UNESCO on cultural diversity > 02/04/04

In the UNESCO Declaration of Cultural Diversity it is stated that “cultural diversity is the common heritage of humankind.” As cultural diversity is not a static but a continuously changing process, we need to preserve records both for the future and for diversity to thrive in intercultural dialogue. The future evolves from history and without profound understanding of the past, there is no understanding of the now.

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defenders of ‘culture’ > 06/11/03

Defenders of [bourgeois] culture always step to the fore when the backbone of its culture is shaken by novelty, difference, other modes of discourse. ––––– I remember a satirical drawing of three professors of high learning boiling feminism, deconstruction and cultural studies in a witches’ kettle –––––

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soaps & self-esteem > 02/10/03

Read in the paper the other day that women's self-esteem is not increased by breast implants. Insightful - how do they arrive at such insights? Implants and other cosmetic surgery remind me of Cinderella's ugly and wicked sisters maiming themselves to fit into Cinderella's shoes, desperately seeking the Prince's approval - a happy foreverafter. And cosmetics - be it a pill, an injection, an incision or an implant - is still nothing but cosmetics - cosmetics of social approval.

idealism & ignorance > 13/09/03

Political idealism and psychological illiteracy tend to go hand and in hand - both eschew reality - the reality of the world and the reality of being human. 

Idealism is perhaps what a crude world needs, but naivety is its neighbour.