Also from H2G2, behold the majestic : " -Perhaps I’m old and tired, but I think that the chances of finding out what’s actually going on are so absurdly remote that the only thing to do is to say, “Hang the sense of it,” and keep yourself busy. I’d far rather be happy than right any day.

-And are you?

-Ah. No. Well that’s where it all falls down, of course "

I like it even better in the movie, Bill Nighy embodies this sentence perfectly.

Came for the second, stayed for the first

Hmmm. I’ll try to remember this one, thank you, that’s a real gift.

A life lesson I’ll learn one day. Trying my best though, but it’ll take time. Thanks for sharing.

I like it. Remember where it’s from?

Love this one. Used to teach students in political science about the horrible thing that “political ventiloquism” is.

I suppose it’s less about the quote origin and more about what we make it to mean :)

Recently, I learned about a historical quote, from French PM Daladier on his way back from Munich where he knew he gave everything to Hitler.

He got out his plane, expecting to be lynched or thrown oranges at, and people, when he realized people were praising him as a herald of “peace”, let out this magnificent “Ah… what a bunch of idiots”.

It’s beautiful and I can understand why it sticks… Thanks for letting us know!!

Oh and there’s also this one ftom H2G2 :

Slartibartfast: Perhaps I’m old and tired, but I think that the chances of finding out what’s actually going on are so absurdly remote that the only thing to do is to say, “Hang the sense of it,” and keep yourself busy. I’d much rather be happy than right any day. Arthur Dent: And are you? Slartibartfast: Ah, no. [laughs, snorts] Slartibartfast: Well, that’s where it all falls down, of course

Hmm, you’re right. I first read this sentence for the first time as an epigraph for a violently anti-patriotic, individualistic, fantastic and oniric book which gave me this impression. After a bit of digging, I still think there’s something of my interpretation in the original material (a lettre from Vaché to Aragon from the battlefield), but it’s also a dadaist piece, so not so easy to decipher, in which he wishes for the death of his own generals, somehow talks about killing Germans while wearing a monocle and, all of them soldiers, French and German, being slowly decerebrated. He was fighting and killing although he was still against the war, seemed to be borderline self-destructing, dandy, rebelling, talking multiple times about how war changed him for the worse in both his mind and his body, crippled for life too. He died at 23 from an opium overdose.

So there is certainly more to it. Indeed, he doesn’t say what I implied and seemed to be such a complicated person he might have wrote the quote while thinking it is a good thing, but I suppose my interpretation isn’t totally absurd.

More info :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vaché

Oh, yeah. There’s another one like this for me, a very short poem I read when I was a teenager :

“Ah, what are they dreaming…? Those who say, say, say… Yesterday I was there, today I was here”

That’s so lovely!

And yet, a WWI soldier uttered that phrase. I suppose he did not share this view of WW1. Or he couldn’t have wrote that.

Well at least this may very well work as intended

What’s happening in the American Reich is inspiring a very strong sense of European patriotism like I’ve never seen before among common people around me.

It’s pretty ironic, yet makes sense, that European unity could be achieved this sad way.

Mmh. Yeah. That’s a sound point.

Indeed. And they weren’t always as clear as they may seem from today. A lot of stuff happened in my country around a certain topic : “If children can be incarcerated at 13yo, why can’t they be deemed unfit to have relationships with adults?”.

A few persons, no doubt, engaged with the “relationship with adults” side. But I met quite more, among LGBT activists of that time, who engaged with the “children shouldn’t be incarcerated at 13yo” side.

History remembered them as pro pedophilia activists, and to this day I still don’t know what to think about that.

95% because they’re basically nazis.

puts on prof hat

Well, in some countries, there was indeed historical link between sexual/gender minorities and pedophile advocacy movements (well “movements” is kind of a strong word here) during the 1950s to 1980s. It’s hard for us to understand today, but during my studies, I’ve worked on that topic and met a few people invested in creating or dismantling this link.

But :

1. It didn’t last for long.
2. That’s certainly not what they have in mind.
3. Most importantly, although public and documented cases exist, those minor parts of the LGBT movements were CERTAINLY NOT the strongest allies of the pedophile advocacy movement. Their strongest allies were actually well… more probably from the ruling class.

A while ago, I read a sociology or social psychology study about children and how they were given attention by their teacher at school. The sample was like a bunch of 9yo, 50% girls, 50% boys.

It showed that when the attention given was like 30% for girls, 70% for boys, boys would feel the girls were given unfairly high and constant attention.

The way they’re educated by their parents and, more potently maybe, society as a whole.