the argument used by negationist politicians who claim that scientists act for political ends is remarkably interesting. A surreal inversion is established, where we believe dishonest scientists do politics, and honest politicians do science – a belief that is only possible in a dystopian and intentionally uninformed society.

— Marcos A. Raposo, Postmodern Flames in Brazil

There’s nothing in the world more difficult than candor, and nothing easier than flattery. If there is only the hundredth part of a false note in candor, there is immediately a dissonance, and then—scandal. But with flattery, even if everything is false down to the last little note, it is still agreeable and is listened to not without pleasure; crude though the pleasure may be, it is still a pleasure.

— Fyodor Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment

A hundred times I was upon the point of killing myself; but still I loved life. This ridiculous foible is perhaps one of our most fatal characteristics; for is there anything more absurd than to wish to carry continually a burden which one can always throw down? to detest existence and yet to cling to one’s existence? in brief, to caress the serpent which devours us, till he has eaten our very heart?

— Voltaire, Candide

…public school systems where students of all social classes were made to get up and march from room to room each hour at the sound of a bell, an arrangement self-consciously designed to train children for future lives of paid factory labor.

— David Graeber, Bullshit Jobs

…if you include the very people who will be affected in your decision-making process, change management becomes unimportant.

— Jim Whitehurst and Gary Hamel, The Open Organization