[pp 82-83] The Corporate State has cast many aside, but especially the young. It has thwarted their dreams and condemned them to a life where the best many can hope for is a low-wage mind-numbing job in the service industry.... The despair, the stress, the sense of failure and loss of self-esteem, the constant anxiety of being laid off, the pressure of debt repayment, often from medical bills, is amplified in a society splintered and atomized to render real relationships and community difficult and often impossible. *Many people, especially the young, sit far too long in front of screens seeking friendship, romance, affirmation, hope and emotional support. This futile attempt to achieve a human connection electronically, vital to our emotional well-being especially in a society that condemns so many to the margins, exacerbates the alienation, loneliness and despair that make opioids attractive. (Chris Hedges)

[pp 82-83] The Corporate State has cast many aside, but especially the young. It has thwarted their dreams and condemned them to a life where the best many can hope for is a low-wage mind-numbing job in the service industry.... The despair, the stress, the sense of failure and loss of self-esteem, the constant anxiety of being laid off, the pressure of debt repayment, often from medical bills, is amplified in a society splintered and atomized to render real relationships and community difficult and often impossible. *Many people, especially the young, sit far too long in front of screens seeking friendship, romance, affirmation, hope and emotional support. This futile attempt to achieve a human connection electronically, vital to our emotional well-being especially in a society that condemns so many to the margins, exacerbates the alienation, loneliness and despair that make opioids attractive.

Chris Hedges

Related topics

affirmation alienation anxiety aside attempt attractive best cast community condemned connection constant corporate debt despair emotional failure far friendship front hope human impossible industry job lay life loneliness loss medical off people pressure real render repayment romance seeking self-esteem sense service sit society state stress support vital well-being young

Related quotes

Literary criticism should arise out of a debt of love. In a manner evident and yet mysterious, the poem or the drama or the novel seizes upon our imaginings. We are not the same when we put down the work as we were when we took it up. To borrow an image from another domain: he who has truly apprehended a painting by Cézanne will thereafter see an apple or a chair as he had not seen them before. Great works of art pass through us like storm-winds, flinging open the doors of perception, pressing upon the architecture of our beliefs with their transforming powers. We seek to record their impact, to put our shaken house in its new order. Through some primary instinct of communion we seek to convey to others the quality and force of our experience. We would persuade them to lay themselves open to it. In this attempt at persuasion originate the truest insights criticism can afford.
George Steiner
If the women but have little virtue, the jealousy of their husbands is extreme, and their revenge deadly and almost certain. A few inches of cold steel have been the punishment of many an unwary man, who has been guilty, perhaps, of nothing more than indiscretion. The difficulties of the attempt [to copulate with a married woman] are numerous, and the consequences of discovery fatal, in the better classes. With the unmarried women, too, great watchfulness is used. The main object of the parents is to marry their daughters well, and to this a fair name is necessary. The sharp eyes of a duena, and the ready weapons to a father or brother, are a protection which the characters of most of them - men and women - render by no means useless; for the very men who would lay down their lives to avenge the dishonor of their own family would risk the same lives to complete the dishonor of another.
Richard Henry Dana, Jr.
Some of the strongest supporters of the war declare that we are a Christian nation, yet use their religious beliefs to justify the war. They claim it is our Christian duty to remake the Middle East and attack the Muslim infidels. Evidently I have been reading from a different Bible. I remember something about "Blessed are the peacemakers.” My beliefs aside, Christian teaching of nearly a thousand years reinforces the concept of "The Just war theory.” This Christian theory emphasizes six criteria needed to justify Christian participation in war... The war in Iraq fails to meet almost all of these requirements. This discrepancy has generated anger and division within the Christian community. Some are angry because the war is being fought out of Christian duty, yet does not have uniform support from all Christians. Others are angry because they see Christianity as a religion as peace and forgiveness, not war and annihilation of enemies.
Ron Paul
Neither acquiescence in skepticism nor acquiescence in dogma is what education should produce. What it should produce is a belief that knowledge is attainable in a measure, though with difficulty; that much of what passes for knowledge at any given time is likely to be more or less mistaken, but that the mistakes can be rectified by care and industry. In acting upon our beliefs, we should be very cautious where a small error would mean disaster; nevertheless it is upon our beliefs that we must act. This state of mind is rather difficult: it requires a high degree of intellectual culture without emotional atrophy. But though difficult, it is not impossible; it is in fact the scientific temper. Knowledge, like other good things, is difficult, but not impossible; the dogmatist forgets the difficulty, the skeptic denies the possibility. Both are mistaken, and their errors, when widespread, produce social disaster.
Bertrand Russell
It is not necessary to stress the general desire of all the people of this country for the promotion of peace. It is the leading principle of all our foreign relations. We have on every occasion tried to cooperate to this end in all ways that were consistent with our proper independence and our traditional policies. It will be my constant effort to maintain these principles, and to reinforce them by all appropriate agreements and treaties. While we desire always to cooperate and to help, we are equally determined to be independent and free. Right and truth and justice and humanitarian efforts will have the moral support of this country all over the world. But we do not wish to become involved in the political controversies of others. Nor is the country disposed to become a member of the League of Nations or to assume the obligations imposed by its covenant.
Calvin Coolidge