Quotes on Society

“The soul is healed by being with children.”

“The unhappiest people in this world, are those who care the most about what other people think.”

“Friends are the family you choose (~ Nin/Ithilnin, Elven rogue).”

“Human relationships always help us to carry on because they always presuppose further developments, a future - and also because we live as if our only task was precisely to have relationships with other people.”

“Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.”

“We all live inside the terrible engine of authority, and it grinds and shrieks and burns so that no one will say: lines on maps are silly.”

“Never judge someone's character based on the words of another. Instead, study the motives behind the words of the person casting the bad judgment.”

“It is the beginning of wisdom when you recognize that the best you can do is choose rules you want to live by, and it's persistent and aggravated imbecility to pretend you can live without any.”

“All this twaddle, the existence of God, atheism, determinism, liberation, societies, death, etc., are pieces of a chess game called language, and they are amusing only if one does not preoccupy oneself with 'winning or losing this game of chess.”

“We started off trying to set up a small anarchist community, but people wouldn't obey the rules.”

“They laugh at me because I'm different; I laugh at them because they're all the same.”

“... for most practical purposes, Tarbean had two parts: Waterside and Hillside. Waterside is where people are poor. That makes them beggars, thieves and whores. Hillside is where people are rich. That makes them solicitors, politicians and courtesans.”

“People will not remember what you did for living,they will remember how you touched them with kindness and loving.”

“We are supposed to call poison medicine and we wonder why we're always sick.”

“This is the Modern Man. The man who seeks himself without ever seeking, because he does not want to find;The man who does not hesitate to criticize the other, although he behaves in the same way;”

“What can oppose the decline of the west is not a resurrected culture but the utopia that is silently contained in the image of its decline.”

“Vulnerability is the least celebrated emotion in our society”

“There would be no society if living together depended upon understanding each other.”

“Those who make conversations impossible, make escalation inevitable.”

“Love as a concrete foundation for an authentically functional civilization requires the around-the-clock labors of forgiveness. Without it, Love fails, Friendship fails, Intelligence fails, Humanity: fails.”

“I refuse to let the standards of evil people chip away at my capacity for integrity.”

“Le but n'est rien, le développement est tout. Le spectacle ne veut en venir à rien d'autre qu'à lui-même.”

“Le spectacle est la principale production de la société actuelle.”

“We are all mutants of sanity.”

“Il est le soleil qui ne se couche jamais sur l'empire de la passivité moderne. Il recouvre toute la surface du monde et baigne indéfiniment dans sa propre gloire.”

“If money’s the god people worship, I’d rather go worship the devil instead.”

“People make the rules of society, not God.”

“Truth, like love and sleep, resents approaches that are too intense.”

“Every violation of truth is not only a sort of suicide in the liar, but is a stab at the health of human society.”

“To say nothing is saying something. You must denounce things you are against or one might believe that you support things you really do not.”

“Despite how entertaining certain stories were, at the bottom of every item of gossip there was someone getting hurt.”

“A visitor is a friend, he brings news, good or bad, which is bread to the hungry minds in lonely places. A real friend who comes to the house is a heavenly messenger, who brings the panis angelorum.”

“[novan]: bassists are very good with their fingers[novan]: and some of us sing backup vocals, so that means we're good with our mouths too...(~ IM chat with Novan Chang, 18, bassist)”

“In your name, the family name is at last because it's the family name that lasts.”

“No one is beyond saving.”

“When the wisdom of the old meets the energy of the young, society achieves true equilibrium of growth, progress, and stability.”

“To walk in the woods is not to run from life. Rather, it’s to observe how life should be done in order to build a culture that won’t require any running.”

If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.

The Englishman does not like being told he is wrong, but he loves to be told that he is right.

There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Hayes. All influence is immoral.

A woman who is not beautiful is like a man who is not handsome.

I never forget a face, but in your case, I'll make an exception.

There is no such thing as an innocent person.

The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech.

A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.

If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.

A fashion is nothing but an induced epidemic.

The Englishman does not like being told he is wrong, but he loves to be told that he is right.

There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Hayes. All influence is immoral.

A woman who is not beautiful is like a man who is not handsome.