OUT OF THE WRECKAGE by GEORGE MONBIOT

"Monbiot's narrative is a great start, it makes me feel more hopeful and optimistic about the political future of the United States, and I feel motivated to get more involved with politics myself" " It is designed to encourage those of us on the Left that have been looking for a way to repackage our message." "...Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of ..." 등 나라마다 평이 좀 다르지만 영국에서는 비교적 호의적인거 같다. 내용이 좀 어려울 수도 있지만 학구적이고 재밌는 내용들이 많다, 정치에 관심이 없는 사람일 수록 이 책을 읽으면 좋을듯 싶다. 더욱이 현대 사회를 이해하는데 중요한 책들중 하나인 것 같다. 저자는 이 책을 다음과 같이 정리하고 있다. "This book has sought to tell a story of hope and restoration, a story that might help to light a path toward a better world. Its purpose is to reveal the defining aspects of our nature. It seeks to revive our humanity - in both senses of this word." 그리고 핵심어는 story, belonging, fellowship, cometition, individualism, alienation, newliberalism, loneliness, community, participation, altruism, connected 등 이다.

 

- Stories are the means by which we navigate the world.

- People may hold information in the form of data and figures, but their beliefs about it are help entirely in the form of stories.

- Drawing on experimental work, Marshall shows that, even when people have been told something is fictitious, they will cling to it if it makes a good story and they have heard it often enough.

- People often angrily deny facts that clash with the narrative 'truth' established in their minds.

- Effective stories tend to possess a number of common elements. They are easy to understand. They can be briefly summarised and quickly memorised. They are internally consistent.

- Facts, evidence, values, beliefs : stories conquer all.

- Despair is the state we fall into when our imagination fails.

- Without a new story, a story that is positive and propositional rather than reactive and oppositional, nothing changes.

- Intrinsically motivated people are more open to change, have a stronger interest in universal rights and equality, and a stronger desire to protect ......

- Surveys of both children and adults reveal that the value which tends to be favoured above all others is what psychologists call 'benevolence' .....

- If people perceive others to be mostly extrinsically motivated, they are less likely to vote in elections.

- If our purpose is to create a kinder world, we should embed within the political story we tell the intrinsic values that promote this aim : empathy, understanding, connectedness, with other people, self-acceptance, independent thought and action.

- The lesson religion has to teach politics is : first, know your values ; then evangelise then in the form of powerful narratives.

- Social contact reduces physical pain. This is why we hug our children when they hurt themselves.

- The trend towards social breakdown is driven by the dominant political narrative of our times.

- Comeptition and individualism are the values at the heart of the twenty-first century's secular religion.

- The loss of common purpose leads in turn to a loss of belief in ourselves as a force for change.

- The anger that cannot be answered through policy will be turned outwards, towards other nations.

- Neoliberalism, like many successful political narratives, provides not only a set of economic or political ideas, but also an account of who we are and how we behave ....

- So pervasive has neoliberalism become that we seldom even recognise it as an ideology.

- Louis Brandeis : We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both ....

- George Bernard Shaw famously remarked that 'all professions are conspiracies against the laity'

- .... arrogance was matched only by their ignorance ....

- The philosopher Byung-Chul Han ; ....... this also means that class struggle has become an internal struggle with oneself ......

- Entertainment can also alienate us from each other ...

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