Sheri S. Tepper

Quotes

1. “I know so little,” she murmured.

   “Better admit you are up to your neck in ignorance than stand upon a pinnacle of misinformation,” he said firmly.

   p. 258

2. 

   Many men of importance were gathered there to be seen talking with other men of importance, resulting in an abundance of conspicuous but immaterial discourse.

   p. 40

3. 

   Janet snarled, “Nell, who made you the arbiter of what’s Right and wrong or wrong?”

   Nell thumped the table. “I’m not making a moral judgment, I’m making a pragmatic one! Before the Happening, the world was full of people, and we were using up the Earth’s resources at a fantastic rate. Somehow we felt we’d find some other world before we used up this one, and going to space was a spectator sport. That game’s over. We’re not going anywhere! Therefore, all the attitudes that led to use-up-the-world-and-leave-it-behind are wrong for us, and whatever attitudes keep the Earth fit for what people and animals are left is right for us, and I defy you to come up with any better definition.”

   p. 226

4. 

   The sooner we can separate salvageable skeptics from self-righteous absolutists, the sooner we can move along.

   p. 464

5. 

   Sacrifice for sacrifice’s sake does no one any good!

   p. 65

6. 

   She had grown through loss and confusion into a girl who lived almost entirely inside her head, taking refuge in the places she created there, not so much repulsed by others’ reality as unable to perceive it.

   p. 57

7. 

   “A lot of things they speak of doing are things many humans have wanted to do but have never been able to muster a mandate to get them done. Things like legalizing drugs to take out the profit motive. Or paying teachers the way we do athletes, depending on how effective they are. Or getting rid of weapons whose only purpose is to kill people.”

   “Is a mandate necessary?”

   “If you’re going to overcome an economic incentive, yes.”

   “Logic has no part?”

   “No part at all. People can see the problem, they’re not stupid, but they can’t influence the legislators the way money can. Even when bad situations go on and on until the people are desperate for a correction, even when they threaten legislators with voting them out, the money still prevails.”

   “It is hard for me to see how this could happen.”

   Chad said, “The legislators react to a problem by writing a law, let’s say to put repeat drunk drivers in jail. The liquor industry objects, because they don’t like a lot of discussion about drunkenness, it hurts their image. The legislators react by amending the law to create a commission to study how best to jail drunk drivers. Then, when the budget bills come along, they fund only the commission. The appointees to the commission include representatives of the liquor industry.

   “This allows the legislators to claim success, because the law got voted in. The liquor industry also claims success, because they made sure the law won’t work.

   “The next step is to hire a lot of people to work for the commission, many of whom are also liquor industry supporters, and the commission begins to issue long, complicated, vaguely pointless reports. Now, however, there are jobs involved, and legislators can’t get rid of jobs, even useless ones.

   “Then, repeatedly, the lawmakers amend the law further, tweaking this and changing that, but always adding more jobs—until we have a bureaucratic monstrosity that’s in the business of helping the liquor industry prevent legislation against drunk drivers. That’s the way our Forestry Service got to be owned by the lumbermen, and our DEA got to be owned by the drug cartels, welfare got to be owned by a social work hierarchy, and schools got to be owned by professional educationalists. None of them work, because that’s not what they’re designed to do.”

   p. 438

8. 

   We are to be needed, but I'm not sure for what.

   p. 42

9. 

   Personal beliefs are unarguable, even if the other side has all the facts.

   p. 51

10. 

    I’ve come to believe, from experience and reading and what I’ve learned on the outside, that the Regime—I suppose really, one might say any regime—is rather like a pot of porridge. If vigorously stirred every now and then, it can be a nourishing if not always tasty staple, but if left on the heat unstirred for some time it becomes increasing stodgy. If left untended, it can char into an immovable solid, like coal.

    Thereafter, it is incapable of being stirred, incapable of providing nourishment. When a regime is like that, citizens have to resort to bribery or lawbreaking to do quite necessary things like digging wells or fixing roads, thus joining corruption to congealment.

    p. 293

11. 

    Each race creates its own devils. You had so many that they specialized. Devils of racial hatred, devils of greed and violence. Devils who killed their own people in orgies of blood. Devils who bombed clinics, devils who bombed school buses, devils who bombed other devils. I got to know every one of them by name. As soon as I arrived, I sent my monsters out to kill them all. They had tarnished my reputation, and though I have lavished much care on mankind, vengeance is mine.

    p. 458

12. 

    The sergeant was braver than most, and stupider—the two qualities often going hand in hand.

    p. 364