Best 3026 quotes in «society quotes» category

I am sometimes asked, "How do you know there won't be a war tomorrow (or a genocide, or an act of terrorism) that will refute your whole thesis?" The question misses the point of this book. The point is not that we have entered an Age of Aquarius in which every last earthling has been pacified forever. It is that substantial reductions in violence have taken place, and it is important to understand them. Declines in violence are caused by political, economic, and ideological conditions that take hold in particular cultures at particular times. If the conditions reverse, violence could go right back up.

I am the most important person to me. I am the most important person in the entire universe to me. I am the centre of my own universe.

I asked my dad what people would remember sooner, the things I said or the things I did. His response was: Forgive me, but what people?

I believe he was feeling a bit nervous. Possibly it was my costume that took him aback. I was dressed quite well, even elegantly, and looked as if I belonged to the best society.

I become quite melancholy and deeply grieved to see men behave to each other as they do. Everywhere I find nothing but base flattery, injustice , self-interest, deceit and roguery. I cannot bear it any longer; I'm furious; and my intention is to break with all mankind.

I believe powerfully that we who have the power should strive to extend the gift of education to everyone. Education is the most important investment a developed society can make, and the most effective way of nurturing a developing one.

I believe in you my friend, so much so, that if any of my ideas make you feel belittled in any manner, I want you to rise against me and throw my work into the fire. Any notion, any book, any institution that weakens the self instead of strengthening it, must be discarded at ones.

I believe in the goodness of life. I believe in humanity.

I believe women’s groups are essential for each of us individually but also for society generally—because progress depends on inclusion, and inclusion begins with women. I’m not saying we should include women and girls as opposed to men and boys, but along with them and on behalf of them. This is not about bringing women in and leaving others out. It’s about bringing women in as a way to bring everyone in.

I can imagine no greater catastrophe than if I were mistaken, and the theory were correct that what I consider secondary instincts or drives are actually primary instincts! Because in that case the emotional plague would rest upon the support of a natural law while its archenemies, truth and sociality, would be relying upon unfounded ethics. Until now both lies and truth have taken recourse to ethics. But only lies have profited because they were able to appear under the guise of truth. Under these circumstances, egoism, theft, petty selfishness, slander, etc., would be the natural rule. (26.july.1943)

I cannot, however, but think that the world would be better and brighter if our teachers would dwell on the Duty of Happiness as well as the Happiness of Duty; for we ought to be as cheerful as we can, if only because to be happy ourselves is a most effectual contribution to the happiness of others.

I can see the cracks in society, in people, in this world and I'd rather die before slipping into one of them.

Ich wünsche mir, dass sich unsere Gesellschaft tolerant, wertbewusst und vor allen Dingen in Liebe zur Freiheit entwickelt und nicht vergisst, dass die Freiheit der Erwachsenen Verantwortung heißt.

I'd been at the mercy of a prick on a power trip, the kind of buttoned-up bantam rooster who gets off on control and then, when you resist him, tells you that you've got issues with control.

I’d been an outcast my entire life. Growing up with technophobe parents in the dawn of a Cyborg Age did that to a person.

Identify darkness in the society and find ways to help illuminate it

Identify the connection between a person’s actions

I did not realise that when money becomes the core value, then education drives towards utility or that the life or the mind will not be counted as good unless it produces measurable results. That public services will no longer be important. That an alternative life to getting and spending will become very difficult as cheap housing disappears. That when communities are destroyed only misery and intolerance are left.

I discovered at an early age that I was - shall we be kind and say different? It's a better, more general word than the other one... I got sick... It was the feeling that the great, deadly pointing forefinger of society was pointing at me - and the great voice of millions chanting, "Shame. Shame. Shame." It's society's way of dealing with someone different.

Idolized my innocence, Stole it from me in the end
 Now I’m wide awaken and still paying for the poison they sold me.

I dont believe knowing can save us. What is constant in history is greed and foolishness and a love of blood and this is a thing that even God—who knows all that can be known—seems powerless to change.

I do not understand, why should mankind destroy each other?. Instead of building and working together for the common good?

I don't know that we are actually human at this point, those of us who are like most of us, who grew up with TV and movies and now the Internet. If we are betrayed, we know the words to say; when a loved one dies, we know the words to say. If we want to play the stud or the smart-ass or the fool, we know the words to say. We are all working from the same dog-eared script. It's a very difficult era in which to be a person, just a real, actual person, instead of a collection of personality traits selected from an endless Automat of characters. And if all of us are play-acting, there can be no such thing as a soul mate, because we don't have genuine souls. It had gotten to the point where it seemed like nothing matters, because I'm not a real person and neither is anyone else. I would have done anything to feel real again.

I don’t know why everyone is still trying to find out whether heaven and hell exist. Why do we need more evidence? They exist here on this very Earth. Heaven is standing atop Mount Qasioun overlooking the Damascene sights with the wind carrying Qabbani’s dulcet words all around you. And hell is only four hours away in Aleppo where children’s cries drown out the explosions of mortar bombs until they lose their voice, their families, and their limbs. Yes, hell certainly does exist right now, at this moment, as I pen this poem. And all we’re doing to extinguish this hellfire is sighing, shrugging, liking, and sharing. Tell me: what exactly does that make us? Are we any better than the gatekeepers of hell?

I don’t wish to be successful but I definitely wish to be successful in helping someone, sometime for something good.

