Red Rising
On Fear and Risk We shouldn’t blame the enemy for winning if it’s the system that favors them. It’s the system that needs to be brought down or surpassed. Fear makes us maintain that system.
“I wonder if Uncle Narol and Barlow know how close we are. Probably. Probably just don’t think anything is ever worth the risk. Probably think divine intervention will squab our chances. Gamma has the Laurel. That’s the way things are and will ever be. We of Lambda just try to scrape by on our foodstuffs and meager comforts. No rising. No falling. Nothing is worth the risk of changing the hierarchy. My father found that out at the end of a rope.”
On Shame as Motivation Darrow’s shame of dying himself after Eo had high expectations is a powerful message. We usually think that we shouldn’t care what others think, but here the shame is eating him… and fueling him.
“Win. Bear the guilt. Reign.”
“I resent two of my teachers after overhearing their words: Mickey for thinking me weak; Dancer for thinking me his tool. Only Harmony doesn’t anger me… She is like me—brimming with a rage that makes all else so inconsequential.”
The Architecture of Control The Society isn’t just held together by force, but by distraction and dependence.
“Golds structure everything to make their own lives easier. They have shows produced to entertain and placate the masses. They give monies and handouts to make generations dependent on the seventh day of each new Earth month. They create goods to grant us a semblance of liberty. If violence is the Gold sport, manipulation is their art form.”
“Pixies have no self-control… They take in all the treats of power, but do pissall to merit them. They are born and they chase pleasure. … If there is a key to understanding Aureates, it is found in understanding control in all its forms. Eat the fish, leave twenty percent to indicate its deliciousness did not overpower my resolve or make slaves of my tastebuds.”
The Cycle of History Nero au Augustus on why Empires fall.
“Society has three stages: Savagery, Ascendance, Decadence. The great rise because of Savagery. They rule in Ascendance. They fall because of their own Decadence.”
“You think you know pain. You think the Society is an inevitable force of history. You think Her the end of history. But many have thought that before. Many ruling classes have believed theirs to be the last, the pinnacle. They grew soft. Fat. They forgot that calluses, wounds, scars, hardship, preserve all those fine pleasure clubs you young boys love to frequent.”