The rule of law, democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of expression - we cannot take them for granted. They do not exist willy-nilly across the world; they are very rare.
Interpretation
Essential rights and freedoms must be actively protected and are not universally guaranteed.
In this quote, Daniel Lubetzky emphasizes the importance of valuing and defending fundamental principles such as the rule of law, democracy, and freedom of speech. He highlights that these ideals are not naturally occurring and can often be found only in a few places, urging us not to take them for granted as they require continuous effort and vigilance to maintain.
In practice
During a speech on human rights, you could quote this to emphasize the importance of defending democracy.
We need to understand the other side to impact the other side. We become much more effective as humans and leaders when we engage in hearty conversations with those who are different from us, not necessarily to change our opinions, but to build the empathy muscle.
Civilized discourse demands critical thinking, self-reflexiveness, sober-headed analysis.
The ideal is to build a culture of healthy discussion, where everyone's ideas are valued. At KIND, we want everyone to be comfortable challenging my or anyone else's ideas without ever feeling or making someone else feel that the questioning is a personal attack.
You have to be very careful. If you over-commercialize a social mission, it completely loses its soul.
My dad had this incredible kindness that oozed through every part of his body. He had the ability to look at life positively in spite of what he went through. He was a Holocaust survivor. When he was 15-1/2 years old, he was liberated from the Dachau Concentration Camp by American soldiers who risked a lot to save people they had never met.
To maintain our entrepreneurial spirit, we have to create a culture in which everyone remembers that every order, big or small - and every interaction, every moment - will define what our company is today and what it will become tomorrow.
It is easy to see that a greater self-reliance must work a revolution in all the offices and relations of men; in their religion; in their education; in their pursuits; their modes of living; their association; in their property; in their speculative views.
There are situations in which hope and fear run together, in which they mutually destroy one another and lose themselves in dull indifference.
Where there is no conflict, there is no fault.
In my country, we're sufficiently consumed by the concept of happiness that the right to its pursuit is enshrined in the Declaration of Independence. But what is happiness?
We are all tattooed in our cradles with the beliefs of our tribe; the record may seem superficial, but it is indelible. You cannot educate a man wholly out of the superstitious fears which were early implanted in his imagination; no matter how utterly his reason may reject them...
Faith is permitting ourselves to be seized by the things that we do not see.
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