Dexter Filkins quotes

  • The most basic barrier was language itself, very few Americans in Iraq whether soldiers or diplomats or news paper reporters could speak more than a few words of Arabic. A remarkable number of them didn't even have translators. That meant for many Iraqis the typical 19 year old army corporal from South Dakota was not a youthful innocent carrying Americas good will, he was a terrifying combination of firepower and ignorance.
    -- Dexter Filkins

    #Ignorance #Army #Years

  • Three minutes thought would suffice to find this out; but thought is irksome and three minutes is a long time.

  • The ground for taking ignorance to be restrictive of freedom is that it causes people to make choices which they would not have made if they had seen what the realization of their choices involved.

  • It is strictly and philosophically true in Nature and reason that there is no such thing as chance or accident; it being evident that these words do not signify anything really existing, anything that is truly an agent or the cause of any event; but they signify merely men's ignorance of the real an immediate cause.

  • Who but the Atman is capable of removing the bonds of ignorance, passion and self-interested action?

  • I believe in the forgiveness of sin and the redemption of ignorance.

  • The great armies, accumulated to provide security and preserve the peace, carried the nations to war by their own weight.

  • The bottom line is the Kiss Army is growing by leaps and bounds.

  • Besides the progress of industry and technique, we see a growing discontent among the masses; we see, besides the expansion ("expansion,", Fr.) of instruction, distrust and hatred expanding among nations ("s'étendre la méfiance et la haine entre," Fr.), that vie with one another ("qui rivalisent à l'envi," Fr.), by the increase of their armies and the improvement of their engines of murder ("engins meurtriers", Fr.).

  • The year showed me beyond a doubt that everyone practices cafeteria religion... But the important lesson was this: there's nothing wrong with choosing. Cafeterias aren't bad per se... the key is in choosing the right dishes. You need to pick the nurturing ones (compassion), the healthy ones (love thy neighbor), not the bitter ones.

  • Med students panic their first year when they learn all the diseases. It's not until the second year that they learn the cures.