# Quote — Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Talents

> Overall, the Pox has had the effect of an installment-plan World War III. In fact, there were several small, bloody shooting wars going on around the world during the Pox. These were stupid affairs—wastes of life and treasure. They were fought, ostensibly, to defend against vicious foreign enemies. All too often, they were actually fought because inadequate leaders did not know what else to do. Such leaders knew that they could depend on fear, suspicion, hatred, need, and greed to arouse patriotic support for war.
>
> Amid all this, somehow, the United States of America suffered a major, nonmilitary defeat. It lost no important war, yet it did not survive the Pox. Perhaps it simply lost sight of what it once intended to be, then blundered aimlessly until it exhausted itself.

- Author: [Octavia E. Butler](https://www.leafyquotes.com/octavia-e-butler.md)
- Book: [Parable of the Talents](https://www.leafyquotes.com/octavia-e-butler/parable-of-the-talents.md)
- Page: 8
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Octavia_Butler#Parable_of_the_Talents_(1998)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/octavia-e-butler/parable-of-the-talents/overall-the-pox

## More from this book

> Consider—
>
> We are born
>
> Not with purpose,
>
> But with potential.

p. 1 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/octavia-e-butler/parable-of-the-talents/consider-we-are.md)

> Beware:
>
> Ignorance
>
> Protects itself
>
> Ignorance
>
> Promotes suspicion.
>
> Suspicion
>
> Engenders fear.
>
> Fear quails,
>
> Irrational and blind,
>
> Or fear looms,
>
> Defiant and closed.
>
> Blind, closed,
>
> Suspicious, afraid,
>
> Ignorance
>
> Protects itself,
>
> And protected,
>
> Ignorance grows.

p. 225 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/octavia-e-butler/parable-of-the-talents/beware-ignorance-protects.md)

> “I’m not a demagogue.”
>
> “That’s too bad. That leaves the field to people who are demagogues—to the Jarrets of the world. And there have always been Jarrets. Probably there always will be.”

p. 395 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/octavia-e-butler/parable-of-the-talents/im-not-a-demagogue.md)