Audience Support Quotes

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I once watched several criminals engage in an organized argument, while an audience of supporters cheered them on, but I was so disgusted that I had to turn off the political debate.
Jarod Kintz (This is the best book I've ever written, and it still sucks (This isn't really my best book))
Your market research objectives need to fit into your marketing strategy. If your objectives are not supporting your marketing strategy, then it’s going to be a waste of your resources.
Pooja Agnihotri (Market Research Like a Pro)
One more, final question came from the audience on my last night in Newtown, and it was the one I most did not want to hear: “Will God protect my child?” I stayed silent for what seemed like minutes. More than anything I wanted to answer with authority, “Yes! Of course God will protect you. Let me read you some promises from the Bible.” I knew, though, that behind me on the same platform twenty-six candles were flickering in memory of victims, proof that we have no immunity from the effects of a broken planet. My mind raced back to Japan, where I heard from parents who had lost their children to a tsunami in a middle school, and forward to that very morning when I heard from parents who had lost theirs to a shooter in an elementary school. At last I said, “No, I’m sorry, I can’t promise that.” None of us is exempt. We all die, some old, some tragically young. God provides support and solidarity, yes, but not protection—at least not the kind of protection we desperately long for. On this cursed planet, even God suffered the loss of a Son.
Philip Yancey (The Question That Never Goes Away)
Appropriately, as an entity specifically designed to support audiences to chart paths out of confusion toward clarity, the Qur’an holds the keys to its own unlocking. It likens itself to a Hadi, a trailblazing guide helping travelers navigate out of seeming dead ends toward their desired destination.
Mohamad Jebara (The Life of the Qur'an: From Eternal Roots to Enduring Legacy)
A fundamental approach to life transformation is using social media for therapy; it forces you to have an opinion, provides intellectual stimulation, increases awareness, boosts self-confidence, and offers the possibility of hope.
Germany Kent
You want to know what I really learned? I learned that people don’t consider time alone as part of their life. Being alone is just a stretch of isolation they want to escape from. I saw a lot of wine-drinking, a lot of compulsive drug use, a lot of sleeping with the television on. It was less festive than I anticipated. My view had always been that I was my most alive when I was totally alone, because that was the only time I could live without fear of how my actions were being scrutinized and interpreted. What I came to realize is that people need their actions to be scrutinized and interpreted in order to feel like what they’re doing matters. Singular, solitary moments are like television pilots that never get aired. They don’t count. This, I think, explains the fundamental urge to get married and have kids[…]. We’re self-conditioned to require an audience, even if we’re not doing anything valuable or interesting. I’m sure this started in the 1970s. I know it did. I think Americans started raising offspring with this implicit notion that they had to tell their children, “You’re amazing, you can do anything you want, you’re a special person.” [...] But—when you really think about it—that emotional support only applies to the experience of living in public. We don’t have ways to quantify ideas like “amazing” or “successful” or “lovable” without the feedback of an audience. Nobody sits by himself in an empty room and thinks, “I’m amazing.” It’s impossible to imagine how that would work. But being “amazing” is supposed to be what life is about. As a result, the windows of time people spend by themselves become these meaningless experiences that don’t really count. It’s filler.
Chuck Klosterman (The Visible Man)
Five years ago, I said vows. And I believe in vows. I meant them, and not just when I said them out loud for an audience to hear but as a motto and a life choice. For as long as we both shall live. I hadn't anticipated the sandy flow of feeling, the yin-yang of love and dread, or the residual buildup of grievances and the slow draining of the benefit of doubt. In good times and in bad. Yes, sure, but in my naivete, I interpreted this as external; we would support each other when the world imposed and intruded. No one tells you that it's the internal that's the real challenge: those moments of decisiveness equal to taking a vow, when you feel the clawing grip of your pormises.
Julie Buxbaum (After You)
Freedom of speech’ means you support the right of people to say exactly those ideas which you do not agree with.
Shaun Usher (Letters of Note: Volume 1: An Eclectic Collection of Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience)
Two-thirds of American movies are extensions of commercials — they tell you how to feel and they tell you how to think — rather than letting you figure it out on your own," said Arkin, who has been acting since the 1960s and won the supporting actor Oscar for "Little Miss Sunshine." "Ben treats the audience like adults. He doesn't shove you into endless close-ups, and the music doesn't tell you what's going to happen next, which is something I hate in American movies.
Alan Arkin (An Improvised Life: A Memoir: Library Edition)
Now his story has shifted. He's no longer the underdog. Instead he's suddenly the luckiest guy in the room, in the school, maybe even in the whole city. He's the luckiest guy anybody knows, and there's no need to root for someone like that to win. Because guys like that—lucky guys, fortunate guys—they don't need any support. And the audience knows it.
Jennifer E. Smith (Windfall)
Jubal shrugged. "Abstract design is all right-for wall paper or linoleum. But art is the process of evoking pity and terror, which is not abstract at all but very human. What the self-styled modern artists are doing is a sort of unemotional pseudo-intellectual masturbation. . . whereas creative art is more like intercourse, in which the artist must seduce- render emotional-his audience, each time. These ladies who won't deign to do that- and perhaps can't- of course lost the public. If they hadn't lobbied for endless subsidies, they would have starved or been forced to go to work long ago. Because the ordinary bloke will not voluntarily pay for 'art' that leaves him unmoved- if he does pay for it, the money has to be conned out of him, by taxes or such." "You know, Jubal, I've always wondered why i didn't give a hoot for paintings or statues- but I thought it was something missing in me, like color blindness." "Mmm, one does have to learn to look at art, just as you must know French to read a story printed in French. But in general terms it's up to the artist to use language that can be understood, not hide it in some private code like Pepys and his diary. Most of these jokers don't even want to use language you and I know or can learn. . . they would rather sneer at us and be smug, because we 'fail' to see what they are driving at. If indeed they are driving at anything- obscurity is usually the refuge of incompetence. Ben, would you call me an artists?” “Huh? Well, I’ve never thought about it. You write a pretty good stick.” “Thank you. ‘Artist’ is a word I avoid for the same reasons I hate to be called ‘Doctor.’ But I am an artist, albeit a minor one. Admittedly most of my stuff is fit to read only once… and not even once for a busy person who already knows the little I have to say. But I am an honest artist, because what I write is consciously intended to reach the customer… reach him and affect him, if possible with pity and terror… or, if not, at least to divert the tedium of his hours with a chuckle or an odd idea. But I am never trying to hide it from him in a private language, nor am I seeking the praise of other writers for ‘technique’ or other balderdash. I want the praise of the cash customer, given in cash because I’ve reached him- or I don’t want anything. Support for the arts- merde! A government-supported artist is an incompetent whore! Damn it, you punched one of my buttons. Let me fill your glass and you tell me what is on your mind.
Robert A. Heinlein (Stranger in a Strange Land)
Conversation is how values get ordered, how passion is made contagious. If a parent talks about it, it's important. If a child is allowed to join the conversation, then that child becomes more than a table decoration, he has a part to play in the drama that is growing up. If his ideas count, then he counts. Children gain essential access to adulthood by being given a safe place to speak, and by rehearsing their thoughts out loud before the most patient and supportive audience they will ever know.
Robin R. Meyers
Saint-Just read for the next two hours his report on the plots of the Dantonist faction. He had imagined, when he wrote it, that he had the accused man before him; he had not amended it. If Danton were really before him, this reading would be punctuated by the roars of his supporters from the galleries, by his own self-justificatory roaring; but Saint-Just addressed the air, and there was a silence, which deepened and fed on itself. He read without passion, almost without inflection, his eyes on the papers that he held in his left hand. Occasionally he would raise his right arm, then let it fall limply by his side: this was his only gesture, a staid, mechanical one. Once, towards the end, he raised his young face to his audience and spoke directly to them: “After this,” he promised, “there will be only patriots left.
Hilary Mantel (A Place of Greater Safety)
The books he and his supporters wanted out of the schools, one of mine among them, were not pornographic, although he would have liked our audience to think so. (There is the word "motherfucker" one time in my Slaughterhouse-Five, as in "Get out of the road, you dumb motherfucker." Ever since that word was published, way back in 1969, children have been attempting to have intercourse with their mothers. When it will stop no one knows.)
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (Fates Worse Than Death: An Autobiographical Collage)
The most humble of words, whispered in the darkness with sincerity and thought are more powerful than the grandest public speech. Often the target audience is 'one' and to speak personally to someone publicly is to draw attention to yourself and away from the person you wish to feel your words. If you have something positive or supportive to say to someone then don't hold back, even if you can't quite get the words right, for it is the message that the reader will feel when they need it the most. And if you know not what to say, regardless of context, a simple 'I love you' will always be better than nothing at all.
Raven Lockwood
a content strategy outlines how content will be used to support both overall organizational goals and audiences’ needs.
Anonymous
A child will risk telling you her desires if she believes you're a receptive audience. She'll conceal them if she doubts your support.
Julie Bogart (The Brave Learner: Finding Everyday Magic in Homeschool, Learning, and Life)
Conspiracy theories have long been used to maintain power: the Soviet leadership saw capitalist and counter-revolutionary conspiracies everywhere; the Nazis, Jewish ones. But those conspiracies were ultimately there to buttress an ideology, whether class warfare for Communists or race for Nazis. With today’s regimes, which struggle to formulate a single ideology – indeed, which can’t if they want to maintain power by sending different messages to different people – the idea that one lives in a world full of conspiracies becomes the world view itself. Conspiracy does not support the ideology; it replaces it. In Russia this is captured in the catchphrase of the country’s most important current affairs presenter: ‘A coincidence? I don’t think so!’ says Dmitry Kiselev as he twirls between tall tales that dip into history, literature, oil prices and colour revolutions, which all return to the theme of how the world has it in for Russia. And as a world view it grants those who subscribe to it certain pleasures: if all the world is a conspiracy, then your own failures are no longer all your fault. The fact that you achieved less than you hoped for, that your life is a mess – it’s all the fault of the conspiracy. More importantly, conspiracy is a way to maintain control. In a world where even the most authoritarian regimes struggle to impose censorship, one has to surround audiences with so much cynicism about anybody’s motives, persuade them that behind every seemingly benign motivation is a nefarious, if impossible-to-prove, plot, that they lose faith in the possibility of an alternative, a tactic a renowned Russian media analyst called Vasily Gatov calls ‘white jamming’. And the end effect of this endless pile-up of conspiracies is that you, the little guy, can never change anything. For if you are living in a world where shadowy forces control everything, then what possible chance do you have of turning it around? In this murk it becomes best to rely on a strong hand to guide you. ‘Trump is our last chance to save America,’ is the message of his media hounds. Only Putin can ‘raise Russia from its knees’. ‘The problem we are facing today is less oppression, more lack of identity, apathy, division, no trust,’ sighs Srdja. ‘There are more tools to change things than before, but there’s less will to do so.
Peter Pomerantsev (This Is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality)
But-when you really think about it-that emotional support only applies to the experience of living in public. We don't have ways to quantify ideas like "amazing" or "successful" or "lovable" without the feedback of an audience. Nobody sits by himself in an empty room and thinks "I'm amazing." It's impossible to imagine how that would work. But being "amazing" is supposed to be what life is about. As a result, the windows of time people spend by themselves become these meaningless experiences that don't really count. It's filler. They're deleted scenes.
Chuck Klosterman (The Visible Man)
Cassie Wright's largest audience, the only part of her audience still growing, is composed of sixteen-to-twenty-five-year-old men. These men buy her backlist movies, her plastic breast relics and pocket vaginas, but not for any erotic purpose. They collect the blow-up sex surrogates and signature lingerie as some form of religious relics. Souvenirs of the real mother, the perfect mother they never had. Frankenstein parts or religious totems of the mother they'll spend the rest of their lives trying to find -who'll praise them enough, support them enough, love them enough.
