Structured Society Quotes

The worst enemy of life, freedom and the common decencies is total anarchy; their second worst enemy is total efficiency.

Civilization is a progress from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity toward a definite, coherent heterogeneity.

The word 'freedom' means for me not a point of departure but a genuine point of arrival. The point of departure is defined by the word 'order.' Freedom cannot exist without the concept of order.

People had been working for so many years to make the world a safe, organized place. Nobody realized how boring it would become. With the whole world property-lined and speed-limited and zoned and taxed and regulated, with everyone tested and registered and adressed and recorded. Nobody had left much room for adventure, except maybe the kind you could buy. [...] The laws that keep us safe, these same laws condemn us to boredom.

New Orleans could not be further removed from where I am from. I come from Holland, where everything is perfectly arranged - it's neat; there's no real crime. There's a very strong middle class. Then you get dumped in New Orleans - just the funkiest city, crazy problems, but also street culture unlike anywhere in the States.

Now, there's a desire for order, authority coming from a feeling that society has gone too far to the side of individualism and liberalism.

What drew me to conservatism years ago was the fact that it gave discipline a slightly higher status than virtue. This meant it could not be subverted by passing notions of the good.