Quotes from George Lakoff

This overall picture is quite damning for the Strict Father model. That model seems to be a myth. If this research is right, a Strict Father upbringing does not produce the kind of child it claims to produce. Incidentally, this picture is not from one study or from studies by one researcher. This is the overall picture gathered from many studies by many different researchers (see References

in France, a capitalist democracy concerned with égalité, in 1910, 70 percent of the wealth was reinvestment wealth, held by the very wealthy—not productive wealth, distributed over most of the population.

Rationalism pervades the progressive world. It is one of the reasons progressives have lately been losing to conservatives. Rationalist-based political campaigns miss the symbolic, metaphorical, moral, emotional, and frame-based aspects of political campaigns.

It's about protection: The government should make sure we have healthy food. It's about equality: Good and healthy food should not be a luxury reserved for the rich. It's about diversity: having a polyculture system and distinctive varieties of food. It's an expansion of freedom: Everyone should have access to good food. It's using the common wealth for the common good to promote public health and increase quality of life. The

Let us now turn to the question of the effects of physical punishment on children. This research should also not give solace to advocates of the Strict Father model. The major research indicates that having strict parents who perform painful corporal punishment in childhood leads to domestic violence, aggression, and delinquency in later life. Take

Here we find a power of metaphor that we have not previously discussed, the power of revelation. This is the power that metaphor has to reveal comprehensive hidden meanings to us, to allow us to find meanings be- yond the surface, to interpret texts as wholes, and to make sense of patterns of events.

Effective campaigns must communicate the candidates' values and use issues symbolically—as indicative of their moral values and their trustworthiness. Recall

Since the Strict Father model is what holds Strict Father morality together, interference with the pursuit of self-interest threatens the foundations of the whole Strict Father moral framework—from the efficacy of moral strength to the validity of the moral order. The

One of the fundamental findings of cognitive science is that people think in terms of frames and metaphors—conceptual structures like those we have been describing. The frames are in the synapses of our brains, physically present in the form of neural circuitry. When the facts don't fit the frames, the frames are kept and the facts ignored.

What we are concerned to provide throughout this book is in- stead a prerequisite to any such discussion, namely, a linguistic and rhetorical analysis of the role of metaphor in the way we understand a poem.

Here is the hierarchy: God above man; man above nature; adults above children; Western culture above non-Western culture; our country above other countries.

Irresponsible corporations win big from tort reform.

Concentrate on values and principles. Be authentic; stand up for what you really believe. Empathize and connect with the people you are talking to, on the basis of identity—their identity and yours. This

They don't care primarily about the lawsuits themselves. They care about getting rid of environmental, consumer, and worker protections in general. And they care about defunding the Democratic Party. That is what a strategic initiative is.

men above women, Christians above non-Christians, whites above nonwhites, straights above gays.

Unlike the right, the left does not think strategically. We think issue by issue.

The entailments of this metaphorical mode of thought are quite considerable: Moral standards that change with time, or social situation, or ethnicity are a danger to the functioning of society. There is no such thing as progress in morality; what is and is not moral is fixed for all time, and any change of standards in the name of would-be moral progress is really an evil, a chipping away at our moral foundations, a tearing of our moral fabric, and so on.

By Strict Father morality, harsh prison terms for criminals and life imprisonment for repeat offenders are the only moral options.

These assumptions lead progressives into other traps: assuming that hard facts will persuade voters, that voters are "rational" and vote in their self-interest and on the issues, and that negating a frame is an effective way to argue against it. 5.

What takes the place of the strict rules of the Strict Father model is clarity of expectations and empathy. What takes the place of reward and punishment is interdependence, communication, and a true desire to remain affectionately connected to those you live with. F

Progressives should argue progressivism. We need to get out of issue silos that isolate arguments and keep us from the values and principles that define an overall progressive vision. 2.

The strict father worldview is so named because according to its own beliefs, the father is the head of the family. The nurturant parent worldview is gender neutral.

Pragmatic conservatism is less idealistic than central conservatism. The goal is to get ahead, to serve your self-interest. The idealistic parts of conservatism are seen as effective means to achieve that goal.

At the heart of conservatism is strict father morality, as we have seen. But strict father morality has complexities and natural variations. What liberals don't see is that the diversity