Nicole (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
trickykitty) wrote2012-01-29 08:34 pm
trickykitty) wrote2012-01-29 08:34 pm
Entry tags:
The Losers
Favorite quotes from my latest reading book.
In Raphael's private place he told himself that he really had no business being there. 'Bel and Flood were aliens to him - bright, beautiful, and totally meaningless. With a kind of startled perception he saw that sophisticated people are sophisticated for that very reason. Meaningless people have to be sophisticated, because they have nothing else.
-----
Quillian looked at him for a moment. "Be careful out there, Taylor. The world isn't set up for people like us. Don't fall down - not in front of strangers."
"We all fall down once in a while."
"Sure," Quillian admitted, "but those bastards out there'll just walk around you, and you can't get up again without help."
-----
"Haven't you ever noticed? Social workers all smell like rotting flesh - the same way vultures do, and probably for the same reason."
"What greater power can you have than to be able to make somebody not only do what you tell him to but think what you tell him to as well?"
"Their magic word is 'programs.' They've got programs for everything, and every program is based on thought control."
"Johnny can't read because his teachers are too worried about his 'relationships,' and their major tool is 'the group.' Modern Americans are sheep. They herd up by instinct. You won't find no Lone Rangers out there no more, Kimo Sabe. Peer pressure, bay-bee, peer pressure. That's the club they use. Americans would sooner die than do anything that runs counter to the wishes of the peer group."
"You can cure somebody of anything if you put him in a cult and grind off all his individuality and alienate him from such distractions as friends, families, wives - little things like that."
"Social workers [need clients] willing to sit around and talk about their problems rather than do something about them. If somebody actually does something about his problems, he doesn't need a social worker anymore. That's the real purpose of all the programs. They want to keep the poor sucker from really addressing his problems. If he does that, he'll probably solve it, and then he gets away."
-----
She shrugged, and Raphael almost ground his teeth at the futility of the gesture. Indifference was the first symptom of that all-prevalent disease that infested the streets below. If she was to be salvaged, that would have to be attacked first.
-----
"Anomalies, Frankie. Your course didn't teach you about anomalies - probably because they shoot statistical theory in the butt."
"Explain."
"An anomaly is an unpredictable event. ... Statistics are used to predict things. Your profession is almost totally dependent on an ability to predict what's going to happen to people, isn't it? ... I'm not a basket case because I'm an anomaly. I beat the odds."
"But the question is how. If I could find out how you did it, maybe I could use it to help other people."
"How does sheer, pigheaded stubbornness grab you?"
-----
Although he had used the word "cripple" in describing himself to the officer he'd just talked with, he realized that it was probably no longer true. Somehow, somewhere during the last summer, he had without realizing it crossed that line Quillian had told him about. He was no longer a cripple, but rather was simply a man who happened to have only one leg.
-----
The Indian bent, picked up the crutches, and handed them to Raphael. "Are you all right now?" he asked, his voice very soft, and his single dark eye searching Raphael's face.
"Yes," Raphael said. "Thanks."
"Are you sure?"
Raphael drew in a deep breath. "Yes. I think everything's fine now. I just got careless, that's all. I should know better."
"Everybody falls now and then," Patch said in his soft voice. "It's not just you. The important thing is not to let it throw you, make you afraid."
"I know. It took me a long time to figure that out, but I think I've got it now."
"Good. You'll be okay then." The brown hand touched his shoulder briefly, and then Patch turned and silently went on down the street.
Raphael stood leaning against his car watching that solitary passage until the dark-faced man was out of sight and the street was empty again.
In Raphael's private place he told himself that he really had no business being there. 'Bel and Flood were aliens to him - bright, beautiful, and totally meaningless. With a kind of startled perception he saw that sophisticated people are sophisticated for that very reason. Meaningless people have to be sophisticated, because they have nothing else.
-----
Quillian looked at him for a moment. "Be careful out there, Taylor. The world isn't set up for people like us. Don't fall down - not in front of strangers."
"We all fall down once in a while."
"Sure," Quillian admitted, "but those bastards out there'll just walk around you, and you can't get up again without help."
-----
"Haven't you ever noticed? Social workers all smell like rotting flesh - the same way vultures do, and probably for the same reason."
"What greater power can you have than to be able to make somebody not only do what you tell him to but think what you tell him to as well?"
"Their magic word is 'programs.' They've got programs for everything, and every program is based on thought control."
"Johnny can't read because his teachers are too worried about his 'relationships,' and their major tool is 'the group.' Modern Americans are sheep. They herd up by instinct. You won't find no Lone Rangers out there no more, Kimo Sabe. Peer pressure, bay-bee, peer pressure. That's the club they use. Americans would sooner die than do anything that runs counter to the wishes of the peer group."
"You can cure somebody of anything if you put him in a cult and grind off all his individuality and alienate him from such distractions as friends, families, wives - little things like that."
"Social workers [need clients] willing to sit around and talk about their problems rather than do something about them. If somebody actually does something about his problems, he doesn't need a social worker anymore. That's the real purpose of all the programs. They want to keep the poor sucker from really addressing his problems. If he does that, he'll probably solve it, and then he gets away."
-----
She shrugged, and Raphael almost ground his teeth at the futility of the gesture. Indifference was the first symptom of that all-prevalent disease that infested the streets below. If she was to be salvaged, that would have to be attacked first.
-----
"Anomalies, Frankie. Your course didn't teach you about anomalies - probably because they shoot statistical theory in the butt."
"Explain."
"An anomaly is an unpredictable event. ... Statistics are used to predict things. Your profession is almost totally dependent on an ability to predict what's going to happen to people, isn't it? ... I'm not a basket case because I'm an anomaly. I beat the odds."
"But the question is how. If I could find out how you did it, maybe I could use it to help other people."
"How does sheer, pigheaded stubbornness grab you?"
-----
Although he had used the word "cripple" in describing himself to the officer he'd just talked with, he realized that it was probably no longer true. Somehow, somewhere during the last summer, he had without realizing it crossed that line Quillian had told him about. He was no longer a cripple, but rather was simply a man who happened to have only one leg.
-----
The Indian bent, picked up the crutches, and handed them to Raphael. "Are you all right now?" he asked, his voice very soft, and his single dark eye searching Raphael's face.
"Yes," Raphael said. "Thanks."
"Are you sure?"
Raphael drew in a deep breath. "Yes. I think everything's fine now. I just got careless, that's all. I should know better."
"Everybody falls now and then," Patch said in his soft voice. "It's not just you. The important thing is not to let it throw you, make you afraid."
"I know. It took me a long time to figure that out, but I think I've got it now."
"Good. You'll be okay then." The brown hand touched his shoulder briefly, and then Patch turned and silently went on down the street.
Raphael stood leaning against his car watching that solitary passage until the dark-faced man was out of sight and the street was empty again.