"We look at past ages with condescension, as a mere preparation for us; but what if we are a mere after-glow of them?"

J. G. Farrell

“Apart from the massacres, deaths, and famines for which communism was responsible, the worst aspect of the system was the official lying—that is to say, the lying in which everyone was forced to take part, whether by repetition, assent, or failure to contradict.

I came to the conclusion that the purpose of propaganda in communist countries was not to persuade, much less to inform, but to humiliate and emasculate. In this sense, the less true it was, the less it corresponded in any way to reality, the better. The more it contradicted the experience of the persons to whom it was directed, the more docile, self-despising, and impotent they became for their failure to protest.”
—Theodore Dalrymple, The Wilder Shores of Marx: Journeys in a Vanishing World

Image: Blindman's Buff by Alexander Melamid & Vitaly Komar