“
The surgeons are playing on the myth's double standard for the function of the body. A man's thigh is for walking, but a woman's is for walking and looking "beautiful." If women can walk but believe our limbs look wrong, we feel that our bodies cannot do what they are meant to do; we feel as genuinely deformed and disabled as the unwilling Victorian hypochondriac felt ill.
”
”
Naomi Wolf (The Beauty Myth)
“
In an age of images and entertainment, in an age of instant emotional gratification, we neither seek nor want honesty or reality. Reality is complicated. Reality is boring. We are incapable or unwilling to handle its confusion.
”
”
Ryan Holiday (Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator)
“
There is a strange emptiness to life without myths.
I am African American — by which I mean, a descendant of slaves, rather than a descendant of immigrants who came here willingly and with lives more or less intact. My ancestors were the unwilling, unintact ones: children torn from parents, parents torn from elders, people torn from roots, stories torn from language. Past a certain point, my family’s history just… stops. As if there was nothing there.
I could do what others have done, and attempt to reconstruct this lost past. I could research genealogy and genetics, search for the traces of myself in moldering old sale documents and scanned images on microfiche. I could also do what members of other cultures lacking myths have done: steal. A little BS about Atlantis here, some appropriation of other cultures’ intellectual property there, and bam! Instant historically-justified superiority. Worked great for the Nazis, new and old. Even today, white people in my neck of the woods call themselves “Caucasian”, most of them little realizing that the term and its history are as constructed as anything sold in the fantasy section of a bookstore.
These are proven strategies, but I have no interest in them. They’ll tell me where I came from, but not what I really want to know: where I’m going. To figure that out, I make shit up.
”
”
N.K. Jemisin
“
In an age of images and entertainment, in an age of instant emotional gratification, we neither seek nor want honesty or reality. Reality is complicated. Reality is boring. We are incapable or unwilling to handle its confusion. We ask to be indulged and comforted by clichés, stereotypes, and inspirational messages that tell us we can be whoever we seek to be, that we live in the greatest country on earth, that we are endowed with superior moral and physical qualities, and that our future will always be glorious
”
”
Chris Hedges (Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle)
“
Where woman do not fit the Iron Maiden [societal expectations/assumptions about women's bodies], we are now being called monstrous, and the Iron Maiden is exactly that which no woman fits, or fits forever. A woman is being asked to feel like a monster now though she is whole and fully physically functional. The surgeons are playing on the myth's double standard for the function of the body. A man's thigh is for walking, but a woman's is for walking and looking "beautiful." If women can walk but believe our limbs look wrong, we feel that our bodies cannot do what they are meant to do; we feel as genuinely deformed and disabled as the unwilling Victorian hypochondriac felt ill.
”
”
Naomi Wolf (The Beauty Myth)
“
You are never to be alone in a bedroom with a male.”
She snorted. “You have no say over who I have in my bedroom. If I want to invite the entire Miami Dolphins team into my bed and have a big orgy while covered in chocolate sauce, you have no say in that whatsoever.”
The brief image set fire to his blood, but he kept his temper on simmer, unwilling to let her bait him. Still, he kind of wanted to hunt down every player on the football team and turn them into stains on the Astroturf.
“My house,” he gritted out, “my rules. No chocolate NFL orgies in my keep. I think that’s a reasonable request.
”
”
Larissa Ione (Lethal Rider (Lords of Deliverance, #3; Demonica, #8))
“
Ulis, he prayed, abandoning the set words, let my anger die with him. Let both of us be freed from the burden of his actions. Even if I cannot forgive him, help me not to hate him. Ulis was a cold god, a god of night and shadows and dust. His love was found in emptiness, his kindness in silence. And that was what Maia needed. Silence, coldness, kindness. He focused his thoughts carefully on the familiar iconography, the image of Ulis’s open hands; the god of letting go was surely the god who would listen to an unwilling emperor. Help me not to feel hatred, he prayed, and after a while it became easier to ask that Dazhis find peace, that Maia’s anger not be added to the weight against his soul.
