness has been achieved.
Interpretation
The quote critiques a society lacking individuality and personal freedom, emphasizing the absurdity of such existence.
Christopher Hitchens' quote illustrates the dangers of a society that prioritizes conformity and control over personal freedom and individuality. In a world where private lives are nonexistent and the state holds absolute power over its citizens, the essence of human experience and meaning is lost, leading to a life devoid of purpose and fulfillment. Hitchens warns against the perils of mediocrity and the worship of oppressive authority, suggesting that such a scenario represents the pinnacle of futility.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of maintaining individual freedoms in a democratic society.
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 — because it’s had to give so much more ground and because we know so much more. But you’ve 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.
To become the enemy, see yourself as the enemy of the enemy
Emancipated' women found out that the honesty, generosity, and camaraderie of men was a lie.
We create institutions and policies on the basis of the way we make assumptions about us and others. We accept the fact that we will always have poor people around us. So we have had poor people around us. If we had believed that poverty is unacceptable to us, and that it should not belong to a civilized society, we would have created appropriate institutions and policies to create a poverty-free world.
We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings.
A man who examines each subject from a philosophical standpoint cannot neglect them: he has to omit nothing, and state the truth about each topic.
Here, then, is what I wanted to tell you of my architecture. I created it with courage and idealism, but also with an awareness of the fact that what is important is life, friends and attempting to make this unjust world a better place in which to live.
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