Posts
"You can have an affection for a murderer or a sodomite, but you cannot have an affection for a man whose breath stinks - habitually stinks, I mean."
George Orwell
"I have never come across anyone in whom the moral sense was dominant who was not heartless, cruel, vindictive, log-stupid and entirely lacking in the smallest sense of humanity."
Oscar Wilde
“America solves problems, Europe manages them...”
John Bolton
“Let’s be clear: Transgender equality is the civil rights issue of our time. There is no room for compromise when it comes to basic human rights.”
New York Times
George Orwell
Oscar Wilde
“America solves problems, Europe manages them...”
John Bolton
“Let’s be clear: Transgender equality is the civil rights issue of our time. There is no room for compromise when it comes to basic human rights.”
Joe Biden on Saturday on Twitter.
"If we have to move into a post-Christian crisis of meaning in the West, and it looks like that’s inevitable, picking up off the shelf the tested wisdom of the pre-Christian world is a better bet than looking to be guided by nebulous nostrums dreamed up in 2014." Gareth Roberts article, Unherd.
"One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny."
Bertrand Russell
"One of the more shocking things about the recent influx of what the political and media classes insist upon calling “the new Irish” is that it is we, the native Irish, who are expected to integrate. Not only are we not entitled to make demands of people who come to Ireland, frequently illegally—for example, that they respect our laws, ways, and culture—but we, it seems, must collapse our own culture lest the “new Irish” take offense. We have been told that crucifixes in hospitals must be removed, and that schools must end all Christian prayers and practices. Politicians are now unashamedly speaking about “hate speech” legislation to subdue any lingering criticism of controversial governmental policies. Multiculturalism means the mandatory dismantling of the rights, laws, and ways of the host culture, the de-Irishing of Ireland." John Waters article in First Things
"One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny."
Bertrand Russell
New York Times
"There is no room for compromise when it comes to basic human rights"
ReplyDeleteIt's amazing how these basic human rights seem to change as often as ladies' fashions. You'd think the if these really were basic human rights they'd be unchanging. It's also amazing how brand new basic human rights, the existence of which had never previously been suspected, can suddenly get discovered.
Exactly! My own thought every day. How can capital punishment or discrimination against homosexuals violate fundamental European values when these things were enshrined in law in many European countries when the EEC was founded? I have always been rather opposed to capital punishment or victimising homosexuals, just so you know, and strongly opposed to homosexuality being illegal.
DeleteDefinitions of human rights evolve. It used to be perfectly normal to keep slaves and to forbid women from voting and owning property. That changed.
ReplyDeleteI think the problem arises from speed and disorientation. New rights emerge and consensus comes together (often with the help of social media) with large tranches of the population feeling as though they did not take part in the discussion or even having been aware there was a discussion taking place.