Daily Inspiration Quote by Ryszard Kapuscinski

Contempt likes to dress up as emotional purity: the cold, rational verdict handed down from a safe distance. Kapuscinski punctures that costume. His line insists that contempt is rarely the absence of feeling; its fuel is attachment. You don t despise what you ve never cared about. You despise the fallen idol, the betrayed ideal, the group you once wanted to belong to, the country you expected to be better than it is.

Coming from a reporter who built a career in upheaval and postcolonial power games, the subtext is journalistic self-policing. Foreign correspondents, war writers, even political analysts often slide into contempt as a shorthand for expertise. The pose is: I have seen enough to stop being sentimental. Kapuscinski suggests the opposite: contempt signals a lingering investment, a hidden tenderness gone rancid. That is why it can feel righteous. It is grief with a sneer.

The phrasing is slyly corrective. "In order" frames contempt not as an instinct but as a constructed outcome. "Generally" keeps it observational rather than moralizing, like field notes. The kicker is "cherish" a verb associated with care, memory, even love. Pairing it with contempt creates a friction that forces self-recognition: the emotion you claim as hard-headed distance is actually proof you are still in the story.

In a media climate that rewards scorched-earth takes, Kapuscinski offers a diagnostic tool. If you catch yourself luxuriating in contempt, ask what you re protecting: an ideal of justice, dignity, competence, decency. The feeling is not neutrality; it is a bruised hope.