”
”
Katherine Addison (The Goblin Emperor (The Chronicles of Osreth, #1))
“
As Chris Hedges, the philosopher and journalist, wrote, “In an age of images and entertainment, in an age of instant emotional gratification, we neither seek nor want honesty or reality. Reality is complicated. Reality is boring. We are incapable or unwilling to handle its confusion.
”
”
Ryan Holiday (Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator)
“
In the depth of my soul there are songs unwilling to take the garb of words, songs living as seed in my heart. They will not flow with ink onto paper. Like a translucent veil, they are wrapped about emotions that can never flow sweetly on my tongue.
Yet how can I even whisper them when I fear what the particles of air may do to them? To whom shall I sing them when they have become accustomed to live in the house of my soul and fear the harshness of other ears?
Were you to look into my eyes, you would see the image of their image. Were you to touch my fingertips, you would feel their quick movements. The works of my hands reveal them as the lake reflects the twinkling of the stars.
My tears disclose them as the mystery of the rose petal is disclosed at the moment the heat dissolves the drops of dew when that rose withers.
… Who can combine the roaring of the sea and the warbling of the nightingale? Who can link the crashing thunder with the baby’s sigh?
”
”
Kahlil Gibran
“
In a sense, everything is magic: magic, for example, is the science of herbs and metals, which allows the physician to influence both malady and patient; magical, too, is illness itself, which imposes itself upon a body like a demonical possession of which sometimes the body is unwilling to be healed. The power of sounds, high or low, is magic, disturbing the soul, or possibly soothing it. Magic, above all, is the virulent force of words, which are almost always stronger than the things for which they stand; their power justifies what is said about them in the Sepher Yetsira, not to mention between us the Gospel According to Saint John. Magical is the prestige which surrounds a monarch, and which emanates from the ceremonies of the Church; and magical in their effect, likewise, are the scaffolds draped in black and the lugubrious roll of drums at executions; all such trappings transfix and terrify the gaping onlookers even more than they awe the victims. And finally, love is magic, as is hatred, too, imprinting as they do upon the brain the image of a being whom we allow to haunt us.
”
”
Marguerite Yourcenar (L'Œuvre au noir)
“
If thou willingly bear the Cross, it will bear thee, and will bring thee to the end which thou seekest, even where there shall be the end of suffering; though it shall not be here. If thou bear it unwillingly, thou makest a burden for thyself and greatly increaseth thy load, and yet thou must bear it. If thou cast away one cross, without doubt thou shalt find another and perchance a heavier.
”
”
Thomas à Kempis (Christian Devotionals - The Imitation of Christ, Confessions, Jesus The Christ, The Book of Ruth and How To Become Like Christ (Five Unabridged Classics with Annotations, Images and Audio Links))
“
She moved to push past him. When he did not move, she stopped, unwilling to touch him.
A pity. The memory of the warmth of her gloved hand on his cold cheek flashed. Apparently her behavior outside had been the product of surprise.
And pleasure.
He wondered what else he might do instinctively in response to pleasure. An image flashed- blond hair spread wide across dark, silken sheets, ice blue eyes alight with surprise as he gave prim, proper Penelope a glimpse of dark and heady pleasure.
He'd nearly kissed her in the darkness. It had started out as a way to intimidate her, to begin the systematic compromising of quiet, unassuming, Penelope Marbury. But he did not deny that as they stood in his barren kitchen, he wondered what she would taste like. How her breath would sound fluttering across his skin. How she would feel against him. Around him.