Chuck Palahniuk (Snuff)
The speaker was good, I liked what he had to say. I had expected a dry recitation on how women should change their gender if they expected to advance in a man's world, since I wasn't about to grow a cock and balls this man gave me hope and inspiration. Women dominated the audience, not surprising since the average African man wouldn’t support a speaker preaching gender equality. Africa was a continent with generational precedent for the alpha male, it was part of their culture, learned at an early age. This led to abuse on many levels. Women were expected to do the physical work, produce male babies and satisfy the sexual urgings of men. Urgings that in other societies would be called rape but in Africa were accepted as common practice. I understood this better than most. Pictures of the Kony boy-soldiers and their adult commander were burned into my memory.
Nick Hahn (Under the Skin)
Genuinely support people in ways you can. If you build great relationships and people get to like you for you, they will eventually promote what you do and would want to do business with you. The bottom line is that people love to do business with those they love and trust. Learn to understand people, your audience, their needs, and their real problem. If you are using a Facebook page or even your own profile, involve your friends in a fruitful discussion. Don’t just make a post and leave to expect likes and comments. Take time to leave a note for a friend, ask about their business and what interests them.
Bernard Kelvin Clive
We don't normally think of it as such, but writing is a technology, which means that a literate person is someone whose thought processes are technologically mediated. We became cognitive cyborgs as soon as we became fluent readers, and the consequences of that were profound. Before a culture adopts the use of writing, when its knowledge is transmitted exclusively through oral means, it can very easily revise its history. It's not intentional, but it is inevitable; throughout the world, bards and griots have adapted their material to their audiences and thus gradually adjusted the past to suit the needs of the present. The idea that accounts of the past shouldn't change is a product of literate cultures' reverence for the written word. Anthropologists will tell you that oral cultures understand the past differently; for them, their histories don't need to be accurate so much as they need to validate the community's understanding of itself. So it wouldn't be correct to say that their histories are unreliable; their histories do what they need to do. Right now each of us is a private oral culture. We rewrite our pasts to suit our needs and support the story we tell about ourselves. With our memories we are all guilty of a Whig interpretation of our personal histories, seeing our former selves as steps toward our glorious present selves.
Ted Chiang (The Truth of Fact, The Truth of Feeling (Exhalation))
Social media is much more than self-promotion. It is a two-way street, a set of tools that allow you to reach out to people and become the bringer of positive things and experiences. In turn, these people will not just support you. They will be there to help you increase your reach and audience – and turn your business into a viable endeavour.
Cendrine Marrouat (The Little Big eBook on Social Media Audiences: Build Yours, Keep It, and Win)
the disappearance of an audience that had supported experimentation and made such works financial, as well as critical, successes. The decline of liberal-arts teaching in schools and colleges meant that the new audience was less cultured and intellectually oriented; wedded to television and movies, it wanted to be entertained rather than challenged.
Meryle Secrest (Stephen Sondheim: A Life)
Some days, it feels unreasonable to expect that an academic text can work as a form of movement assessment or to support social and political change, including the redistribution of power. Perhaps nonfiction & the arts--literature, poetry & film--are potentially much better suited to the work of politically engaging audiences than the staid tools of the academy.
Erica R. Meiners (For the Children?: Protecting Innocence in a Carceral State (Posthumanities))
On the TV screens along the back wall I could see COMEY RESIGNS in large letters. The screens were behind my audience, but they noticed my distraction and started turning in their seats. I laughed and said, “That’s pretty funny. Somebody put a lot of work into that one.” I continued my thought. “There are no support employees in the FBI. I expect…” The message on the screens now changed. Across three screens, displaying three different news stations, I now saw the same words: COMEY FIRED. I wasn’t laughing any longer. There was a buzz in the room. I told the audience, “Look, I’m going to go figure out what’s happening, but whether that’s true or not, my message won’t change, so let me finish it and then shake your hands.
James B. Comey (A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership)
This is called the Sarick Effect, named after the social scientist Leslie Sarick. In both situations, Griscom was presenting ideas to people who had more power than he had, and trying to convince them to commit their resources. Most of us assume that to be persuasive, we ought to emphasize our strengths and minimize our weaknesses. That kind of powerful communication makes sense if the audience is supportive.
Adam M. Grant (Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World)
Shakespeare's plays do not present easy solutions. The audience has to decide for itself. King Lear is perhaps the most disturbing in this respect. One of the key words of the whole play is 'Nothing'. When King Lear's daughter Cordelia announces that she can say 'Nothing' about her love for her father, the ties of family love fall apart, taking the king from the height of power to the limits of endurance, reduced to 'nothing' but 'a poor bare forked animal'. Here, instead of 'readiness' to accept any challenge, the young Edgar says 'Ripeness is all'. This is a maturity that comes of learning from experience. But, just as the audience begins to see hope in a desperate and violent situation, it learns that things can always get worse: Who is't can say 'I am at the worst?' … The worst is not So long as we can say 'This is the worst.' Shakespeare is exploring and redefining the geography of the human soul, taking his characters and his audience further than any other writer into the depths of human behaviour. The range of his plays covers all the 'form and pressure' of mankind in the modern world. They move from politics to family, from social to personal, from public to private. He imposed no fixed moral, no unalterable code of behaviour. That would come to English society many years after Shakespeare's death, and after the tragic hypothesis of Hamlet was fulfilled in 1649, when the people killed the King and replaced his rule with the Commonwealth. Some critics argue that Shakespeare supported the monarchy and set himself against any revolutionary tendencies. Certainly he is on the side of order and harmony, and his writing reflects a monarchic context rather than the more republican context which replaced the monarchy after 1649. It would be fanciful to see Shakespeare as foretelling the decline of the Stuart monarchy. He was not a political commentator. Rather, he was a psychologically acute observer of humanity who had a unique ability to portray his observations, explorations, and insights in dramatic form, in the richest and most exciting language ever used in the English theatre.
Ronald Carter (The Routledge History of Literature in English: Britain and Ireland)
Wallace seemed to draw strength from the restiveness in the air. “He has a bugle voice of venom,” a commentator from the New Republic wrote, “and a gut knowledge of the prejudices of his audience.” A Newsweek correspondent covering the Wallace rallies, noting “the heat, the rebel yells, the flags waving,” and the legions of “psychologically threadbare” supporters, declared that Wallace “speaks to the unease everyone senses in America.
Hampton Sides (Hellhound on His Trail: The Stalking of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the International Hunt for His Assassin)
Don’t be fooled by clever hands, sir” the Sunlight Man said. He’d be lying with the back of his head on his hands, as he always lay. “Entertainment’s all very well, but the world is serious. It’s exceedingly amusing, when you think about it: nothing in life is as startling or shocking or mysterious as a good magician’s trick. That’s what makes stagecraft deadly. Listen closely, friend. You see great marvels performed on the stage - the lady sawed in half, the fat man supported by empty air, the Hindu vanishing with the folding of a cloth - and the subtlest of poisons drifts into your brain: you think the earth dead because the sky is full of spirits, you think the hall drab because the stage is adazzle with dimestore gilt. So King Lear rages, and the audience grows meek, and tomorrow, in the gray of old groceries, the housewife will weep for Cordelia and despair for herself. They weren’t fools, those old sages who called all art the Devil’s work. It eats the soul.
John Gardner (The Sunlight Dialogues (New Directions Paperbook))
It reset and mended my freshly damaged and distorted view of life, and made me recognize that this thing we call music, this primal expression that we reshape and refine and define ourselves with, is the gift I was given. The ability to communicate what others feel but cannot fully express, the passing down and around of songs and stories, from Pete Townshend to Joey Ramone to me, to the audiences who take the time and effort to support our work and give us a way to support ourselves -- I'm thinking this is what I am supposed to be doing.
Bob Mould (See A Little Light: The Trail of Rage and Melody)
The hecklers weren’t hacking people’s computers; they were hacking their minds, in two ways. In one sense, they sought to change a target audience’s perception on issues, nudging audiences toward preferred foreign policy positions and influencing experts, politicians, and media personalities toward a pro-Assad or pro-Russia stance. When not shaping audience conversations through a barrage of slanted content and supporting banter, hecklers sought to batter adversaries off social media platforms through either endless harassment or compromise.
Clint Watts (Messing with the Enemy: Surviving in a Social Media World of Hackers, Terrorists, Russians, and Fake News)
{Stockton, a playwright who performed plays about Robert Ingersoll, gives the four moments in Ingersoll's life that shaped him, first being the death of his father, who was a reverend} Despite their opposing religious views, the old revivalist on his deathbed asked Bob to read to him from the black book clutched to his chest. Bob relented, took the book, and was surprised to discover that it wasn't the Bible. It was Plato describing the noble death of the pagan Socrates: a moving gesture of reconciliation between father and son in parting. The second event was Bob’s painful realization that his outspoken agnosticism not only invalidated his own political career but ended his brother Ebon’s career in Congress, as well. Third was the exquisite anguish of seeing his supportive wife Eva and his young daughters made to suffer for his right to speak his own mind. And fourth was the dramatic tension of having to walk out alone on public stages, in a glaring spotlight, time after time with death threats jammed in his tuxedo pocket informing him that some armed bigot in that night’s audience would see to it that he didn't leave the stage alive.
Richard F. Stockton
When did the Q-Anon ideology start to really infect the Republican base? One of the first times that Donald Trump officially interacted with Q-Anon supporters was when Q-Anon user @MAGAPILL posted a Trump “accomplishment” list. Trump responded in a November 25, 2017, tweet less than a month after the first Q drop: “Wow, even I didn’t realize we did so much. Wish the Fake News would report! Thank you.”10 Most important, the retweet contained a link to MagaPill, a site loaded with conspiracy theories associated with Q-Anon.11 Millions of Twitter users saw Trump’s praise and clicked the link. This introduced Q to the entire MAGA audience.
Malcolm W. Nance (They Want to Kill Americans: The Militias, Terrorists, and Deranged Ideology of the Trump Insurgency)
Jowell fell back on the same justification for funding the arts that the first chairman of the Arts Council, John Maynard Keynes, had deployed in 1945. Art was something produced by people with special skills, who set their own standards of excellence; they needed to be supported to do this, and the audience needed to be encouraged to appreciate this excellence, by being given subsidised access to it. And for all of Jowell’s attempts to transcend instrumentalism, the purpose of culture continued to be to help the government ‘to transform our society into a place of justice, talent and ambition where individuals can fulfil their true potential’.22
Robert Hewison (Cultural Capital: The Rise and Fall of Creative Britain)
The most plausible explanation is that positive illusions are a bargaining tactic, a credible bluff. In recruiting an ally to support you in a risky venture, in bargaining for the best deal, or in intimidating an adversary into backing down, you stand to gain if you credibly exaggerate your strengths. Believing your own exaggeration is better than cynically lying about it, because the arms race between lying and lie detection has equipped your audience with the means of seeing through barefaced lies. ... our brains were not selected for the benefit of the species, and no individual can afford to be the only honest one in a community of selfenhancers.
