To hide or dissemble Fact: The birth agonies of the New IRS led to one of the great and terrible PR discoveries in modern democracy, which is that if sensitive issues of governance can be made sufficiently dull and arcane, there will be no need for officials to hide or dissemble, because no one not directly involved will pay enough attention to cause trouble. David Foster Wallace, The Pale King secretsgovernment
We infantilize ourselves Here in the US, we expect government and law to be our conscience. Our superego, you could say. It has something to do with liberal individualism, and something to do with capitalism, but I don't understand much of the theoretical aspect—what I see is what I live in. Americans are in a way crazy. We infantilize ourselves. We don't think of ourselves as citizens—parts of something larger to which we have profound responsibilities. We think of ourselves as citizens when it comes to our rights and privileges, but not our responsibilities. We abdicate our civic responsibilities to the government and expect the government, in effect, to legislate morality. David Foster Wallace, The Pale King societygovernmentpoliticsmoralitycivics
But what do you want to say? An Article by Ralph Ammer ralphammer.com Pablo Picasso famously said: “The world doesn’t make sense, so why should I paint pictures that do?” A sensible approach to something that can’t be explained is to express it. Rather than giving you explanations or “saying something”, most artists are concerned with what I like to call “room for interpretation”. They create platforms that trigger thoughts, feelings, emotions, and ideas. Instead of trying to explain the inexplicable artists express their view of it. They don’t want to tell you what to think, they invite you to respond. Making sense artemotion