Tag: Albert Camus

Guest Post by Jeffrey Tucker

Jan Jakielek of the Epoch Times recently conducted an in-depth interview with Robert Kennedy, Jr., and asked him in particular about the relationship between truth seeking and suffering. Kennedy recalled a moment from his childhood when his father gave him a book to read. It was The Plague by Albert Camus, published in 1947. I can see how and why the son was well prepared to deal with the torments of our times.

For many people, these last 3 years was their first experience in a full denial of freedom. Locked in their homes. Prevented from traveling. Separated from loved ones. Forced to spend day after day wondering about big things previously unconsidered: why am I here, what are my goals, what is the purpose of my life?

Continue reading “Albert Camus on the Denial of Freedom”

“The time is almost here — and ignorance, falsehood, cruelty, greed and lust of power were never stronger in the hearts of any ruling class in history than they are in those who constitute the Invisible Government of America today. Day by day the money-masters of America become more aware of their danger, they draw together, they grow more class-conscious, more aggressive.

The [first world] war has taught them the possibilities of propaganda; it has accustomed them to the idea of enormous campaigns which sway the minds of millions and make them pliable to any purpose. American political corruption was the buying up of legislatures and assemblies to keep them from doing the people’s will and protecting the people’s interests; it was the exploiter entrenching himself in power, it was financial autocracy undermining and destroying political democracy.”

Upton Sinclair, The Brass Check, 1919

“Booms start with some tie-in to reality, some reason which justifies the increase in asset values, and then — and this is the critical feature of speculative mood — the market loses touch with reality.”

John Kenneth Galbraith

“A country that tolerates evil means—evil manners, standards of ethics—for a generation, will be so poisoned that it never will have any good end.”

Sinclair Lewis, It Can’t Happen Here

“Everyone knows that plagues have a way of recurring throughout history, yet somehow we find it hard to believe in the ones that crash down on us out of the sky. There have always been plagues and wars, yet they always take us by surprise. When war breaks out people say it’s stupid and won’t last long. Stupidity has a knack of getting in the way, which we would see if not wrapped up in ourselves. In this our townsfolk were like everybody else— they did not believe in plagues.”

Albert Camus, The Plague

“The point of modern propaganda isn’t only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth.”

Garry Kasparov

“While the Senate goes on break during a deadly pandemic, they’re telling us peasants to go back to work, because the billionaires need more billions.

Some of you will die, but that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”

Oliver Markus Malloy

“There have been as many plagues as wars in history; yet always plagues and wars take people equally by surprise. Stupidity has a knack of getting its way; as we should see if we were not always so much wrapped up in ourselves. In this respect our townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves; in other words they were human: they did not believe in plagues.”

Albert Camus, The Plague

“Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.”

John Milton, Paradise Lost

“Unlimited power in the hands of limited people always leads to cruelty.”

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

“Nature doesn’t ask your permission; it does not care about your wishes, or whether you like its laws or not. You’re obliged to accept it as it is, and consequently all of its consequences as well.”

Fyodor Dostoevsky

“Foolishness has a knack of getting its way; as we should see if we were not always so much wrapped up in ourselves. In this respect our townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves; they did not believe in plagues.”

Albert Camus