Steven Pinker (The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined)
It seems to us that there are four great collective sociological assumptions in the modern world. By this we mean not only the Western world, but all the world that shares a modern technology and is structured into nations…. That man’s aim in life is happiness, that man is naturally good, that history develops in endless progress, and that everything is matter. The other great psychological reflection of social reality is the myth. The myth expresses the deep inclinations of a society. Without it, the masses would not cling to a certain civilization, or its process of development and crisis. It is a vigorous impulse, strongly colored, irrational, and charged with all of man’s power to believe… In our society the two great fundamentals myths on which all other myths rest are Science and History. And based on them are the collective myths that are man’s principal orientations: the myth of Work, the myth of Happiness (which is not the same thing as presupposition of happiness), the myth of the Nation, the myth of Youth, the myth of Hero. Propaganda is forced to build on those presuppositions and to express these myths, for without them nobody would listen to it. And in so building it must always go in the same direction as society; it can only reinforce society. A propaganda that stresses virtue over happiness and presents man’s future as one dominated by austerity and contemplation would have no audience at all. A propaganda that questions progress or work would arouse distain and reach nobody; it would immediately be branded as an ideology of the intellectuals, since most people feel that the serious things are material things because they are related to labor, and so on. It is remarkable how the various presuppositions and aspects of myths complement each other, support each other, mutually defend each other: If the propagandist attacks the network at one point, all myths react to the attack. Propaganda must be based on current beliefs and symbols to reach man and win him over.
Jacques Ellul (Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes)
An apt analogy for how the brain consolidates new learning may be the experience of composing an essay. The first draft is rangy, imprecise. You discover what you want to say by trying to write it. After a couple of revisions you have sharpened the piece and cut away some of the extraneous points. You put it aside to let it ferment. When you pick it up again a day or two later, what you want to say has become clearer in your mind. Perhaps you now perceive that there are three main points you are making. You connect them to examples and supporting information familiar to your audience. You rearrange and draw together the elements of your argument to make it more effective and elegant.
Peter C. Brown (Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning)
It is conventional to tell that constitutional story - of a republican failure ending in restoration - but to do so is to limit the significance of the 1640s to that single constitutional queston. There is much more to say, and to remember, about England's decade of civil war and revolution. Political and religious questions of fundamental importance were thrashed out before broad political audiences as activists and opportunists sought to mobilize support for their proposals. The resulting mass of contemporary argument is alluring to the historian since it lays bare the presumptions of a society very alient to our own. At the same time, by exposing those presumptions to sustained critical examination, this public discussion changed them.
Michael Braddick (God's Fury, England's Fire: A New History of the English Civil Wars)
side of the story, I’m toast. But who could I possibly call that could sway this biased audience? “Order!” Quovaar demands again, this time rising to his feet. “Order in the court! I say order in the court!” Wait. What did he just say? Order…? In the court? That’s it! But it’s a longshot. And if it doesn’t work, I’m doomed. Finally, the Paladins settle down. “Elliott Harkness,” Quovaar says. “While you plead innocent to one charge, you plead guilty to the other, with a claim of self-defense. These accusations against you are serious, and this case must be carefully deliberated. Per the Order of the Paladin, you are allowed to call before the Court one witness who may try to support your claims. Once named, we will summon this individual to
R.L. Ullman (Epic Zero: Collection 2 (Epic Zero #4-6))
In the film Death and the Maiden, there is a point during which Sigourney Weaver has duct-taped Ben Kingsley to a chair in her living room. The characters are re-enacting a reverse torture scene. To move the plot of a woman tortured toward its desire: to torture the torturer. To extract a confession. The chair is a prop. A prop is a stage object that supports the drama. If the audience suspends their disbelief the chair transforms itself in time and space. If the audience is left unconvinced the chair is silly and imaginable in anyone’s living room. In the film Romeo is Bleeding Lena Olin sits in a chair and spreads her legs so that her cunt can be seen/scene. Her nationality keeps slipping; she is what we want her to be in a million ways. Her severed arm our severed arms. Her mouth opening like a country. In the film Exotica Atom Egoyan has the male lead (primary actor, financial draw) sit in a chair immobile while a child-stripper dances excruciatingly close to his body. His hands on his thighs. His mouth open. His mind seated. Torture. In the film Barbarella Jane Fonda is trapped inside of a science fiction sexual orgasm chair. This is before her politics come. In the film Breaker Morant two men mutated soldiers lost are executed—shot through the chest—while seated in chairs. In my kitchen I jack my father off while he sits in a chair, my hand smally domestic, the back of the chair holding his back, the legs of the chair forgiving his weight, the wood of the chair blonde, the hair of the girl blonde, the room magnified to cinematic proportions.
Lidia Yuknavitch (Liberty's Excess: Fictions)
Out of that global audience, four hundred thousand NASA employees, contractors, and military support watched with particular interest, seeing in the craft that approached the Moon the measure of a screw, the blueprint of a hatch, the filament in a circuit, the fulfillment of a promise made by a president who hadn’t lived to see it carried out. They dotted the globe, those who had worked on Project Apollo, those who had made possible the day that had come. They clustered around displays and switchboards and dials and computers, monitoring every heartbeat of the spacecraft that had slipped out of the influence of its home planet and was now being enticed by the gravitational pull of the Moon. Most of them joined their friends and families in gathering around the televisions as well.
Margot Lee Shetterly (Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race)
Audiences would not be so easily fooled if they would only recall that educated people were and are more likely to be Republicans, while high school dropouts are more likely to be Democrats. Hawkish right-wing Republicans, including the core supporters of Barry Goldwater in 1964, of Ronald Reagan in 1980, and of groups like the John Birch Society, come disproportionately from the most educated and affluent segments of our society, particularly dentists and physicians. So we should not be surprised that education correlates with hawkishness. At the other end of the social-status spectrum, although most African Americans, like most whites, initially supported U.S. intervention in Vietnam, blacks were always more questioning and more dovish than whites, and African American leaders—Muhammad Ali, Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X—were prominent among the early opponents of the war.22
James W. Loewen (Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong)
What the turbulent months of the campaign and the election revealed most of all, I think, was that the American people were voicing a profound demand for change. On the one hand, the Humphrey people were demanding a Marshall Plan for our diseased cities and an economic solution to our social problems. The Nixon and Wallace supporters, on the other hand, were making their own limited demands for change. They wanted more "law and order," to be achieved not through federal spending but through police, Mace, and the National Guard. We must recognize and accept the demand for change, but now we must struggle to give it a progressive direction. For the immediate agenda, I would make four proposals. First, the Electoral College should be eliminated. It is archaic, undemocratic, and potentially very dangerous. Had Nixon not achieved a majority of the electoral votes, Wallace might have been in the position to choose and influence our next President. A shift of only 46,000 votes in the states of Alaska, Delaware, New Jersey, and Missouri would have brought us to that impasse. We should do away with this system, which can give a minority and reactionary candidate so much power and replace it with one that provides for the popular election of the President. It is to be hoped that a reform bill to this effect will emerge from the hearings that will soon be conducted by Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana. Second, a simplified national registration law should be passed that provides for universal permanent registration and an end to residence requirements. Our present system discriminates against the poor who are always underregistered, often because they must frequently relocate their residence, either in search of better employment and living conditions or as a result of such poorly planned programs as urban renewal (which has been called Negro removal). Third, the cost of the presidential campaigns should come from the public treasury and not from private individuals. Nixon, who had the backing of wealthy corporate executives, spent $21 million on his campaign. Humphrey's expenditures totaled only $9.7 million. A system so heavily biased in favor of the rich cannot rightly be called democratic. And finally, we must maintain order in our public meetings. It was disgraceful that each candidate, for both the presidency and the vice-presidency, had to be surrounded by cordons of police in order to address an audience. And even then, hecklers were able to drown him out. There is no possibility for rational discourse, a prerequisite for democracy, under such conditions. If we are to have civility in our civil life, we must not permit a minority to disrupt our public gatherings.
Bayard Rustin (Down the Line: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin)
If you are preaching on the first commandment (“Thou shalt have no other gods before me”) or Ephesians 5:5 (which calls greed idolatry) or any of the several hundred other places in the Bible that speak of idols, you could quote David Foster Wallace, the late postmodern novelist. In his Kenyon College commencement speech he argues eloquently and forcefully that “everyone worships. The only choice we get is what to worship.”32 He goes on to say everyone has to “tap real meaning in life,” and whatever you use to do that, whether it is money, beauty, power, intellect, or something else, it will drive your life because it is essentially a form of worship. He enumerates why each form of worship does not merely make you fragile and exhausted but can “eat you alive.” If you lay out his argument in support of fundamental biblical teaching, even the most secular audience will get quiet and keep listening to what you say next.
Timothy J. Keller (Preaching: Communicating Faith in an Age of Skepticism)
Charisma in this world is often just looking good and speaking well. Others merely project onto you what they want to believe to be true. Most people have superficial attachments and shallow thoughts, so the glib man can persuade many. One does not have to be a supreme salesman. No need to be a wizard with words. People clamor for a confident speaker that sounds the part. That your actions can deliver on words cements their allegiance. But even if you don’t become a leader yourself, you may find a key supporting role as a great communicator. Even before you speak, work on being a better listener and observer of cues in others. All messages must be tailored to the audience. In a group, there may be one listener who, if engaged, can turn the whole room towards your speech. Speak calmly, clearly and keep eye contact. Your voice is the voice of a leader confident in his capabilities and beliefs. Changes in tone should have a reason.
Ryan Landry (Masculinity Amidst Madness)
Now everyone knows that to try to say something in the mainstream Western media that is critical of U.S. policy or Israel is extremely difficult; conversely, to say things that are hostile to the Arabs as a people and culture, or Islam as a religion, is laughably easy. For in effect there is a cultural war between spokespersons for the West and those of the Muslim and Arab world. In so inflamed a situation, the hardest thing to do as an intellectual is to be critical, to refuse to adopt a rhetorical style that is the verbal equivalent of carpet-bombing, and to focus instead on those issues like U.S. support for unpopular client re­gimes, which for a person writing in the U.S. are somewhat more likely to be affected by critical discussion. Of course, on the other hand, there is a virtual cer­tainty of getting an audience if as an Arab intellectual you passionately, even slavishly support U.S. policy, you attack its critics, and if they happen to be Arabs, you invent evi­dence to show their villainy; if they are American you confect stories and situations that prove their duplicity; you spin out stories concerning Arabs and Muslims that have the effect of defaming their tradition, defacing their history, accentuating their weaknesses, of which of course there are plenty. Above all, you attack the officially ap­ proved enemies-Saddam Hussein, Baathism, Arab na­tionalism, the Palestinian movement, Arab views of Israel. And of course this earns you the expected accolades: you are characterized as courageous, you are outspoken and passionate, and on and on. The new god of course is the West. Arabs, you say, should try to be more like the West, should regard the West as a source and a reference point. · Gone is the history of what the West actually did. Gone are the Gulf War's destructive results. We Arabs and Mus­lims are the sick ones, our problems are our own, totally self-inflicted. A number of things stand out about these kinds of performance. In the first place, there is no universalism here at all. Because you serve a god uncritically, all the devils are always on the other side: this was as true when you were a Trotskyist as it i's now when you are a recanting former Trotskyist. You do not think of politics in terms of interrelationships or of common histories such as, for instance, the long and complicated dynamic that has bound the Arabs and Muslims to the West and vice versa. Real intellectual analysis forbids calling one side innocent, the other evil. Indeed the notion of a side is, where cultures are at issue, highly problematic, since most cultures aren't watertight little packages, all homogenous, and all either good or evil. But if your eye is on your patron, you cannot think as an intellectual, but only as a disciple or acolyte. In the back of your mind there is the thought that you must please and not displease.
Edward W. Said (Representations of the Intellectual)
Insofar as craft and poetics in a poem have a politics, I wanted to avoid that brittle enjambed-prose-sentence-lyric verse, where you have standard sentences snapped off and scattered decoratively across the page (which I might go out on a limb and say was characteristic of some leftist poets, Beat poets, street poets and populist poets of the 70s and 80s—all of whom I basically view as comrades, I should probably say, to this day) and on the other hand I also wanted my poetics to operate differently than those more right-wing academics—in practice—even if in their poems or statements they proclaim public leftist views or ideas—they remain academic poets, operating in elite university-supported circles, institutionalized and reading before institutional audiences, awarding grants and awards to each other, sitting on each other’s grants panels, awards and tenure committees, as Philip Levine admitted in an interview in Don’t Ask, 'giving prizes to friends.
