Syllogisms of apathy

• If one is not virtuous oneself, one can still profit from the virtue of others.
  
• There is no such thing as the golden mean. Moderation in all things is a recipe for mindless consumption. Drinking in moderation is unentertaining compared to drunkenness and uneconomical compared to sobriety.
  
• Politics is the process of establishing who's going to impose whose will on whom, or at least of establishing who thinks who's going to impose whose will on whom.
  
• Leadership is a talent exemplified by, among others, the fastest lemming.
  
• Self-righteousness: The common form of righteousness.
  
• If your knowledge of Italy came entirely from Italian television, you'd believe all Italian women were blondes.
  
• Fortune favours the fortunate.
  
• If we were ever privileged to be shown The Truth, we'd be too embarrassed to believe it.
  
• We no longer believe that suffering ennobles, but instead believe that it profits.
  
• Orderly habits are the sign of a disorderly mind.
  
• People make fun of the superstitious, but believe that a well-dressed person is trustworthy, and a beautiful one admirable.
  
• Reading allows us to live vicariously in a fantasy world other than the fantasy world we actually live in. Its chief function is to distract. People don't remember what they read, they don't think about it, they don't apply it in their lives – they don't even follow instructions. Perhaps it's because they've tried doing all these things.
  
• The chief problem with luck is figuring out which is the good and which the bad.
  
• Adoption is a process by which, instead of redistributing income, we redistribute children.
  
• People seem to feel compelled to offer a justification for their actions, but not to examine it.
  
• Euphemism is the politeness of the condescending.
  
• Since we can't tell the truth to ourselves, how can we be expected to tell it to others?
  
• Insecurity is the belief that one's life, to be successful, must be guided by something other than common decency.

Syllogisms of Apathy © John FitzGerald, 2005