Dogs

“Who Let the Dogs Out?”    -Anslem Douglas

Fluffy Bunnies

“It’s amazing how good governments are, given their track record in almost every other field, at hushing up things like alien encounters…The truth may be out there, but lies are inside your head.”

Terry Pratchett in Hogfather, New York: Harper Torch, 1996, page 188.

Non-Conformity

“My life is about turning concepts into useful products.”    -Bill Squire

Self

What is significant about this viewpoint concerning the evil of “selfishness” is in how many versions it has appeared throughout human history. Don’t be selfish—subordinate your interests to those of the tribe. Don’t be selfish—subordinate your interests to those of the family. Don’t be selfish—sacrifice for the Pharaoh, Emperor, King, Church, Country, Race, State, Proletariat, Society, or Globe. Remember: Service is your noblest goal; selfishness is the root of all evil.
In this doctrine, selfishness is presumed to be narrow, petty, small-minded, materialistic, immature, narcissistic, anti-social, exploitative, mean-spirited, arrogant, ruthless, indifferent, cruel, and potentially murderous. These traits are evidently regarded as being to one’s self-interest, since they are labeled as expressions of selfishness. It is interesting to speculate about the psychology of those who believe this. By my own understanding I would say that these traits are self-destructive and that self-destruction is not to one’s self-interest.

If one’s goal is a happy and fulfilling life, self-interest is best served by rationality, productivity, integrity, and a sense of justice and benevolence in dealings with others. It is served by learning to think long-range and to project the consequences of one’s actions, which means learning to live responsibly. Irresponsibility is not to one’s self-interest. And neither is mindlessness, dishonesty, or brutality.

-Nathaniel Branden

Goals

Set goals that dont feel all that easy, that challenge you, stimulate you, and that give you a chance to stretch and push yourself. That is where the power of growth lies.

— Nathaniel Branden

I am learning to be patient and compassionate with myself
as I gain the courage to be true to myself.
-Shakti Gawain, Living in the Light

Noble

Not by harming life
Does one become noble.
One is termed noble
For being gentle
To all living things.

-Dhammapada, 19, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Non-Conformity

“I would rather have people hate me for whom I am, than love me for whom I am not” Kurt Cobain

“I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy” Tom Waits

Bully

To be GOVERNED is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be place[d] under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality. -Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Bully

In the animal world we have seen that the vast majority of species live in societies, and that they find in association the best arms for the struggle for life: understood, of course, in its wide Darwinian sense — not as a struggle for the sheer means of existence, but as a struggle against all natural conditions unfavourable to the species. The animal species, in which individual struggle has been reduced to its narrowest limits, and the practice of mutual aid has attained the greatest development, are invariably the most numerous, the most prosperous, and the most open to further progress. The mutual protection which is obtained in this case, the possibility of attaining old age and of accumulating experience, the higher intellectual development, and the further growth of sociable habits, secure the maintenance of the species, its extension, and its further progressive evolution. The unsociable species, on the contrary, are doomed to decay. —Peter Kropotkin, Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution (1902), Conclusion.