”
”
Sarah MacLean (A Rogue by Any Other Name (The Rules of Scoundrels, #1))
“
Images of him continued to plague me, unbidden and cruelly tantalising: the mesmerizing blue eyes that compelled me to share with him my most private fears; the feel of his thick, untidy hair as the sunlight split it into myriad shades of gold; the soft laugh that touched my soul; his aloof but unpretentious manner; his confident assurance that I could make my own choices. I shuddered at the thought of Steldor's attitude toward me, for he saw me as only a woman, relegated to supervising that household, planning and executing social events and raising the children. All he really wanted was my presence in his bed, which made me all the more unwilling to comply. Steldor's glance made me uncomfortable, his patronising laugh made me cringe, his condescension frequently led to my humiliation. In Narians arms, I had felt extraordinary happiness; in Steldor's I felt trapped.
”
”
Cayla Kluver (Allegiance (Legacy, #2))
“
there is something about watching a person slowly disappear—their energy, then their color, then their body—that pushes you, unwillingly, to the edge of an emotional canyon and forces you to look, to see the vastness held within it and realize that you’ve explored so little. That life isn’t infinite but is monumental, and if you don’t start exploring now, you are going to miss some of the most important sights. The feeling of being consumed with grief at the idea of losing someone you’ve known for so long yet hardly understand… that feeling changes you.
”
”
Jes Baker (Landwhale: On Turning Insults Into Nicknames, Why Body Image Is Hard, and How Diets Can Kiss My Ass)
“
Defenders of hell must overcome the prima facie absurdity of the following conjunction: God loves every one of His creatures with a profound and unwavering benevolence; and He wills upon some of these creatures the very worst kind of evil conceivable, and He wills that they suffer it for all eternity, even though it cannot possibly do them any good, since it never culminates in anything but more of the same. Defenders of [another] version of the doctrine of hell face different challenges. Because they hold that damnation originates in the creature’s own rejection of God, they must accept that some creatures freely reject God forever, and that God cannot legitimately overcome this free rejection of Him (despite potentially infinite time in which to work on their intransigence). That someone created in the divine image, and hence naturally ordered towards the good, should eternally reject the perfect good strikes us as prima facie unlikely, especially if God continues unremittingly to seek the creature’s repentance. Furthermore, that an omnipotent and omniscient God should eternally fail to find a morally legitimate way to transform an unwilling creature’s heart strikes us as prima facie dubious.
”
”
Robert Wild (A Catholic Reading Guide to Universalism)
“
An image-based culture communicates through narratives, pictures, and pseudo-drama. Scandalous affairs, hurricanes, untimely deaths, train wrecks—these events play well on computer screens and television. International diplomacy, labor union negotiations, and convoluted bailout packages do not yield exciting personal narratives or stimulating images … Reality is complicated. Reality is boring. We are incapable or unwilling to handle its confusion … We become trapped in the linguistic prison of incessant repetition.
”
”
Bandy X. Lee (The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President)
“
Ashtart’s secondary purpose was to debase the image of Elohim in mankind through carnal intercourse with everything unnatural or inhuman. It would bring humanity down from its lofty heights of dominion over creation and suck them into the muck and slime. She so hated the Creator and wanted to spit in his face, that she inspired the hatred of all that was good and humanly beautiful in the name of “love.” The delicious irony was that she had created cities of hate masquerading as “Cities of Love.” At the apex of all this sexual freedom was the ultimate goal of Ashtart: sexual congregation of humans with the gods. She wanted to eliminate all separation between gods and men. She invited select gods of Canaan – Molech, Dagon and Asherah – to join her in the covert activity of breeding with the daughters of men. But they were unwilling, out of fear of reprisal from Elohim. The Deluge judgment was still too vivid in their memories. So Ashtart cursed them and pursued her agenda alone, as she felt she always had to.
”
”
Brian Godawa (Abraham Allegiant (Chronicles of the Nephilim Book 4))
“
He sees me based on what I can do for him, not who I am. He has an image of me and he doesn’t want to see beneath the image. You can’t be with a man who is unwilling or unable to see the real you.