Sesshu Foster
Peer into any corner of current American life, and you’ll find the positive-thinking outlook. From the mass-media ministries of evangelists such as Joel Osteen, Creflo Dollar, and T.D. Jakes to the millions-strong audiences of Oprah, Dr. Phil, and Mehmet Oz, from the motivational bestsellers and seminars of the self-help movement to myriad twelve-step programs and support groups, from the rise of positive psychology, mind-body therapies, and stress-reduction programs to the self-affirmative posters and pamphlets found on walls and racks in churches, human-resources offices, medical suites, and corporate corridors, this one idea—to think positively—is metaphysics morphed into mass belief. It is the ever-present, every-man-and-woman wisdom of our time. It forms the foundation of business motivation, self-help, and therapeutic spirituality, including within the world of evangelism. Its influence has remade American religion from being a salvational force to also being a healing one.
Mitch Horowitz (One Simple Idea: How Positive Thinking Reshaped Modern Life)
Pastor Max Lucado of San Antonio, Texas, said in an editorial for the Washington Post in February 2016 that he was “chagrined” by Trump’s antics. He ridiculed a war hero. He made a mockery of a reporter’s menstrual cycle. He made fun of a disabled reporter. He referred to a former first lady, Barbara Bush, as “mommy” and belittled Jeb Bush for bringing her on the campaign trail. He routinely calls people “stupid” and “dummy.” One writer catalogued 64 occasions that he called someone “loser.” These were not off-line, backstage, overheard, not-to-be-repeated comments. They were publicly and intentionally tweeted, recorded and presented.18 Lucado went on to question how Christians could support a man doing these things as a candidate for president, much less as someone who repeatedly attempted to capture evangelical audiences by portraying himself as similarly committed to Christian values. He continued, “If a public personality calls on Christ one day and calls someone a ‘bimbo’ the next, is something not awry? And to do so, not once, but repeatedly, unrepentantly and unapologetically? We stand against bullying in schools. Shouldn’t we do the same in presidential politics?” Rolling Stone reported on several evangelical leaders pushing against a Trump nomination, including North Carolina radio host and evangelical Dr. Michael Brown, who wrote an open letter to Jerry Falwell Jr., blasting his endorsement of Donald Trump. Brown wrote, “As an evangelical follower of Jesus, the contrast is between putting nationalism first or the kingdom of God first. From my vantage point, you and other evangelicals seem to have put nationalism first, and that is what deeply concerns me.”19 John Stemberger, president and general counsel for Florida Family Action, lamented to CNN, “The really puzzling thing is that Donald Trump defies every stereotype of a candidate you would typically expect Christians to vote for.” He wondered, “Should evangelical Christians choose to elect a man I believe would be the most immoral and ungodly person ever to be president of the United States?”20 A
Ben Howe (The Immoral Majority: Why Evangelicals Chose Political Power Over Christian Values)
The communists didn’t release their grip until the late 1980s. Effective organisation kept them in power for eight long decades, and they eventually fell due to defective organisation. On 21 December 1989 Nicolae Ceaus¸escu, the communist dictator of Romania, organised a mass demonstration of support in the centre of Bucharest. Over the previous months the Soviet Union had withdrawn its support from the eastern European communist regimes, the Berlin Wall had fallen, and revolutions had swept Poland, East Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia. Ceaus¸escu, who had ruled Romania since 1965, believed he could withstand the tsunami, even though riots against his rule had erupted in the Romanian city of Timis¸oara on 17 December. As one of his counter-measures, Ceaus¸escu arranged a massive rally in Bucharest to prove to Romanians and the rest of the world that the majority of the populace still loved him – or at least feared him. The creaking party apparatus mobilised 80,000 people to fill the city’s central square, and citizens throughout Romania were instructed to stop all their activities and tune in on their radios and televisions. To the cheering of the seemingly enthusiastic crowd, Ceauşescu mounted the balcony overlooking the square, as he had done scores of times in previous decades. Flanked by his wife, Elena, leading party officials and a bevy of bodyguards, Ceaus¸escu began delivering one of his trademark dreary speeches. For eight minutes he praised the glories of Romanian socialism, looking very pleased with himself as the crowd clapped mechanically. And then something went wrong. You can see it for yourself on YouTube. Just search for ‘Ceauşescu’s last speech’, and watch history in action.20 The YouTube clip shows Ceaus¸escu starting another long sentence, saying, ‘I want to thank the initiators and organisers of this great event in Bucharest, considering it as a—’, and then he falls silent, his eyes open wide, and he freezes in disbelief. He never finished the sentence. You can see in that split second how an entire world collapses. Somebody in the audience booed. People
Yuval Noah Harari (Homo Deus: A History of Tomorrow)
What content types best meet the needs of our target audience and their changing, multiple contexts? What content types best fit the skills of our copywriters? What content types do we already have? What contexts are appropriate for the delivery of our content, and how will we translate our information into multiple content types appropriate for different screens, resolutions, locations, and contexts? Is existing content still good? Is it still current, relevant, and brand-appropriate for our needs, our users’ needs, and the context in which we want to deliver it? How will we get more content to bridge the gaps between what we have and what we need? What is the workflow that already supports that, and do we need to refine it? How will we make the case for these new content types to other team members who help shape the user experience? Who will do this for launch? Who will maintain content on an ongoing basis? Who will train them? How will we help people find the answers, definitions, and other information they need? What are the relationships within our content?
Margot Bloomstein (Content Strategy at Work: Real-world Stories to Strengthen Every Interactive Project)
Our Difficulty in Believing in Providence The first obstacle is that, as long as we have not experienced concretely the fidelity of Divine Providence to provide for our essential needs, we have difficulty believing in it and we abandon it. We have hard heads, the words of Jesus do not suffice for us, we want to see at least a little in order to believe! Well, we do not see it operating around us in a clear manner. How, then, are we to experience it? It is important to know one thing: We cannot experience this support from God unless we leave Him the necessary space in which He can express Himself. I would like to make a comparison. As long as a person who must jump with a parachute does not jump out into the void, he cannot feel that the cords of the parachute will support him, because the parachute has not yet had the chance to open. One must first jump and it is only later that one feels carried. And so it is in spiritual life: “God gives in the measure that we expect of Him,” says Saint John of the Cross. And Saint Francis de Sales says: “The measure of Divine Providence acting on us is the degree of confidence that we have in it.” This is where the problem lies. Many do not believe in Providence because they’ve never experienced it, but they’ve never experienced it because they’ve never jumped into the void and taken the leap of faith. They never give it the possibility to intervene. They calculate everything, anticipate everything, they seek to resolve everything by counting on themselves, instead of counting on God. The founders of religious orders proceed with the audacity of this spirit of faith. They buy houses without having a penny, they receive the poor although they have nothing with which to feed them. Then, God performs miracles for them. The checks arrive and the granaries are filled. But, too often, generations later, everything is planned, calculated. One doesn’t incur an expense without being sure in advance to have enough to cover it. How can Providence manifest itself? And the same is true in the spiritual life. If a priest drafts all his sermons and his talks, down to the least comma, in order to be sure that he does not find himself wanting before his audience, and never has the audacity to begin preaching with a prayer and confidence in God as his only preparation, how can he have this beautiful experience of the Holy Spirit, Who speaks through his mouth? Does the Gospel not say, …do not worry about how to speak or what you should say; for what you are to say will be given to you when the time comes; because it will not be you who will be speaking, but the Spirit of your Father will be speaking in you (Matthew 10:19)? Let us be very clear. Obviously we do not want to say that it is a bad thing to be able to anticipate things, to develop a budget or prepare one’s homilies. Our natural abilities are also instruments in the hands of Providence! But everything depends on the spirit in which we do things. We must clearly understand that there is an enormous difference in attitude of heart between one, who in fear of finding himself wanting because he does not believe in the intervention of God on behalf of those who lean on Him, programs everything in advance to the smallest detail and does not undertake anything except in the exact measure of its actual possibilities, and one who certainly undertakes legitimate things, but who abandons himself with confidence in God to provide all that is asked of him and who thus surpasses his own possibilities. And that which God demands of us always goes beyond our natural human possibilities!
Jacques Philippe (Searching for and Maintaining Peace)
King Henry was carried back to Chinon on a litter and confined to bed, but he could find no peace. The Old King now became fixated by the desire to make a last account of his supporters. The keeper of the royal seal, Roger Malchael, was sent to Tours to demand the list of turncoats promised by Philip. When Roger returned he was hurriedly ushered into a private audience with Henry, but could hardly bring himself to reveal the bleak truth, saying: ‘My lord, so Jesus Christ help me, the first name written down on this list here is that of your son, count John.’ When King Henry heard that the person he most expected to do right, and who he most loved, was in the act of betraying him, he said nothing more except this: ‘You have said enough.’ This final act of treachery crushed the Old King’s spirits. He soon collapsed into a ‘burning hot’ feverish stupor, and ‘his blood so boiled within him that his complexion became clouded, dark, blue and livid’. Unmanned by agonising pain, he ‘lost his mental faculties, hearing and seeing nothing’, and though he spoke ‘nobody could understand a word of what he said’. On the night of 6 July 1189, with only a handful of servants in attendance, Henry’s will finally gave out. In the words of the History: ‘Death simply burst his heart with her own hands’, and a ‘stream of clotted blood burst forth from his nose and mouth’.
Thomas Asbridge (The Greatest Knight: The Remarkable Life of William Marshal, the Power Behind Five English Thrones)
Images of people in the Middle East dressing like Westerners, spending like Westerners, that is what the voters watching TV here at home want to see. That is a visible sign that we really are winning the war of ideas—the struggle between consumption and economic growth, and religious tradition and economic stagnation. I thought, why are those children coming onto the streets more and more often? It’s not anything we have done, is it? It’s not any speeches we have made, or countries we have invaded, or new constitutions we have written, or sweets we have handed out to children, or football matches between soldiers and the locals. It’s because they, too, watch TV. They watch TV and see how we live here in the West. They see children their own age driving sports cars. They see teenagers like them, instead of living in monastic frustration until someone arranges their marriages, going out with lots of different girls, or boys. They see them in bed with lots of different girls and boys. They watch them in noisy bars, bottles of lager upended over their mouths, getting happy, enjoying the privilege of getting drunk. They watch them roaring out support or abuse at football matches. They see them getting on and off planes, flying from here to there without restriction and without fear, going on endless holidays, shopping, lying in the sun. Especially, they see them shopping: buying clothes and PlayStations, buying iPods, video phones, laptops, watches, digital cameras, shoes, trainers, baseball caps. Spending money, of which there is always an unlimited supply, in bars and restaurants, hotels and cinemas. These children of the West are always spending. They are always restless, happy and with unlimited access to cash. I realised, with a flash of insight, that this was what was bringing these Middle Eastern children out on the streets. I realised that they just wanted to be like us. Those children don’t want to have to go to the mosque five times a day when they could be hanging out with their friends by a bus shelter, by a phone booth or in a bar. They don’t want their families to tell them who they can and can’t marry. They might very well not want to marry at all and just have a series of partners. I mean, that’s what a lot of people do. It is no secret, after that serial in the Daily Mail, that that is what I do. I don’t necessarily need the commitment. Why should they not have the same choices as me? They want the freedom to fly off for their holidays on easy Jet. I know some will say that what a lot of them want is just one square meal a day or the chance of a drink of clean water, but on the whole the poor aren’t the ones on the street and would not be my target audience. They aren’t going to change anything, otherwise why are they so poor? The ones who come out on the streets are the ones who have TVs. They’ve seen how we live, and they want to spend.
