but ignorance is a kind of insanity in the human animal. People who delight in torturing defenseless children or tiny creatures are in reality insane. The terrible thing is that people who are madmen in private may wear a totally bland and innocent expression in public.
Interpretation
Ignorance can lead to inhumane behavior, masking true madness behind a facade of normalcy.
This quote by Akira Kurosawa explores the idea that ignorance can blind individuals to their own moral compass, leading to cruel actions towards innocent beings. It suggests that some people may hide their true nature under a guise of normalcy, making it difficult to recognize the insanity that lies beneath their surface. The quote challenges us to confront the darker aspects of human behavior and reflect on the societal implications of ignorance and inhumanity.
In practice
This quote can be used in discussions about moral responsibility in society.
Of all my films, people wrote to me most about this one... ...I had wanted to make The Idiot long before Rashomon. Since I was little I've liked Russian literature, but I find that I like Dostoevsky the best and had long thought that this book would make a wonderful film. He is still my favourite author, and he is the one - I still think - who writes most honestly about human existence.
I can't afford to hate anyone. I don't have that kind of time.
For me, filmmaking combines everything. That's the reason I've made cinema my life's work. In films, painting and literature, theatre and music come together. But a film is still a film.
A truly good movie is enjoyable too. There’s nothing complicated about it.
The role of the artist is to not look away.
The root of any film project for me is this inner need to express something. What nurtures this root and makes it grow into a tree is the script. What makes the tree bear flowers and fruit is the directing.
But let us not forget that cities are like human beings. They are born, they go through childhood and adolescence, they grow old, and eventually they die
Yet the true friend of the people should see that they be not too poor, for extreme povery lowers the character of the democracy; measures therefore should be taken which will give them lasting prosperity; and as this is equally the interest of all classes, the proceeds of the public revenues should be accumulated and distributed among its poor, if possible, in such quantities as may enable them to purchase a little farm, or, at any rate, make a beginning in trade or husbandry.
... you cannot make a man clean [simply] by washing his shirt.
So full of artless jealousy is guilt, It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.
The quality of rhetoric emanating from the psychedelic community must improve radically. If it does not, we will forfeit the reclamation of our birthright and all opportunity for exploring the psychedelic dimension will be closed off.
They sensed that what had happened around them and in their presence, and in them, was irrevocable. Never again could it be cleansed; it would prove that man, the human species - we, in short - had the potential to construct an enormity of pain, and that pain is the only force created from nothing, without cost and without effort. It is enough not to see, not to listen, not to act.
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