”
”
Cathy Lamb (What I Remember Most)
“
It is quite clear, whether you read Christopher Hitchens or Friedrich Nietzsche, that the image of God running the world to which they are reacting involves a celestial tyrant imposing his will on an unwilling world and unwilling human beings, cramping their style, squashing their individuality and their very humanness, requiring them to conform to arbitrary and hurtful laws and threatening them with dire consequences if they resist. This narrative (which contains a fair amount of secularist projection) serves the Enlightenment’s Deist agenda, following centuries of religious wars, as well as the power interests of those who would move God to a remote heaven in order that they can carry on exploiting the world.
”
”
N.T. Wright (Surprised by Scripture: Engaging Contemporary Issues)
“
Attending Diana’s funeral was the saddest thing I’ve ever done. The image of her solitary coffin and the haunting echo of the guards’ footsteps will stay with me always. I prayed for her young sons, for whom she will be irreplaceable.
I looked across the square at the thousands of people who remained, listening to the Abbey bells, unwilling to leave. Men and women alike were still blinking back tears, biting trembling lips, or openly crying after seeing Diana’s casket being borne away.
The funeral service had been truly sublime--a funeral fit for a queen. Yet, Diana would have been more deeply touched by the unprecedented and heartfelt expressions of love and loss from ordinary people. She had said she wanted to be a “princess for the world.” The world’s sorrow for her untimely death made it undeniably clear that she was, indeed, “the people’s princess,” as Tony Blair had so eloquently called her. On that mournful day, her lonely path away from royal convention had been completely vindicated.
But the cost had been too high.
”
”
Mary Robertson (The Diana I Knew: Loving Memories of the Friendship Between an American Mother and Her Son's Nanny Who Became the Princess of Wales)
“
He studied what he'd long avoided, and there was now no detail obscured, no truth denied. Here he stood in the cold light of eternity, and by some magic greater than chromaturgy, all that was wretched and self-deprecatory and judgmental and hating fell away like a serpent's scale from his eye.
He had seen through Orholam's mask of being an old prophet, and beheld something ineffably beguiling beneath the old prophet's age spots and deep wrinkles and snaggle teeth.
And now he saw something of that same beauty in himself, an image of the divine.
Here was Dazen Guile through the eyes of charity.
And as unwilling tears flooded his eyes, he realized that —wonder of wonders!—he was glorious.
”
”
Brent Weeks (The Burning White (Lightbringer, #5))
“
This tendency of scapegoating to occur on a collective level can have dangerous consequences for a society. Those unwilling, or unable, to face up to their shadows, are easy prey for collectivist movements which have ready-made scapegoats in the form of political opponents, members of different ethnic groups or socioeconomic classes. Scapegoating at the level of collectives, or in other words projecting our problems on to groups of people who differ from us, proves attractive for several reasons. It allows us to avoid the damage to our personal relationships which occurs when we use someone close to us as a scapegoat. Furthermore, given that our interactions with members of the scapegoated group are usually limited, we do not risk awakening to the realization that these people are not nearly like the distorted image of them we hold in our psyche. Scapegoating at a group level is made easier by the fact that those in the scapegoated group, being composed of individuals with their own weaknesses and flaws, may in fact behave in ways that provide legitimate reasons for indignation.
”
”
Academy of Ideas
“
I suppose, Maurice thought, there is no personal immortality! All that remained of his father was this vivid image in his own mind, in Rhoda's, in his mother's; less vivid in the minds of others, but alive still in an incident, a word, a gesture that had left its print. Here on the end of the club fender his father had sat twelve months ago, intervening in a dispute that was growing heated, laughing at the two disputants, making them laugh unwillingly. Once he had looked across at Maurice, and smiled, sharing the absurdity. Maurice had loved him at that moment, because he was never pompous, did not take offence, never stood upon his own dignity, saw clear. And all that remained of that living, breathing figure on the end of the club fender was the memory growing fainter, like a ripple of sound spreading out in widening rings through the air.
”
”
Lettice Cooper (The New House)