Paul Torday (Salmon Fishing in the Yemen)
The appropriation of terms from psychology to discredit political opponents is part of the modern therapeutic culture that the sociologist Christopher Lasch criticized. Along with the concept of the authoritarian personality, the term “-phobe” for political opponents has been added to the arsenal of obloquy deployed by technocratic neoliberals against those who disagree with them. The coinage of the term “homophobia” by the psychologist George Weinberg in the 1970s has been followed by a proliferation of pseudoclinical terms in which those who hold viewpoints at variance with the left-libertarian social consensus of the transatlantic ruling class are understood to suffer from “phobias” of various kinds similar to the psychological disorders of agoraphobia (fear of open spaces), ornithophobia (fear of birds), and pentheraphobia (fear of one’s mother-in-law). The most famous use of this rhetorical strategy can be found in then-candidate Hillary Clinton’s leaked confidential remarks to an audience of donors at a fund-raiser in New York in 2016: “You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? They’re racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic—you name it.” A disturbed young man who is driven by internal compulsions to harass and assault gay men is obviously different from a learned Orthodox Jewish rabbi who is kind to lesbians and gay men as individuals but opposes homosexuality, along with adultery, premarital sex, and masturbation, on theological grounds—but both are "homophobes.” A racist who opposes large-scale immigration because of its threat to the supposed ethnic purity of the national majority is obviously different from a non-racist trade unionist who thinks that immigrant numbers should be reduced to create tighter labor markets to the benefit of workers—but both are “xenophobes.” A Christian fundamentalist who believes that Muslims are infidels who will go to hell is obviously different from an atheist who believes that all religion is false—but both are “Islamophobes.” This blurring of important distinctions is not an accident. The purpose of describing political adversaries as “-phobes” is to medicalize politics and treat differing viewpoints as evidence of mental and emotional disorders. In the latter years of the Soviet Union, political dissidents were often diagnosed with “sluggish schizophrenia” and then confined to psychiatric hospitals and drugged. According to the regime, anyone who criticized communism literally had to be insane. If those in today’s West who oppose the dominant consensus of technocratic neoliberalism are in fact emotionally and mentally disturbed, to the point that their maladjustment makes it unsafe to allow them to vote, then to be consistent, neoliberals should support the involuntary confinement, hospitalization, and medication of Trump voters and Brexit voters and other populist voters for their own good, as well as the good of society.
Michael Lind (The New Class War: Saving Democracy from the Managerial Elite)
I was headed into the final fitting of my leg. I’d gone through the test socket phase and my leg was finally ready. I was so excited! I walked into the physical therapy lab and shouted, “Man, I cannot wait to put this leg on and walk!” My physical therapist, Bob, and the prosthetist exchanged nervous glances. My right leg was still pretty weak and by all normal standards, I should not be able to walk right away. But then, of course, I never like to be like everyone else. They had me wheel over to the parallel bars to attach my new leg. “We’re just going to have you stand for now,” said Bob. “Nah, I’m walking.” I offered up my best shit-eating grin. “Let’s just see how it feels,” Bob replied with some firmness. I stood up and said, “I feel good. I feel really good.” Bob relented and they let me try to walk. They put a belt around me so that Bob could hold on to me as I walked the parallel bars. Most guys can use the parallel bars for support. I only have one arm so that only helped me so much. Good thing I didn’t really need them. I started walking without faltering right away. “Yeah, this feels good. I feel good. You can back up,” I told them. They backed up and I started walking by myself, holding on with one hand. Then, feeling bolder, I lifted my hand off the bar. I took a step. And then another step. I was walking without any help. I walked up and down those parallel bars the very first day I put on my leg. I did all this with an audience. Dad and Uncle Johnny were right there with me, watching and cheering me on. They were so excited. Uncle Johnny snapped a picture and sent it to my mom back home in Alabama. And as any proud mom would do, she sent that picture to everyone she knew. That picture went the pre-viral version of viral! It was a triumphant snapshot. I was walking again. And not only that, I was wearing those shiny new New Balance shoes the nice ladies had given me. As the picture made the rounds through my mom’s friends and friends of her friends and friends of friends of friends, somehow it ended up with people at New Balance. They reached out to my mom to ask what sizes of shoe Colston and I wore. She told them and then soon after that, Colston and I had matching sneakers.
Noah Galloway (Living with No Excuses: The Remarkable Rebirth of an American Soldier)
The tendency to want what has been banned and therefore to presume that it is more worthwhile is not limited to such commodities as laundry soap. In fact, the tendency is not limited to commodities at all but extends to restrictions on information. In an age when the ability to acquire, store, and manage information is becoming increasingly the determinant of wealth and power, it is important to understand how we typically react to attempts to censor or otherwise constrain our access to information. Although much data exist on our reactions to various kinds of potentially censorable material—media violence, pornography, radical political rhetoric—there is surprisingly little evidence as to our reactions to the act of censoring them. Fortunately, the results of the few studies that have been done on the topic are highly consistent. Almost invariably, our response to the banning of information is a greater desire to receive that information and a more favorable attitude toward it than before the ban.112 The intriguing thing about the effects of censoring information is not that audience members want to have the information more than they did before; that seems natural. Rather, it is that they come to believe in the information more, even though they haven’t received it. For example, when University of North Carolina students learned that a speech opposing coed dorms on campus would be banned, they became more opposed to the idea of coed dorms. Thus, without ever hearing the speech, they became more sympathetic to its argument. This raises the worrisome possibility that especially clever individuals holding a weak or unpopular position can get us to agree with that position by arranging to have their message restricted. The irony is that for such people—members of fringe political groups, for example—the most effective strategy may not be to publicize their unpopular views, but to get those views officially censored and then to publicize the censorship. Perhaps the authors of this country’s Constitution were acting as much as sophisticated social psychologists as staunch civil libertarians when they wrote the remarkably permissive free-speech provision of the First Amendment. By refusing to restrain freedom of speech, they may have been attempting to minimize the chance that new political notions would win support via the irrational course of psychological reactance.
Robert B. Cialdini (Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion (Collins Business Essentials))
But there were problems. After the movie came out I couldn’t go to a tournament without being surrounded by fans asking for autographs. Instead of focusing on chess positions, I was pulled into the image of myself as a celebrity. Since childhood I had treasured the sublime study of chess, the swim through ever-deepening layers of complexity. I could spend hours at a chessboard and stand up from the experience on fire with insight about chess, basketball, the ocean, psychology, love, art. The game was exhilarating and also spiritually calming. It centered me. Chess was my friend. Then, suddenly, the game became alien and disquieting. I recall one tournament in Las Vegas: I was a young International Master in a field of a thousand competitors including twenty-six strong Grandmasters from around the world. As an up-and-coming player, I had huge respect for the great sages around me. I had studied their masterpieces for hundreds of hours and was awed by the artistry of these men. Before first-round play began I was seated at my board, deep in thought about my opening preparation, when the public address system announced that the subject of Searching for Bobby Fischer was at the event. A tournament director placed a poster of the movie next to my table, and immediately a sea of fans surged around the ropes separating the top boards from the audience. As the games progressed, when I rose to clear my mind young girls gave me their phone numbers and asked me to autograph their stomachs or legs. This might sound like a dream for a seventeen-year-old boy, and I won’t deny enjoying the attention, but professionally it was a nightmare. My game began to unravel. I caught myself thinking about how I looked thinking instead of losing myself in thought. The Grandmasters, my elders, were ignored and scowled at me. Some of them treated me like a pariah. I had won eight national championships and had more fans, public support and recognition than I could dream of, but none of this was helping my search for excellence, let alone for happiness. At a young age I came to know that there is something profoundly hollow about the nature of fame. I had spent my life devoted to artistic growth and was used to the sweaty-palmed sense of contentment one gets after many hours of intense reflection. This peaceful feeling had nothing to do with external adulation, and I yearned for a return to that innocent, fertile time. I missed just being a student of the game, but there was no escaping the spotlight. I found myself dreading chess, miserable before leaving for tournaments. I played without inspiration and was invited to appear on television shows. I smiled.
Josh Waitzkin (The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance)
There is definitely an audience for feminist-friendly porn, just a small audience and a small fraction of women overall. What is fascinating is that women commonly promote the idea of feminist porn and socially want to believe in it. Activists argue that there needs to be more of it, women support it in public and I see women start erotic websites all the time. But when it comes down to it, that is just not what they are interested in looking at,
Anonymous
I went to that show, although I remember very little about it. History relates, though, that also in the audience that night was Ian McLagan, later the keyboard player with the Faces, and that the support act was a band called Jeff Beck and the Tridents. But that’s how tight it all seemed to be in those days: at any time, almost everyone who would later matter would be standing around in the same place. One unfortunate gas explosion under the wrong club on the wrong night, and three-quarters of the history of British rock music would have been taken out in one go.
Rod Stewart (Rod: The Autobiography)
Failing to get institutional support, Hopper continued working on building a data processing compiler on her own. “When you have a good idea,” she loved to tell audiences, “and you’ve tried it and you know it’s going to work, go ahead and do it—because it’s much easier to apologize afterwards than it is to get permission.
Kathleen Broome Williams (Grace Hopper: Admiral of the Cyber Sea)
By supporting like-minded people, and by connecting people and seeking out supporters, we were able to become a leader online and grow our audience. I also tested ideas like a “critter twitter” and tried different ways to engage our followers.
Claire Díaz-Ortiz (Twitter for Good: Change the World One Tweet at a Time)
Video can provide a welcome change of pace in a presentation. For longer presentations, it’s especially important to change up what you are doing. There is evidence that people’s attention really drops after about ten minutes. Unless you change some aspect of your presentation delivery from time to time, you are going to lose some of your audience. You cannot simply keep talking and dishing out new information. You must do something that is relevant to your topic—something that re-engages your audience or illustrates and supports your point in a different way. You can tell a story, give examples, explain a graph, show an illustration or photo, ask a question, and so on. And, of course, using video that relates to your point is also a great way to change pace and engage the viewer’s brain, bringing them deeper into your presentation.
Garr Reynolds (Presentation Zen Design: Simple Design Principles and Techniques to Enhance Your Presentations (Voices That Matter))
The continuing appeal of Tolkien’s fantasy, completely unexpected and completely unpredictable though it was, cannot then be seen as a mere freak of popular taste, to be dismissed or ignored by those sufficiently well-educated to know better. It deserves an explanation and a defence, which this book tries to supply. In the process, I argue that his continuing appeal rests not on mere charm or strangeness (though both are there and can again to some extent be explained), but on a deeply serious response to what will be seen in the end as the major issues of his century: the origin and nature of evil (an eternal issue, but one in Tolkien’s lifetime terribly re-focused); human existence in Middle-earth, without the support of divine Revelation; cultural relativity; and the corruptions and continuities of language. These are themes which no one can afford to despise, or need be ashamed of studying. It is true that Tolkien’s answers will not appeal to everyone, and are wildly at odds with those given even by many of his contemporaries as listed above. But the first qualification applies to every author who has ever lived, and the second is one of the things that make him distinctive. However, one of the other things that make him distinctive is his professional authority. On some subjects Tolkien simply knew more, and had thought more deeply, than anyone else in the world. Some have felt (and said) that he should have written his results up in academic treatises instead of fantasy fiction. He might then have been taken more seriously by a limited academic audience. On the other hand, all through his lifetime that academic audience was shrinking, and has now all but vanished. There is an Old English proverb that says (in Old English, and with the usual provocative Old English obscurity), Ciggendra gehwelc wile pœt hine man gehere, ‘Everyone who cries out wants to be heard!’ (Here and in a few places later on, I use the old runic letters þ, ð and 3. The first usually represents ‘th’ as in ‘thin’, the second ‘th’ as in ‘then’. Where the third is used in this book, it represents -3 at the end of a word, -gh- in the middle of one.) Tolkien wanted to be heard, and he was. But what was it that he had to say?
