Baldwin on Distrustful Countries and Group Thought

Concerning Cuba and other countries devoted to the single-minded group thought (such as mindlessly repeating the self-serving mantras that the American administration is the world's only [or main] threat today and that capitalism is the world's most terrible and inhumane system), today is the birthday of James Baldwin, the American novelist (1924-1987) who said that

It is very nearly impossible... to become an educated person in a country so distrustful of the independent mind.

and

When one begins to live by habit and by quotation, one has begun to stop living.