We have the pots, jewelry, and wall decorations of our ancient ancestors, and a few of their stories. We know nothing of the joys and sorrows of their family lives and care little for their political intrigues. Their faiths have disappeared or changed utterly; their science has been superceded. The things that mattered most to them have vanished. What remains is the superficial. It is how we know them. And when we too are dust, our descendants will have Rashid's curvy plastic trash cans.

Virginia Postrel, The Substance of Style (191)

The entire repertory company went through a profound shock when David Lochary died in New York from complications of an angel dust overdose. David had never had a drug problerm until he discovered "dust," and for some reason he lost control. To this day I'm in favor of busting dealers who sell this crap. So if you're on the stuff, don't come around me, because I might call the police. David's death stunned Dreamland and made us realize a whole era in our lives had abruptly ended. At his wake we discussed the major influence David had had on our style and attitudes, and I knew that without my favorite leading man I had no choice but to make a film with all women stars.

John Waters, Shock Value (160)

Dwell's editor in chief preaches a pluralism that would sound strange to her forebears: "We think of ourselves as Modernists, but we are the nice Modernists. One of the things we like best about Modernism - the nice Modernism - it its flexbility." She tweaks the puritanical doctrines of Adolf Loos - "one crabby Modernist" - whose influential 1908 essay "Ornament and Crime" proclaimed decoration degenerate, the amoral indulgence of children and barbarians. To a contemporary reader, Loos sounds like a racist, pleasure-hating totalitarian. In the twenty-first century, ornament is not a crime. It is an essential form of human self-expression.

Virginia Postrel, The Substance of Style (14)

But if you think about it, Santa Claus is directly responsible for heroin addiction. Innocent children are brainwashed into believing the first big lie their parents ever tell them, and when the truth finally hits, they never believe them again. All the stern warnings on the perils of drugs carry the same credibility as flying reindeer or fat men in your chimney. But I love Santa Claus anyway: All legends have feet of clay. Besides, he's a boon to the unemployed. Where else can drunks and fat people get temporary work? And if you're a child molester - eureka! the perfect job: clutching youngsters' fannies and chuckling away, all the while knowing what you'd like to give them.

John Waters, Crackpot (117)

Considering how often people in America inquire about the ethnic backgrounds of people they've just met, and considering that a kiss-me-I'm-Irish name like Hollahan invites the question, D.J. would have conversations like this over and over again all his adult life. He would come to hate us for for giving him such a green-beer-and-shamrocks last name. There were a couple of other family-name possibilities - Keenan, my middle name and also my other grandmother's maiden name; and Bunbaker, Terry's mother's maiden name. But Keenan presented the same "So you must be Irish" problem as Hollahan, and a name like Bunbaker could get a kid beaten up on the playground daily through grade school. With two gay dads and the name "D.J. Bunbaker," he would never get out of junior high alive. We might as well name him Liberace.

Dan Savage, The Kid (205)

All kinds of films could benefit. The producers of Porky's et al., pretend their films aren't made for dirty, filthy twelve-year-old lechers, but why not be honest and sponsor a circle-jerk for Cub Scout troops with the winner receiving a call girl for the night? If you want to be civic minded and publicize your newly installed handicap ramps, show The Crippled Masters, an honest-to-God karate film with two heroes - one has no arms, the other no legs. Everybody beats them up until one jumps on the other's shoulders, and together they become a killing machine.

John Waters, Crackpot (22)