Word: evens
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...crowd of eager peasants. “Jacobins kill for it!” This violent passion in Danton’s early days finds a corollary in his sexual appetite. An unabashed patron of whorehouses, the Revolutionary leader immerses himself fully in the sensual pleasures of life, even cheekily noting, “What a bore it is to have to put on pants each day,” as he zips up his trousers from yet another illicit romp...
...declaring, “We didn’t make the Revolution—the Revolution made us.” Originally a haphazardly charismatic character, Danton grows embittered when his initial quests for pleasure through women and wine start to feel like the listless idles of a cynic. Even in his final hours, Danton proves remotely unmoved by his impending demise; he reflectively admits one dark night, “I am merely flirting with death—it’s all empty noise, bravado.” Clark portrays this shift in Danton’s character...
...fight and end their lives—have also garnered national media attention. Here it’s clearest that the community of citizens within liberal democracy becomes a house divided over the question of whether society should leave man free to destroy himself. This difficult question forces an even more difficult choice between liberty and limit...
Very few countries, such as Belgium and the Netherlands, have chosen the former option on a nationwide level, and here in the U.S., Washington and Oregon have followed suit. But even without such drastic permissiveness, there is a link between Fukuyama’s predicted champion, liberal democracy, and a rejection of constraint. A democracy that attempts to retain any sense of right and wrong beyond the obvious indicators of injury and illness faces an uphill battle in light of this aversion of conflict...
...culture wars in the U.S. are a good example of the more general societal conflict over whether time’s arrow points the way toward a world that is good or, for that matter, happy. Empirical studies give some indication that progress is not a recipe for satisfaction, even though citizens are freer—perhaps, at liberty to be as unhappy as they are unconstrained. Society might not be on the path that Fukuyama or the preceding picture suggests, but any reclamation of societal standards—such as those underlying monogamy or speech regulations—would...