Guest Columnist

Let the poor have luxury phones

“Let them eat cake,” runs the famous quote. Of course, it`s not that simple. This quote is both wrongly attributed and misunderstood. And therein lies its explanatory power.

03 April 2006

The usual story is that Queen Marie-Antoinette, upon hearing that the poor had no bread to eat, regally waved away the complaint with the words, “Let them eat cake!”

The truth, however, is that those words were written in 1766, when Marie-Antoinette was ten and living in Vienna, Austria. Jean-Jacques Rousseau did attribute the words to “a great princess”, but that princess was not the arrogant, flippant and uncaring queen of popular caricature.

ITWeb Premium

Get 3 months of unlimited access
No credit card. No obligation.

Already a subscriber Log in