“If there is no free speech, every single life has lived in vain”

A clear understanding of such differences will help the rest of the world understand China and all that is happening to the nation.

I also have to speak out for people around me who are afraid, who think it is not worth it or who have totally given up hope. So I want to set an example: you can do it and this is OK, to speak out.

The leadership knows that you cannot solve the issues of China’s future with the means of the past. The demographic consequences of the one-child policy, the build-up of the welfare state.

Without freedom of speech, there is no modern world, just a barbaric one.

I spend a lot of time talking to journalists.

In China, we don’t have any contemporary art museums. Until a few years ago, we didn’t even have a gallery.

The IT people who have made such an effort to know and understand computer technology. They are frustrated that you cannot use Facebook, Twitter and YouTube in China. They are the first to recognize that the situation is terrible.

China didn’t want to lose the cutting edge of technology. So the idea of having a Sina Weibo was an attempt to compete with Twitter. However, it has no soul – which is freedom of expression. Nevertheless,

It’s very essential values that we all have to protect. But in Chinese society, people are giving up on protecting these values.

I think Allen [Ginsberg] was a person who’s like a child.

A small act is worth a million thoughts.

It is to wonder about the world, to understand the nature of people and, most importantly, to be shared with another, old or young, known or unknown.

Somehow, we [ Tan Dun and director Chen Kaige] were all privileged at the time; we could be outside of China. But at the moment, we had no sense of what the future was going to be like.

Mass production is nothing new. Weren’t cathedrals built through mass production? The pyramids?

I’m just bringing them to Kassel to see the art show, and pay their room and board.

The purpose of art is the fight for freedom.

Never forget that for 250 years black people were born into chains-whole generations followed by more generations who knew nothing but chains.

Only indiscriminate love can make us free.

I have a free couple of hours,” i told him, walking toward my car, which was parked on the next block. “there’s a very private, very secluded barn in lookout hill park behind the carousel. I could be there in fifteen minutes.” i heard the smile in his voice. “you want me bad.

There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.

And the Buddha is the person who’s free: free of plans, free of cares.

I see the psychedelic experience as a birthright, and we can’t have a free society until people are free to explore their own mind.

The victim of mind-manipulation does not know that he is a victim. To him, the walls of his prison are invisible, and he believes himself to be free.

The press of Italy is free, freer than the press of any other country, so long as it supports the regime.