Tom Shippey (J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century)
Were these slides the visual support for a live oral presentation? If so, I sympathized with the audience. Since when can an audience read and listen to someone talk at the same time (even if they could actually see the 12-point text on the screen well enough to read it)? Were the slides used merely as a kind of document printed in PowerPoint? If so, I pitied both the author and the reader because PowerPoint is not a tool for document creation. Boxes of bullet points and logos do not make for a good handout or report.
Garr Reynolds (Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery (Voices That Matter))
Research supports the concept that it is indeed more difficult for audiences to process information when it is presented in spoken and written form at the same time. So perhaps it would be better to just remain silent and let people read the slides. But this raises the issue: Why are you there? A good oral presentation is different from a well-written document, and attempts to merge them result in poor presentations and poor documents,
Garr Reynolds (Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery (Voices That Matter))
I’ve heard it estimated that a core buying audience of about 20,000+ readers is supporting 80% of working SF writers today,
Gardner Dozois (The Year's Best Science Fiction: First Annual Collection)
The second audience consists of those—Americans and all others—who either do not believe that the American value system is as described, or that it is the best ever devised, or that there is even such a thing as a specifically American value system. I welcome these readers. I have in many ways designed this book for them. The third audience is non-Americans. As this book goes to press, it is finally becoming obvious that the European attempt to create a welfare state alternative to the American model has failed. Begun after World War II, the secular welfare state offered Europeans and sympathetic non-Europeans an alternative to American religiosity and to what the welfare state’s supporters depict as cutthroat, heartless American free market capitalism. But some fifty to sixty years later, it is clear that this state is economically—and, as I show in the book, morally—unsustainable. Of the two democratic models—the European and the American—only the American one works and can endure. And the beauty of it as far as non-Americans are concerned is that it does not demand that any group give up its national or religious culture (except insofar as the culture holds values in conflict with the American value system). On the contrary, Americanism, as this value system is called, wants all peoples to retain their national culture and allegiances.
Dennis Prager (Still the Best Hope: Why the World Needs American Values to Triumph)
AUDIENCE ORIENTATION: Social marketers view their audience as decision-makers with choices, rather than students to be educated, or incorrigibles to be regulated. Social Marketing begins with a bottom-up versus a top-down perspective, and therefore rejects the paternalist notion that “experts know what is best and will tell people how to behave for their own good” in favor of an audience-centered approach which seeks to understand what people want and provide them support in acquiring it.
Nancy R. Lee (Social Marketing: Changing Behaviors for Good)
These are some mighty men about to hit the stage," an unseen announcer screamed through the PA system. "With an average height of six-foot-four, a massive weight of three hundred thirty pounds - all of it rock-solid muscle - they are nationally ranked power lifters, some of whom bench-press over six hundred pounds! And they're not here to brag on their muscles, but to brag on Jesus." The eight members of the Power Team ran up to the stage on thunderous feet, wearing red, black, and blue warm-up suits, weight belts, and boxing shoes. To a man, they were as big as a semitrailer truck. They pumped their fists in the air and stood before us bouncing lightly on the balls of their feet, ready to kick some religious butt. "Fasten your seat belts. If God is for you, who can be against you?" "Woo! Woo! Woo!" the audience screamed, instantly ready to rock and roll. We were less than an hour into the first night of a six-night revival, and already it seemed that Sin was going down in a terminal headlock, and Grand Junction would never be the same.... I had heard about the Power Team not from Christian friends, but from a succession of potheads - quintessential late-night cable TV channel surfers. To the stoned, there is nothing more entertaining than the sudden, near hallucinatory vision of this troupe of power-lifting missionaries led by former Oral Roberts University football star John Jacobs.... [My nephew] bought a comic book in which John Jacobs and the Power Team defeat a lisping South American drug lord. From that and an orientation video, we learned that the Team conducts seventy crusades each year, saves close to a million souls here and abroad - notably in Russia - and consists of "world-class athletes who inspire people to follow Christ - and to move away from drugs, alcohol, and suicide." (At the same time, we were pressured not to let our long-distance dollars go to support "nudity, profanity, or the Gay Games." We could avoid this by signing up with Lifeline, a Christian long-distance provider.)" People Who Sweat: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Pursuits, pp. 126-8.
Robin Chotzinoff (People Who Sweat: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Pursuits)
Not unlike alcoholism, the cycle of OCD continues in solitude and isolation … Even in therapy it never occurred to me to talk about plucking out my eyelashes and eyebrows. Not once did I bring it up – not once did it occur to me bring it up, the shame was so deep and ingrained. Fortunately, over the years alcoholism has gotten more and more screen time and does not carry quite the cloak of shame it once did. You won’t necessarily find us shouting it from the rooftops, but then again there are support groups in high schools these days. Hopefully OCD will one day find a similar degree of understanding in the general audience, because that understanding and dialogue are what we need to break not necessarily the cycle of repetitive behavior - because sometimes we can and sometimes we can’t - but to break the cycle of shame. Because I can tell you from experience . . . the shame is a killer.
Maggie Lamond Simone (Body Punishment: OCD, Addiction, and Finding the Courage to Heal)
May 19: At 2:00 p.m., Marilyn arrives at Madison Square Garden for a brief rehearsal. She departs to have her hair styled by Kenneth Battelle at a cost of $150. Then she returns to her New York apartment for a $125 makeup session with Marie Irvine. Finally, her maid, Hazel Washington, helps hook Marilyn into her Jean Louis gown, and she arrives at Madison Square Garden approximately three hours before she is to perform. Introduced to an audience of fifteen thousand as the “late Marilyn Monroe” after she delays her entrance (all part of the carefully rehearsed show), Marilyn performs flawlessly as the last of twenty-three entertainers and is clearly the highlight of the evening. Columnist Dorothy Kilgallen describes Marilyn as “making love to the president of the United States.” Marilyn also attends a party at the home of Arthur Krim, president of United Artists. She is photographed in a group of Kennedy supporters watching Diahann Carroll sing. To her right is Maria Callas and Arthur Miller’s father, Isidore. She is also photographed with both Robert and John Kennedy, as well as presidential advisor Arthur Schlesinger Jr. Schlesinger and Robert Kennedy playfully compete to dance with Marilyn. Contrary to sensationalistic reports, Marilyn spends the rest of the evening in her New York apartment with her friend Ralph Roberts and James Haspiel, one of her devoted fans.
Carl Rollyson (Marilyn Monroe Day by Day: A Timeline of People, Places, and Events)
Many Americans wonder why Robert Kennedy took no action against Lyndon Johnson if he suspected the vice president’s complicity in the murder of his brother. In fact, we now know that Johnson was concerned that Robert Kennedy would object to his immediate ascendancy to the presidency. The very fact that Johnson would worry about something so constitutionally preordained virtually proved Johnson’s fear that Kennedy would see through his role in the murder. I now believe that Johnson’s call to Robert Kennedy to obtain the wording of the presidential oath was an act of obsequiousness to test Kennedy as well as an opportunity to twist the knife in Johnson’s bitter rival. We now know that the “oath” aboard Air Force One was purely symbolic; the US Constitution elevates the vice president to the presidency automatically upon the death of the president. Johnson’s carefully arranged ceremony in which he insisted that Jackie Kennedy be present was to put his imprimatur and that of the Kennedys, on his presidency. Additionally, Judge Sarah T. Hughes, who administered the oath, had recently been blocked from elevation on the federal bench by Attorney General Robert Kennedy. This impediment would be removed under President Lyndon Johnson. Robert Kennedy knew his brother was murdered by a domestic conspiracy and, at a minimum, suspected that Lyndon Johnson was complicit. Kennedy would tell his aide Richard Goodwin, “there’s nothing I can do about it. Not now.”86 In essence, Kennedy understood that with both the FBI and the Justice Department under the control of Lyndon Johnson and Kennedy nemesis J. Edgar Hoover, there was, indeed, nothing he could do immediately. While numerous biographers describe RFK as being shattered by the murder of his brother, Robert Kennedy was not so bereaved that it prevented him from seeking to maneuver his way onto the 1964 ticket as vice president. Indeed, RFK had Jackie Kennedy call Johnson to lobby for Bobby’s selection. Johnson declined, far too cunning to put Bobby in the exact position that he had maneuvered John Kennedy into three years previous. Robert Kennedy knew that only by becoming president could he avenge his brother’s death. After lukewarm endorsements of the Warren Commission’s conclusions between 1963 and 1968, while campaigning in the California primary, RFK would be asked about his brother’s murder. In the morning, he mumbled half-hearted support for the Warren Commission conclusions but asked the same question that afternoon he would tell a student audience in Northern California that if elected he would reopen the investigation into his brother’s murder. Kennedy’s highly regarded press secretary Frank Mankiewicz would say he was “shocked” by RFK’s comment because he had never said anything like it publicly before. Mankiewicz and Robert Kennedy aide Adam Walinsky would ultimately conclude that JFK had been murdered by a conspiracy, but to my knowledge, neither understood the full involvement of LBJ. Only days after Robert Kennedy said he would release all the records of the Kennedy assassination, the New York Senator would be killed in an assassination eerily similar to his brother’s, in which there are disputes, even today, about the number of shooters and the number of shots. The morning after Robert Kennedy was murdered a distraught Jacqueline Kennedy called close friend New York socialite Carter Burden, and said “They got Bobby, too,” leaving little doubt that she recognized that the same people who killed her husband also killed her brother in law.87
Roger Stone (The Man Who Killed Kennedy: The Case Against LBJ)
CONCERT CHECKLIST 1. Secure a date on the calendar. Be sure it is listed on the official school calendar to protect it. 2. Reserve a performance venue for the concert and for final rehearsals. 3. Have tickets printed if they are to be used. 4. Plan the printed program and get it to the printer by the deadline date. 5. Plan the publicity. The following types of publicity can be utilized to draw a sizable concert audience: Radio releases Television releases Newspaper releases Online listings School announcements Notices to other schools and/or organizations in the area Posters for public placement 6. Send complimentary tickets to: Civic leaders Board of Education Superintendent People who have helped in some way Key supporters Key people to stimulate their interest 7. Have the president of the choir send personal letters of invitation to people that are special to the music program (newspaper editor, Board of Education, Superintendent, civic club presidents, supporters etc.). 8. Appoint a stage manager. He should be someone who can control the stage lighting, pull curtains, shut off air circulation fans that are noisy, and see that the stage is ready for the concert. 9. Arrange for ushers. 10. Check wearing apparel. Be sure that all singers have the correct accessories (same type and color of shoes, no gaudy jewelry for girls, etc.). 11. Post on bulletin board and tell students the time they will meet for a pre-concert warm-up. High school students will perform best if they meet together at least forty-five minutes before the concert.
