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Fear of Mirrors QUOTES

Fear of Mirrors QUOTES

1 " Belief! That was always a big problem. Marxism as a surrogate religion with its prophets and popes. Look where it has got us. You believe? You have no right to believe. You must not believe… "

― Tariq Ali , Fear of Mirrors

2 " Try and understand your parents, Karl. You owe us at least that much. I know you’re angry. You feel wounded. You think that Helge and I were obsessed with the Idea, that it finally imploded, and this has made you suspicious of all ideas. And yet you know full well that our Idea was not the DDR. You can make many criticisms of Marx, but to hold him responsible for our so-called socialist experiences is unfair. "

― Tariq Ali , Fear of Mirrors

3 " Vlady smiled to himself. He was fifty-six today. What had loomed in the distance like a giant iceberg had finally caught up with him, but he had survived the encounter. He was still alive. Despite everything, he had not thrown himself under a train. He was still there and that was enough reason to celebrate. "

― Tariq Ali , Fear of Mirrors

4 " Vlady did not like such arguments. The blind worship of accomplished facts always led to passivity. Why should one come to terms with the present? Such an attitude would never have brought down the Wall. He refused to accept what existed simply because happenings elsewhere were much worse. History became an alibi. It was a cursed history whose womb was producing tiny new republics. Monstrous creations. How could they be otherwise, deformed as they were by decades of unnatural confinement?
Men, women and children were living and dying for these new states. In the past they had done the same for the big empires, but with this difference: in the old days they had fought reluctantly and cynically. It could have been any old job. Today they went to war with a sullen obstinacy, their heads and bodies distorted by an intolerant zeal. It would end badly. Of this Vlady was sure. "

― Tariq Ali , Fear of Mirrors

5 " He had chosen the SPD like one chooses a football team. There is a simple rule. If you stick with your team through bad times, there is a reward sooner or later. "

― Tariq Ali , Fear of Mirrors