“Dehumanizing and holding people accountable are mutually exclusive...Challenging ourselves to live by higher standards requires constant diligence and awareness.”
“A very important tidbit about customer service: just apologize to people. Even if it’s not your fault, they’ve been disappointed by the company you work for and it’s your job to empathize with them. Though you may be paid minimum wage, to the customers you are the face of the entire company. It’s this kind of accountability that gets people raises, promotions, and eventually careers.”
″‘And what exactly were you trying to accomplish?’ Haymitch asks in a very measured voice.
‘I’m not sure. I just wanted to hold them accountable, if only for a moment,’ says Peeta. ‘For killing that little girl.‘”
“And then it was not a toy lion, but a real lion, The Real Lion, just as she had seen him on the mountain beyond the world’s end. And a smell of all sweet-smelling things there are filled the room. But there was some trouble in Jill’s mind, though she could not think what it was... The Lion told her to repeat the signs, and she found that she had forgotten them all. At that, a great horror came over her.”
“You were thinking how nice it would have been if Aslan hadn’t put the instructions on the stones of the ruined city till after we’d passed it. And then it would have been his fault, not ours. So likely, isn’t it? No. We must own up to it. We’ve only four signs to go by, and we’ve muffed the first three.”
“‘You met the Witch?’ said Aslan in a low voice which had the threat of a growl in it.
‘She woke up,’ said Digory wretchedly. And then, turning very white, ‘I mean, I woke her. Because I wanted to know what would happen if I struck a bell. Polly didn’t want to. It wasn’t her fault. I—I fought her. I know I shouldn’t have. I think I was a bit enchanted by the writing under the bell.’
‘Do you?’ asked Aslan; still speaking very low and deep.
‘No,’ said Digory. ‘I see now I wasn’t. I was only pretending.‘”
“Tyrants can no longer hide. There needs to be, and will be, documentation and accountability, and we need to bear witness. And to this end, I insist that all that happens should be known.”
“When setting expectations, no matter what has been said or written, if substandard performance is accepted and no one is held accountable—if there are no consequences—that poor performance becomes the new standard.”
His parents smile after reading this, and his father says, “Well, we’d better buy a chess set.” Subtle account of how children can take action against something with which they disagree.
“Pooh,” said Owl severely, “did you do that?”
“No,” said Pooh humbly. “I don’t think so.”
“Then who did?”
“I think it was the wind,” said Piglet. “I think your house has blown down.”
“Oh, is that it? I thought it was Pooh.”
“No,” said Pooh.
“If it was the wind,” said Owl, considering the matter, “then it wasn’t Pooh’s fault. No blame can be attached to him.” With these kind words he flew up to look at his new ceiling.
“My Lord Godalming, I, too, have a duty to do, a duty to others, a duty to you, a duty to the dead; and, by God, I shall do it! All I ask you now is that you come with me, that you look and listen; and if when later I make the same request you do not be more eager for its fulfilment even than I am, then—then I shall do my duty, whatever it may seem to me. And then, to follow of your Lordship’s wishes I shall hold myself at your disposal to render an account to you, when and where you will.”
“It is of moment to her soul, and therefore, as the worshipful Governor says, momentous to thine own, in whose charge hers is. Exhort her to confess the truth!”
“Listen,” said the abbé, extending his hand over the wounded man, as if to command him to believe; “this is what the God in whom, on your death-bed, you refuse to believe, has done for you—he gave you health, strength, regular employment, even friends—a life, in fact, which a man might enjoy with a calm conscience. Instead of improving these gifts, rarely granted so abundantly, this has been your course—you have given yourself up to sloth and drunkenness, and in a fit of intoxication have ruined your best friend.”