Gordon Lamb (Choral Techniques)
The refurbished Cromwell must be speaking to something in contemporary culture and the job of the adapters is to figure out what that something might be. They must do so knowing that whatever it is, it is not primarily about religion. The religious background is important in both versions: More’s relentless pursuit of heretics, Cromwell’s sympathy for, and manipulation of, Protestant reformers, the willingness of those reformers to support Anne because she is on their side, Henry’s genuine conviction that God is punishing his sin. But it matters as historical setting, not as contemporary passion. There is no religious shortcut to engagement with these dramas, no assumption that Catholics will hiss Cromwell and cheer More and that Protestants will do the opposite. Some other connection must be forged. What makes Mantel’s Cromwell appealing to readers, audiences, and TV viewers is that he is rather like most of them. He is a middle-class man trying to get by in an oligarchic world. Thirty years ago, Mantel’s Cromwell would have been of limited interest. His virtues—hard work, self-discipline, domestic respectability, a talent for office politics, the steady accumulation of money, a valuing of stability above all else—would have been dismissed as mere bourgeois orthodoxies. If they were not so boring they would have been contemptible. They were, in a damning word, safe. But they’re not safe anymore. They don’t assure security. As the world becomes more oligarchic, middle-class virtues become more precarious. This is the drama of Mantel’s Cromwell—he is the perfect bourgeois in a world where being perfectly bourgeois doesn’t buy you freedom from the knowledge that everything you have can be whipped away from you at any moment. The terror that grips us is rooted not in Cromwell’s weakness but in his extraordinary strength. He is a perfect paragon of meritocracy for our age. He is a survivor of an abusive childhood,
Anonymous
The novel’s audience was not restricted to the literati; it had prominent fans in other sectors too. In 1943, Hamsun gave his Nobel medal to one of those fans: Josef Goebbels. Hamsun wanted to thank the Nazi propaganda minister for the hospitality he had enjoyed during a recent trip to Germany. Ten years earlier, a 74-year-old Hamsun had taken to supporting the Nazis in Norwegian newspapers. When the Nazis invaded Norway in April 1940, Hamsun urged his countrymen to surrender. Not long after his meeting with Goebbels, Hamsun paid a visit to Hitler himself. Two years later, when Hitler committed suicide, Hamsun took the opportunity to compose an unsolicited obituary, which was published in Norway’s most prominent broadsheet, Aftenposten. In the obituary, Hamsun mourned the loss of the Führer and praised him as “a preacher of the gospel of justice for all nations.” The Allies liberated Norway the next day.
Anonymous
Life is a theatrical folly, a play of the great players and big dreamers set out on the biggest stage. Where improvisation dictates the mood. The contest for the lead is unabating when the cast is made up of those aiming high. Fortunately we don't all want the lead, for the dream of some is not to be the hero and face the challenges that accompany it, to maintain their prowess every day, to be ready to see off every pretender to their throne. We don't all want to be revolutionaries, we don't all want to be alone in the spotlight and have the eyes of the critical audience on us for a single minute, not feeling owed their fifteen minutes of fame. Some don't want to take to that vast stage alone and perform a monologue of Shakespearean proportions. Some recognise maybe that within leading roles, the most memorable characters, there is vulnerability and often the part is a tragic one. It is a stronger mind that recognises their part in the play of life, someone who knows that the lead part is not for them. Someone who supports the lead, wishes to journey with them and knows they will need a supporting cast. Someone who aims for contentment and lives a humble yet happy existence. The risk is for those who sets their standards too high and will never reach them. The reality is, we won't all achieve the same greatness in our lives, because our view of greatness differs between us. So on a personal level you must decide what role you wish to have, make it your own. Be the best you can by your standards, not anyone else's.
Raven Lockwood
Almost twenty years ago I was invited to moderate a panel of adoptive parents who were sharing their experiences with interracial adoption with an audience of prospective parents considering the same option. The White panelists spoke of ways they had tried to affirm the identities of their adopted children of color. One parent, the mother of a Central American adoptee, spoke of how she had become involved in a support group of parents who had adopted Latinx children as a way of providing her son with playmates who had a shared experience. She also described her efforts to find Latinx adults who might serve as role models for her child. There were very few Latinx families in her mostly White community, but she located a Latinx organization in a nearby town and began to do volunteer work for it as a way of building a Latinx friendship network. During the question-and-answer period that followed, a White woman stood up and explained that she was considering adopting a Latinx child but lived in a small rural community that was entirely White. She was impressed by the mother’s efforts to create a Latinx network for her child but expressed doubts that she herself could do so. She said she would feel too uncomfortable placing herself in a situation where she would be one of few Whites. She didn’t think she could do it. I thought this was an amazing statement. How could this White adult seriously consider placing a small child in a situation where the child would be in the minority all the time, while the idea of spending a few hours as a “minority” was too daunting for her?
Beverly Daniel Tatum (Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?)
Kulinski's fans in the audience represent the id of some of the most vocal people on the progressive left; in many ways, they're the id of the Bernie Sanders supporter: white, male, Millennial, and uncompromising. Typically, these young white men, who love Bernie more than sliced bread, are also raucous, rowdy, and quick to heckle anyone deemed insufficiently progressive, the problem her being that anyone not named Bernie falls into this category for them.
Zerlina Maxwell (The End of White Politics: How to Heal Our Liberal Divide)
The Kremlin switches messages at will to its advantage, climbing inside everything: European right-wing nationalists are seduced with an anti-EU message; the Far Left is co-opted with tales of fighting US hegemony; US religious conservatives are convinced by the Kremlin’s fight against homosexuality. And the result is an array of voices, working away at global audiences from different angles, producing a cumulative echo chamber of Kremlin support, all broadcast on RT.
Peter Pomerantsev (Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the New Russia)
Confidence spark If public speaking is a great fear of yours, try practicing first with a few people you are comfortable with, people who you know will be an encouraging audience. Allow for nervousness, but focus on your listeners and their supportive presence. Take a few deep breaths and share something personal that’s meaningful for you. Authenticity and vulnerability help create a connection with your audience. A few sessions with a coach might be helpful if you feel the need.
Helene Lerner (The Confidence Myth: Why Women Undervalue Their Skills, and How to Get Over It)
identify your employee adjectives, (2) recruit through proper advertising, (3) identify winning personalities, and (4) select your winners. Step One: Identify Your Employee Adjectives When you think of your favorite employees in the past, what comes to mind? A procedural element such as an organized workstation, neat paperwork, or promptness? No. What makes an employee memorable is her attitude and smile, the way she takes the time to make sure a customer is happy, the extra mile she goes to ensure orders are fulfilled and problems are solved. Her intrinsic qualities—her energy, sense of humor, eagerness, and contributions to the team—are the qualities you remember. Rather than relying on job descriptions that simply quantify various positions’ duties and correlating them with matching experience as a tool for identifying and hiring great employees, I use a more holistic approach. The first step in the process is selecting eight adjectives that best define the personality ideal for each job or role in your business. This is a critical step: it gives you new visions and goals for your own management objectives, new ways to measure employee success, and new ways to assess the performance of your own business. Create a “Job Candidate Profile” for every job position in your business. Each Job Candidate Profile should contain eight single- and multiple-word phrases of defining adjectives that clearly describe the perfect employee for each job position. Consider employee-to-customer personality traits, colleague-to-colleague traits, and employee-to-manager traits when making up the list. For example, an accounting manager might be described with adjectives such as “accurate,” “patient,” “detailed,” and “consistent.” A cocktail server for a nightclub or casual restaurant would likely be described with adjectives like “energetic,” “fun,” “music-loving,” “sports-loving,” “good-humored,” “sociable conversationalist,” “adventurous,” and so on. Obviously, the adjectives for front-of-house staff and back-of-house staff (normally unseen by guests) will be quite different. Below is one generic example of a Job Candidate Profile. Your lists should be tailored for your particular bar concept, audience, location, and style of business (high-end, casual, neighborhood, tourist, and so on). BARTENDER Energetic Extroverted/Conversational Very Likable (first impression) Hospitable, demonstrates a Great Service Attitude Sports Loving Cooperative, Team Player Quality Orientated Attentive, Good Listening Skills SAMPLE ADJECTIVES Amazing Ambitious Appealing Ardent Astounding Avid Awesome Buoyant Committed Courageous Creative Dazzling Dedicated Delightful Distinctive Diverse Dynamic Eager Energetic Engaging Entertaining Enthusiastic Entrepreneurial Exceptional Exciting Fervent Flexible Friendly Genuine High-Energy Imaginative Impressive Independent Ingenious Keen Lively Magnificent Motivating Outstanding Passionate Positive Proactive Remarkable Resourceful Responsive Spirited Supportive Upbeat Vibrant Warm Zealous Step Two: Recruit through Proper Advertising The next step is to develop print or online advertising copy that will attract the personalities you’ve just defined.
Jon Taffer (Raise the Bar: An Action-Based Method for Maximum Customer Reactions)
gentlemen who were desirous of going with us, we all started westward, and after a pleasant trip arrived at Fort McPherson." Before he arrived at Fort McPherson, Cody was interviewed by the local press. Cody allowed, surely with tongue in cheek, that We have played New York until we forced Edwin Booth to go West. He said it would not do for him to try to buck against us, and he was right. I propose to [be] ... playing Shakespeare right through, from beginning to end, with Ned Buntline and Texas Jack to support me. I shall do Hamlet in a buckskin suit and when my father's ghost appears "doomed for a certain time," &c., I shall say to Jack, "Rope the cuss in, Jack!!" and unless the lasso breaks, the ghost will have to come. As Richard the Third I shall fight with pistols and hunting knives. In "Romeo and Juliet" I will put a half-breed squaw on the balcony, and make various interpretations of Shakespeare's words to suit myself. Shakespeare has had to endure many indignities over the years: bowdlerizations, bizarre directorial concepts, and costume choices of all kinds, but theatergoers, fortunately, were spared Hamlet in buckskin or the balcony scene in a Western saloon. On the other hand, it is possible that Cody, with his genius for showmanship, might have won over a whole new audience to the plays. During the run of The Scouts of the Prairie, Cody had not only overcome his initial stage fright but had developed enough self-confidence to feel comfortable onstage. Moreover, he knew that audiences responded favorably to him. Although he still did not consider himself an actor, he had begun to wear the more becoming mantle of "showman." Ned Buntline had all kinds
Robert A. Carter (Buffalo Bill Cody: The Man Behind the Legend)
These are the four core functions of a platform: Audience building: Build a liquid marketplace by attracting a critical mass of consumers and producers. Matchmaking: Connect the right consumers with the right producers in order to facilitate transactions and interactions. Providing core tools and services: Build tools and services that support the core transaction by lowering transaction costs, removing barriers to entry, and making the platform more valuable over time through data. Creating rules and standards: Set guidelines that govern which behaviors are allowed and encouraged and which are forbidden or discouraged.
Alex Moazed (Modern Monopolies: What It Takes to Dominate the 21st Century Economy)
Another sociological approach alleged that urban and industrial leveling since the late nineteenth century had produced an atomized mass society in which purveyors of simple hatreds found a ready audience unrestrained by tradition or community. Hannah Arendt worked within this paradigm in her analysis of how the new rootless mob, detached from all social, intellectual, or moral moorings and inebriated by anti-Semitic and imperialistic passions, made possible the emergence of an unprecedented form of limitless mass-based plebiscitary dictatorship. The best empirical work on the way fascism took root, however, gives little support to this approach. Weimar German society, for example, was richly structured, and Nazism recruited by mobilizing entire organizations through carefully targeted appeals to specific interests. As the saying went, “two Germans, a discussion; three Germans, a club.” The fact that German clubs for everything from choral singing to funeral insurance were already segregated into separate socialist and nonsocialist networks facilitated the exclusion of the socialists and the Nazi takeover of the rest when Germany became deeply polarized in the early 1930s.