I don't really know a whole lot about complicated, worldly things. But I think parents and siblings, they need to be able to care for each other unconditionally. How many people could you risk your life to protect? Not that many, I bet. Everyone's top priority is taking care of themselves. But if there's anyone who can overcome that, it's flesh and blood. If you understand that feeling, then you can look at other people, and realize, this person's family cares about them, too. That's a really heavy feeling. When you think about that, it becomes a lot harder to do horrible things to them. So I think that love for your family....is really at the root of what it means to care for other people.

I don't want them to think that we dress like savages,' she replied, with a scorn that Pocahontas might have resented; and he was struck again by the religious reverence of even the most unworldly American women for the social advantages of dress. 'It's their armour,' he thought, 'their defence against the unknown, and their defiance of it.' And he understood for the first time the earnestness with which May, who was incapable of tying a ribbon in her hair to charm him, had gone through the solemn rite of selecting and ordering her extensive wardrobe.

I’d rather listen to what you think of yourself, than what the whole world has to say about you.

I don't trust anybody who isn't a little bit neurotic

I don't want to die. I deserve, certainly, the most extreme punishment society has, and I think society deserves to be protected from me and from others like me. That's the irony. What I'm talking about is going beyond retribution because there is no way in the world that killing me is going to restore those beautiful children to their parents and correct and soothe the pain.

I dread to think of a society devoid of love, compassion and humanity.

I emphasise it now; I had little-to-nothing in common with other people. Their values I did not comprehend, their ideals were to me a living horror. Call it ostentatious but I even sought to provide tangible proof of my withdrawal from the world. I posted a sign in the entrance to the building wherein I dwelt; a sign that indicated I had no wish to be disturbed by anyone, for any purpose whatsoever. As these convictions took hold of me and, as I denied, nay even repudiated, the hold that the current society of men possesses over its ranks, as I retreated into a hermitage of the imagination, disentangling my own concerns from those paramount to the age in which I happened to be born, an age with no claim to be more enlightened, significant or progressive than any other, I tried to make a stand for the spirit. Tyranny, in this land, I was told, was dead. But I contend that the replacement of one form of tyranny with another is still tyranny. The secret police now operate not via the use of brute force in dark underground cells; they operate instead by a process of open brainwashing that is impossible to avoid altogether. The torture cells are not secret; they are everywhere, and so ubiquitous that they are no longer seen for what they are. One may abandon television; one may abandon all forms of broadcast media, even the Internet, but the advertising hoardings in every street, on vehicles, inside transport centres, are still there. And they contain the same messages. Only the very rich can avoid their clutches utterly. Those who have obtained sufficient wealth may choose their own surroundings, free from the propaganda of a decayed futurity. And yet, and yet, in order to obtain such a position of freedom it is first necessary to have served the ideals of the tyranny slavishly, thereby validating it. ("The Tower")

If achieving world peace and ending poverty were really genuine concerns to the majority, then they would have happened already by now. So, either people are not aware of their collective power, or their fears overpower their desires. The amount of money spent on the military-industrial complex in one year is more than enough to end hunger in Africa. Every problem on earth today has more than one solution. However, priorities are determined by values.

If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. [Inaugural Address, January 20 1961]

If a person wants to live a prosperous life, they must first of all determine what prosperity is to them personally

If a person derives the sense of superiority and pride at the disadvantage of others, it indicates a lack of humanity, integrity and harmony with oneself

If a person derives their sense of superiority and pride as a result of the impoverished people of Africa, it speaks of the depth of their shallowness and their backness

If a person is less developed, then we no longer accept the possibility that he can teach us something in a mono cultural society

If a society permits one portion of its citizenry to be menaced or destroyed, then, very soon, no one in that society is safe. The forces thus released in the people can never be held in check, but run their devouring course, destroying the very foundations which it was imagined they would save.

If blacks are judged based on the basis of their skin color, then why do whites sun bathe during summer and show off their tan?

If every citizen should recite their national anthem daily, you will develop love to serve your country better.

If every man who passed an unjust judgment on his fellow should be condemned, how many judges would be found so vain and foolish as to review and condemn their Maker’s work?

I felt that the magical people must be in the hidden back roads and dusty cubby holes of life; on highways, in hostels, and in shabby, smoky cafes. These enchanting people are in trees, around fires and under hand-knit hats and street lamps reflecting gold on rain soaked pavement. They dance while others dangle; they vibrantly sing the songs that get jumbled and stuck in the subconscious of others who only wish to catch tune. They are the rare ones whose uncommon experiences touch your heart through just a wink of their eye, the stories stitched in the holes of their shoes, invoking a longing for the unknown, taking others to a place of missing what they've never even had -- they do not settle, they do not compromise.

If God fairness, impartiality, equity, are his essence, that should become dominant in any society

If he could not restore her to the status of a respectable woman, then Sohrab would make her into something else entirely, something hitherto unknown in their entire extended family, an educated woman, a professional woman.

If I faced so much resistance, despite belonging to an educated and enlightened family, what must other girls be up against?

If all you are looking for is a miracle you are wide open to follow the antichrist and the false prophets because they are going to have a big league of signs and wonders ministry. If signs and wonders do not bring glory and honour to Jesus Christ, then you must be watching a false prophet whose anointing does not come from the Holy Spirit of God.

If a nation and any nation on this earth could raise up the standard of personal responsibility in their society, you will in no time see a nation of virtuous people, developed and civilized.

If a person labors diligently and has vital qualities, such a person will be very wealthy and successful

If a person’s appearance is consistent with our socially accepted norms, we automatically esteem them