My education was dominated by modernist thinkers and artists who taught me that the supreme imperative was courage to face the awful truth, to scorn the soft-minded optimism of religious and secular romantics as well as the corrupt optimism of… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
What cultural revolutionaries do not seem to grasp is that, far from being a grass-roots art form that has been taken over by businessmen, rock itself comes from the commercial exploitation of the blues. — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
You don't have to be Sigmund Freud to surmise that war has a perverse appeal for the human race, nor is the attraction limited… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
For democrats, it's as crucial to defend secular culture as to preserve secular law. And in fact the two projects are inseparable: When religion… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
Some conservatives have expressed outrage that the views of professors are at odds with the views of students, as if ideas were entitled to… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
For the most part, Americans speak of culture and politics as if they were two separate realms. — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
Mass consumption, advertising, and mass art are a corporate Frankenstein; while they reinforce the system, they also undermine it. By continually pushing the message… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
My education was dominated by modernist thinkers and artists who taught me that the supreme imperative was courage to face the awful truth, to… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
The public's continuing ambivalence about cultural matters is all the more striking given that the political conversation on these issues has for 30 years… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
Music that boldly and aggressively laid out what the singer wanted, loved, hated — as good rock ’n’ roll did — challenged me to… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
Individuals bearing witness do not change history; only movements that understand their social world can do that. Movements encourage solidarity; the moral individual is… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
Whatever their limitations, Freud and Marx developed complex and subtle theories of human nature grounded in their observation of individual and social behavior. The… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
The drug war has nothing to do with making communities livable or creating a decent future for black kids. On the contrary, prohibition is… — Ellen Willis Copy Share Image