Robert O. Paxton (The Anatomy of Fascism)
Antidemocratic and xenophobic movements have flourished in America since the Native American party of 1845 and the Know-Nothing Party of the 1850s. In the crisis-ridden 1930s, as in other democracies, derivative fascist movements were conspicuous in the United States: the Protestant evangelist Gerald B. Winrod’s openly pro-Hitler Defenders of the Christian Faith with their Black Legion; William Dudley Pelley’s Silver Shirts (the initials “SS” were intentional); the veteran-based Khaki Shirts (whose leader, one Art J. Smith, vanished after a heckler was killed at one of his rallies); and a host of others. Movements with an exotic foreign look won few followers, however. George Lincoln Rockwell, flamboyant head of the American Nazi Party from 1959 until his assassination by a disgruntled follower in 1967, seemed even more “un-American” after the great anti-Nazi war. Much more dangerous are movements that employ authentically American themes in ways that resemble fascism functionally. The Klan revived in the 1920s, took on virulent anti-Semitism, and spread to cities and the Middle West. In the 1930s, Father Charles E. Coughlin gathered a radio audience estimated at forty million around an anticommunist, anti–Wall Street, pro–soft money, and—after 1938—anti-Semitic message broadcast from his church in the outskirts of Detroit. For a moment in early 1936 it looked as if his Union Party and its presidential candidate, North Dakota congressman William Lemke, might overwhelm Roosevelt. Today a “politics of resentment” rooted in authentic American piety and nativism sometimes leads to violence against some of the very same “internal enemies” once targeted by the Nazis, such as homosexuals and defenders of abortion rights. Of course the United States would have to suffer catastrophic setbacks and polarization for these fringe groups to find powerful allies and enter the mainstream. I half expected to see emerge after 1968 a movement of national reunification, regeneration, and purification directed against hirsute antiwar protesters, black radicals, and “degenerate” artists. I thought that some of the Vietnam veterans might form analogs to the Freikorps of 1919 Germany or the Italian Arditi, and attack the youths whose demonstrations on the steps of the Pentagon had “stabbed them in the back.” Fortunately I was wrong (so far). Since September 11, 2001, however, civil liberties have been curtailed to popular acclaim in a patriotic war upon terrorists. The language and symbols of an authentic American fascism would, of course, have little to do with the original European models. They would have to be as familiar and reassuring to loyal Americans as the language and symbols of the original fascisms were familiar and reassuring to many Italians and Germans, as Orwell suggested. Hitler and Mussolini, after all, had not tried to seem exotic to their fellow citizens. No swastikas in an American fascism, but Stars and Stripes (or Stars and Bars) and Christian crosses. No fascist salute, but mass recitations of the pledge of allegiance. These symbols contain no whiff of fascism in themselves, of course, but an American fascism would transform them into obligatory litmus tests for detecting the internal enemy. Around such reassuring language and symbols and in the event of some redoubtable setback to national prestige, Americans might support an enterprise of forcible national regeneration, unification, and purification. Its targets would be the First Amendment, separation of Church and State (creches on the lawns, prayers in schools), efforts to place controls on gun ownership, desecrations of the flag, unassimilated minorities, artistic license, dissident and unusual behavior of all sorts that could be labeled antinational or decadent.
Robert O. Paxton (The Anatomy of Fascism)
Scott’s “Anaconda Plan” failed to consider what the Southern troops would be doing while the Northern troops took several months to travel to and sail down the Mississippi. Lincoln knew that the public would never have the patience for Scott’s plan. In listening to his daily visitors, he came to understand that his Northern audience needed to see some results if he and the Union would retain their support.
Ronald C. White Jr. (A. Lincoln)
Have you ever said - I wish I could quit, but I need to pay the bills. - I need more time for myself, but I have so much to do. - I want a support group that doesn’t judge me.
Meera Kothand (The Blog Startup: Proven Strategies to Launch Smart and Exponentially Grow Your Audience, Brand, and Income without Losing Your Sanity or Crying Bucketloads of Tears)
An individual can use philosophy to explain his or her belief to explain his or belief on a particular social science theory. However, if the individual negates an existing social science theory he or she needs to excavate new information and provide scientific evidence toward his or her audience. This way the individual can effectively support his or her reasoning to contradict an existing social science theory.
Saaif Alam
We go into preacher mode when our sacred beliefs are in jeopardy: we deliver sermons to protect and promote our ideals. We enter prosecutor mode when we recognize flaws in other people’s reasoning: we marshal arguments to prove them wrong and win our case. We shift into politician mode when we’re seeking to win over an audience: we campaign and lobby for the approval of our constituents. The risk is that we become so wrapped up in preaching that we’re right, prosecuting others who are wrong, and politicking for support that we don’t bother to rethink our own views.
Adam M. Grant (Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know)
In many ways, my parents have always been at the back of the room. The support I felt from them that day gave me resolve to take the leap in front of that intimidating audience, and many others in years to come. I knew they'd be there to help me put myself back together with every subsequent failure - or at least to help me craft a good story out of it.
Kimberly Williams-Paisley
Thanks for reading all the way through. I hope that you enjoyed this book. As a new writer, it is hard to get started; it is difficult to find an audience that wants to read my books. There are millions of books out there and sometimes it is super hard to find one specific book. But that’s where you come in! You can help other readers find my books by leaving a simple review. It doesn’t have to be a lengthy or well written review; it just has to be a few words and then click on the stars. It would take less than 5 minutes.  Seriously, that would help me so much, you don’t even realize it. Every time I get a review, good or bad, it just fills me with motivation to keep on writing. It is a great feeling to know that somewhere out there, there are people who actually enjoy reading my books. Anyway, I would super appreciate it, thanks. If you see new books from me in the future, you will know that I wrote them because of your support. Thank you for supporting my work. Special thanks again to previous readers and reviewers. Thank you for encouraging me to keep writing. I’ll do my best to provide high quality books for you all. My Other Books
Steve the Noob (Diary of Steve the Noob 22 (An Unofficial Minecraft Book) (Diary of Steve the Noob Collection))
7. Energy. Your degree of personal energy and enthusiasm has a great deal to do with whether or not someone will want to hear the message you are trying to communicate. Believing in what you have to say also helps you to overcome interactive inhibition. If you care passionately about something, your life force will flow naturally, energizing you, and you will be able to focus better on getting the message out to others. Before entering an interactive situation, try “turning yourself on.” Put yourself in a peak state of enthusiasm. This might involve playing a piece of music that makes you feel great or thinking back to a time when you felt absolutely unstoppable. By accessing memories of a time when you felt energetic, you can induce the same state again. 8. Pitch and tone of voice. Speaking in a monotone is a quick way to turn off any audience. Practice using a variety of vocal qualities in your speech. Try using a tape recorder to make sure your voice is pleasant to listen to, and that your message matches your tone of voice. People pick up more from the voice tone than from the actual words you use. 9. Animation and gestures. Don’t be afraid to use your body, especially your hands, to use moderate gestures during conversation. Gestures send signals of enthusiasm and energy. Whenever you speak, you are essentially on stage, and appropriate gesturing helps you to communicate. 10. Ability to hold interest of others. In an interview, be prepared to discuss a variety of topics—not just the job you are applying for. And be sure to ask questions (prepare some in advance if necessary). 11. Commitment. This attribute has to do with caring passionately—about yourself, the other person, and the message you are trying to convey. If you convey that you can make a positive difference in the prospective workplace, you are much more likely to influence the interviewer and leave him or her with a lasting positive impression of you. 12. Ability to make others feel comfortable. In order to make others comfortable, you must first appear comfortable yourself. Practice looking more comfortable and relaxed by watching yourself in the mirror. Encouraging others to speak openly and freely also helps them to feel more comfortable and at ease with you. Dominating a conversation makes others feel uncomfortable very quickly. Asking others for their opinions, feelings, and values opens them up to you equally quickly. In an interview situation, it is usually a good idea to let the interviewer do most of the talking. Again, prepare some questions to get a two-way conversation going. All twelve elements are essential for good communication. They should work together in harmony, and each element should support the overall message you are communicating.
Jonathan Berent (Beyond Shyness: How to Conquer Social Anxieties)
Mid May 2012 Dearest Andy, After all these years, you have not changed. You’ll always be the Valet I’ve grown to love and adore. When I read your email, I can hear the sound of your voice as it was so long ago. Although we are miles apart, I continue to feel you close to my heart. After our separation, I looked for a ‘big brother’ and lover like you and failed miserably, until Walter came into my life. He inquires about you persistently. I think he is hoping for a triplet relationship, similar to the one we shared with Oscar. He thinks highly of you. Walter is very similar to you, in that you both know that you are gods who could do no wrong. In the majority of cases, that is how I remember you. Of course we both have our shortcomings, as humans do. The wonderful times we shared definitely overshadowed the negative moments. I fear that having two alpha males in the same house will be a disaster because you’ll both be competing for power and lording your masculinity over me. That’s scary! LOL! That said, my partner and I discuss you frequently. The difference between you two is that he fully supports the writing of my memoirs while you, my friend, have made it clear that writing about my adolescent life experiences isn’t a good idea. I respect both your differing opinions, but this is something I will have to decide on my own. I sincerely believe that now is the moment to tell my story and I will tell it without hurting or exposing anyone unnecessarily. I’ve changed the names of the schools, the society, and, of course, the people that played an important role in my young life. Do you remember when we were in Las Vegas working on “Sacred Sex In Sacred Places”? The Count told us that Howard Hughes was in town and you dragged me along for an audience with the tycoon? You desperately wanted an apprenticeship in his aerodynamics engineering company. I remember the episode well. That experience is definitely worth documenting in my memoirs. We will have many opportunities to reminisce, but for now I am simply happy that we are communicating regularly. Tell me more about yourself in your next correspondence. I love you and miss you. Wishing you all the best! Young.
Young (Unbridled (A Harem Boy's Saga, #2))
I attended a symposium to hear Shilagh Mirgain, Ph.D. speak on Mindful Leadership. Throughout her program, I made sure to make eye contact and smile to support, affirm, and engage with her presentation. When audience members do this for me, it adds an extra punch of dynamic energy that enriches my presentations and improves my performance.
Susan C. Young (The Art of Body Language: 8 Ways to Optimize Non-Verbal Communication for Positive Impact (The Art of First Impressions for Positive Impact, #3))
Here are some action words to help act as thought starters as you determine what you are asking of your audience: accept | agree | begin | believe | change | collaborate | commence | create | defend | desire | differentiate | do | empathize | empower | encourage | engage | establish | examine | facilitate | familiarize | form | implement | include | influence | invest | invigorate | know | learn | like | persuade | plan | promote | pursue | recommend | receive | remember | report | respond | secure | support | simplify | start | try | understand | validate
Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic (Storytelling with Data: A Data Visualization Guide for Business Professionals)
What are bad recommendations you hear in your profession or area of expertise? The biggest one is that international audiences won’t see films about people of color. It’s particularly insidious, but it’s reflective of a broader issue wherein Hollywood accepts conventional wisdom that is more convention than wisdom without interrogating whether there’s any evidence to support those assumptions. What advice would you give to a smart, driven college student about to enter the “real world”? Try everything you think you might want to do professionally before accepting whatever backup plan you have in the back of your head but are very much hoping to avoid.
Timothy Ferriss (Tribe Of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World)
Fourth, you should lay out a road map for the rest of the speech: “I will begin by describing X, next I will argue Y, and finally I will propose Z.” This is not a time for subtlety; be direct and explicit. If you are going to use visuals to support your speech, you should spell out these three steps in an “agenda” slide. Such an explicit road map helps your audience see how the different components of your argument fit together in a logical fashion. The body of your speech should have a clear structure with a logical progression. One possible structure is: • Here’s the problem. • Here’s my analysis. • Here’s how we could solve this problem. Another possible structure might be: • Here’s an issue of current interest. • Here’s my take on this issue. • Here’s how we might rethink this issue in the future.
Robert C. Pozen (Extreme Productivity: Boost Your Results, Reduce Your Hours)