“How do you explain to people who’ve never been allowed to travel to New York that the idiotic carousel, constantly spinning sights and sounds round your head there, without your blessing or permission, may not be wholly benevolent? How do you explain the conspiracy to steal attention, to interpret every minute of your waking life as an opportunity to sell you something, to people enraptured by the conspiracy’s most perfect instruments, television and the disorienting environments of the Europa Center and other shopping malls? The answer is, you don’t. Like Americans, they’ll only insist on learning for themselves, and when that carousel starts gathering momentum, they won’t have the slightest idea what hit ‘em.”“On countless fronts, keeping up appearances will now replace all deep reflection and self-scrutiny.”
- Jonathan Kalb, Berlin by Metaphor, from Free Admissions: Collected Theater Writings, 1990
