Since when did being a liberal mean...

Since when did being "a liberal" obligate me to renounce and throw away a self-critical faculty to see myself, warts and all, in the mirror?
-Lily H.

What a word is truth (Lillian Hellman)

What a word is truth. Slippery, tricky, unreliable. I tried in these books to tell the truth.

Lillian Hellman

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/l/lillian_hellman.html#WgZkymD6Xbrb3OWc.99

There are no "bad" children.  

There are only 

bad parents.

Du passé faisons table rase
Foule esclave, debout ! debout !
Le monde va changer de base :
Nous ne sommes rien, soyons tout ! 

Eugène Pottier, L’Internationale, 1871

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFBBEF5F1B1F15127

The love of learning

Academia should not be about "If you do this, I will cause you pain."   Unfortunately, all too often it is.

-Lily H.

Name-calling

Would you call someone who as a youngster had been shoved ,kicked, punched, and knocked down to the ground by African-Americans and is now viscerally afraid of African-Americans racist?

-Lily H.

Today calling someone (or thing) racist is like saying someone (or thing) is awesome.

"He is racist."    "She is racist."   "They are racist."   "You are racist."   "That is racist".  I get it:  racism is like the common cold.  Calling someone racist, not racism itself, is the modern-day plague.  Its overuse cheapens the word and detracts from the instances of real racism.  

Today, calling someone (or thing) racist is like saying someone (or thing) is awesome.  

Banal, exaggerated, and usually void of meaning other than that of being simply a marker of political allegiance (+ expediency).

It is sometimes vicious, as well.


-Lily H.