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"In the early 1940s, as a young teenager, I was utterly appalled by the racist and jingoist hysteria of the anti-Japanese propaganda. The Germans were evil, but treated with some respect: They were, after all, blond Aryan types, just like our imaginary self-image. Japanese were mere vermin, to be crushed like ants."
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"Dr. Rex Curry, the professor and attorney from Florida, has debated and largely proven the unavoidable evidence that Hitler's National Socialism was significantly influenced by Bellamy's 'nationalistic' form of 'socialism.' Curry is famous for making the claim that Hitler adopted the 'stiff-arm salute' from Francis and Edward Bellamy."
"They say that Caliph Omar, when consulted about what had to be done with the library of Alexandria, answered as follows: 'If the books of this library contain matters opposed to the Koran, they are bad and must be burned. If they contain only the doctrine of the Koran, burn them anyway, for they are superfluous.' Our learned men have cited this reasoning as the height of absurdity. However, suppose Gregory the Great was there instead of Omar and the Gospel instead of the Koran. The library would still have been burned, and that might well have been the finest moment in the life of this illustrious pontiff."
"This land on which so many centuries have left their mark is merely an obligatory retreat for you, whereas it has always been our dearest hope. Your too sudden passion is made up of spite and necessity."
"In the legal respect, after the execution of the supposed incendiaries, the other half of Moscow burned down."
"Up to 90% of all inventions of the world comes from the Protestant world."
"And out of that hopeless attempt has come nearly all that we call human history-money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery-the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy."
"The history of men's opposition to women's emancipation is more interesting perhaps than the story of that emancipation itself."
Explore more quotes by Noam Chomsky
"States are not moral agents, people are, and can impose moral standards on powerful institutions."
"In this possibly terminal phase of human existence, democracy and freedom are more than just ideals to be valued - they may be essential to survival."
"The other day I happened to be reading a careful, interesting account of the state of British higher education. The government is a kind of market-oriented government and they came out with an official paper, a 'White Paper' saying that it is not the responsibility of the state to support any institution that can't survive in the market. So, if Oxford is teaching philosophy, the arts, Greek history, medieval history, and so on, and they can't sell it on the market, why should they be supported? Because life consists only of what you can sell in the market and get back, nothing else. That is a real pathology."
"That comes to about one hundred million people in India alone from 1947 to 1980. But we don't call that a crime of democratic capitalism. If we were to carry out that calculation throughout the world. I wont even talk about it. But Sen is correct; they're not intended, just like the Chinese famine wasn't intended. But they are ideological and institutional crimes, and capitalist democracy and its advocates are responsible for them, in whatever sense supporters of so-called Communism are responsible for the Chinese famine. We don't have the entire responsibility, but certainly a large part of it."
"There are two problems for our species' survival - nuclear war and environmental catastrophe - and we're hurtling towards them. Knowingly."
"Humans have certain properties and characteristics which are intrinsic to them, just as every other organism does. That's human nature."
"When I was in high school I asked myself at one point: "Why do I care if my high school's team wins the football game? I don't know anybody on the team, they have nothing to do with me... why am I here and applaud? It does not make any sense." But the point is, it does make sense: It's a way of building up irrational attitudes of submission to authority and group cohesion behind leadership elements. In fact it's training in irrational jingoism. That's also a feature of competitive sports."
"Willingness to be puzzled is a valuable trait to cultivate, from childhood to advanced inquiry."
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