Combining Texts

Ideas for 'Truth and the Past', 'The Trouble with Being Born' and 'Law and Authority'

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2 ideas

25. Social Practice / B. Equalities / 1. Grounds of equality
Only liberty, equality and sympathy can stand up to anti-social people [Kropotkin]
     Full Idea: Liberty, equality and practical human sympathy are the only effective barriers we can oppose to the anti-social instincts of certain among us.
     From: Peter (Pyotr) Kropotkin (Law and Authority [1886], 1 'Anarchism'), quoted by Jonathan Wolff - An Introduction to Political Philosophy (Rev)
     A reaction: One might state it more succinctly as 'only the social can oppose the anti-social'. The dominance in society of essentially anti-social people seems to have become a major political fact in 2017, in the UK and the USA.
25. Social Practice / F. Life Issues / 4. Suicide
Suicide is pointless, because it always comes too late [Cioran]
     Full Idea: It's not worth the bother of killing yourself, since you always kill yourself too late.
     From: E.M. Cioran (The Trouble with Being Born [1973], 02)
     A reaction: A neat thought, but unlikely to be true for those who commit suicide, which presumably results from a sustained and apparently incurable situation.