Massimo Cacciari

"(About the MOSE, in Venice) Is the water high? Put on your boots!"

"It is a very long story, in which I found myself completely alone, with my administrations, opposing this project, which was [considered] highly critical from a technical and environmental point of view by a large number of experts."

"No one can look into another person's soul. If a person has truly lost all hope and life has become pure and simple suffering for them, we have a duty to believe them. Politicians and legislators must act on the basis of their own convictions, but they must also be able to draft laws that respect the inalienable freedom of the individual. Our culture has elevated freedom to the highest criterion, and a decision contrary to freedom would have no basis. First of all, it must be verified with the utmost rigor that the request [for euthanasia] does not stem from any form of pressure or necessity, that it is absolutely free."

"We will never achieve the “truth,” but the purpose of seeking its affirmation allows us to approach it, which is already beautiful in itself."

"(About Pontius Pilate) He was neither impartial nor democratic. And he could not understand Jesus."

"Corriere della Sera, July 5, 2007."

"What are we facing today? A mass of individuals who are anything but liquid: they are gaseous! Individuals who, with the disappearance of all forms of social, union, corporate, and political aggregation, find themselves alone. This is what is new. This is what creates the social base for the Trumps, the Le Pens, the Salvinis, and the Grillos. At the root of it all is not only the impoverishment and downgrading of the middle class: there is also mass individualization."

"The more the metropolitan “nervous network” expands, the more it devours the surrounding territory, the more its ‘spirit’ seems to be lost; the more “powerful” it becomes, the less it seems able to order and rationalize the life that takes place there. The metropolitan intellect, its Nervenleben, undergoes a sort of “spatial crisis” – which is perfectly analogous to that undergone by the Leviathan State, the modern State in its territorially determined sovereignty. The powers that determine metropolitan growth are finding it increasingly difficult to “territorialize” themselves, to “embody” themselves in a territorial order, to give rise to forms of coexistence that are legible and observable in the territory, spatially."

"It is worth repeating. In the name of humanity, the most brutal atrocities have been committed – first and foremost, declaring one's enemy to be a beast. And so, in the name of equality, individuality, cultures, and destinies have been massacred. It is time to silence all the “big words” – or at least prevent the loudmouths from using them. But is it really inevitable, in order to understand the meaning of “equality,” to think of a natural essence of man, that is, to strip him of all his personality, to ‘free’ him from his history? If so, “equality” would tragically conflict with freedom. But perhaps, instead, it is legitimate to understand equality as the condition that allows us to express our individual diversity, as having equal means precisely in order to be able to freely diverge. And to be able to become ‘friends’ precisely because of, and not in spite of, this free distinction. In the ‘fatal’ term fraternité I think this should be preferred to friendship. ‘Egalité thinks of friendship as, precisely, friendship between equals; and therefore speaks of brotherhood. The equality and freedom we have mentioned, on the other hand, think of friendship that can bind even the most distant stars."

"Sgalambro was a follower of Schopenhauer, he was Schopenhauer. I don't think this critical and essentially pessimistic approach did Battiato much good, as he lost some of that irreverence, that paradoxical, ironic, sometimes even completely light-hearted energy that he had in his work, such as Bandiera bianca."

"(About the contrast between those who are in favor of civil unions and same-sex parenting and those who are against them) [...] I would like someone to explain to me what a traditional family is. Is it that of fifth-century Athens? That of Sparta? That of Rome? [...] The patriarchal family of fifty years ago? The “wife, husband, two children” family? Is that it? Is the traditional family that of the last fifty years? [...] The family is a socio-cultural product. [...] It is therefore quite clear that its concept is changing. [...] These changes [...] should take place with a minimum of [...] cultural foundation, awareness, and conscience. Not in the spirit of “We want everything” and everything that comes to mind is a “natural right” because then two “naturalisms” are opposed: the Catholic one, which is totally absurd because everything can be Christian except a ‘naturalist’; and the other one, the so-called “natural rights,” which are a phantom [...]."

"(About the COVID-19) I got the vaccine. You have to do it; you have to obey the law. Philosophers obey the law, even when they think it's completely insane. Socrates teaches us that."

"Nietzsche's assertion of the death of God is not at all as vulgar and atheistic as some might think."

"An author such as Friedrich Nietzsche has nothing to do with vulgar atheism."

"The true form of atheism, which has nothing to do with either Nietzsche or Heidegger, is the view that, in a nutshell, we are merely beings in the world: we are settled, domesticated in our worldly existence."

"The phenomenon we are experiencing in Italy is similar to that of all the historic centers of major cities around the world, where more profitable functions than residential ones become competitive."

"In Venice, there were two million tourists a year in the 1970s; now there are thirty million. And it is an irresistible pressure, a demand that will continue to grow. A few years ago, there were no Chinese, no Russians. Now there are, in droves. It will be tough. Consumption in the city is increasing dramatically."

"If we want to resist the exodus from historic centers, we must give people the opportunity to live there on equal terms with those who live elsewhere. The cost of living for those who live in the center cannot be double that of those who live ten kilometers away. Today, however, living in the center is very expensive. The tax and subsidy system needs to be reviewed, both for residents and for craft and commercial activities."