And perhaps the sun, in search of novelty, will rise in the west. - David Mamet

The audience can endorse the triviality of modern art, but they can’t like it.

I pray you indulge me for a space, for I am going to set out on a speech which may have some duration, but whose theme may be gleaned from its opening phrase: how dare you.

We were taught in the sixties to award ourselves merit for membership in a superior group — irrespective of our group’s accomplishments. We continue to do so, irrespective of accomplishments, individual or communal, having told each other we were special. We learned that all one need do is refrain from trusting anybody over thirty — we were the culmination of history, superior to all those misguided who had come before, which is to say all humanity.