The politics of resentment

“Revolutionaries and other malcontents, because they are not in the place of power, or perhaps, in a nation, are the country’s restive minorities, or sometimes because they are spiteful courtiers out of favor: these desperadoes—sort of, aren’t they?—preach a rigid dogma to their followers, and wild relativism to the rest. Anarchists. Communists. Suffragettes. Separatists. Special pleaders. Splinter groups. Sects. The way they try to weaken official opposition, and get a hearing for themselves. Foxes make good chickens, the foxes say, pretending to cluck kindly in the direction of the henhouse. Then, having tempted tolerance to get in, their fangs vote.” – William H. Gass, The Tunnel