"Immature people falling in love destroy each other’s freedom, create a bondage, make a prison. Mature persons in love help each other to be free; they help each other to destroy all sorts of bondages. And when love flows with freedom there is beauty. When love flows with dependence there is ugliness.
A mature person does not fall in love, he or she rises in love. Only immature people fall; they stumble and fall down in love. Somehow they were managing and standing. Now they cannot manage and they cannot stand. They were always ready to fall on the ground and to creep. They don’t have the backbone, the spine; they don’t have the integrity to stand alone.
A mature person has the integrity to stand alone. And when a mature person gives love, he or she gives without any strings attached to it. When two mature persons are in love, one of the great paradoxes of life happens, one of the most beautiful phenomena: they are together and yet tremendously alone. They are together so much that they are almost one. Two mature persons in love help each other to become more free. There is no politics involved, no diplomacy, no effort to dominate. Only freedom and love."
Osho (via electrichoney)
(via fuckyeahexistentialism)
(Source: crimesagainsthughsmanatees)
(via legitimusmaximus)
"The upshot for all this for teens is simple: your lives suck a little more thanks to increased police presence and surveillance. If you’re in one of those poor schools dominated by cops, you could be prosecuted as a criminal just by acting out, so it’s probably safest not to engage with anything—just keep your head down and your mouth shut and try to get through it. […]
So until the adults can figure out a way to get the prison-industrial complex in check, try not to do anything whatsoever, OK?"
Harry Cheadle, “We need to stop arresting so many children”
You’ve likely heard the story of Kiera Wilmot, a high school student who was charged with a felony for doing a science experiment which caused a loud noise, some smoke, and no damage to anyone’s person or property. It took a petition with nearly 200,000 signatures to bring sanity to Kiera’s case, but she’s off the hook and will be going back to school.
Unfortunately, this isn’t an isolated incident. Cheadle’s article lists a number of cases of teenagers pulling pretty harmless — albeit stupid — pranks or just generally being dumb kids on the internet and receiving serious charges as a result, e.g. being charged with a felony for making threats on Instagram. Instagram.
Yes, wrong or stupid behavior shouldn’t be ignored because the prankster is a kid — but handing out felony charges for science experiments and online threats is beyond overreaction. (Not to mention, it’s highly impractical. Are we going to arrest half the internet?)
There’s a difference between being tough on crime and being stupid. I’ll let you figure out which category Kiera’s case and others like it fall into.
Definitely read Cheadle’s whole article here.
(via hipsterlibertarian)