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Society Quotes
"The only social change presented by most SF has been towards authoritarianism, the domination of ignorant masses by a powerful elite-sometimes presented as a warning, but often quite complacently. Socialism is never considered as an alternative, and democracy is quite forgotten. Military virtues are taken as ethical ones. Wealth is assumed to be a righteous goal and a personal virtue. Competitive free-enterprise capitalism is the economic destiny of the entire Galaxy. In general, American SF has assumed a permanent hierarchy of superiors and inferiors, with rich, ambitious, aggressive males at the top, then a great gap, and then at the bottom the poor, the uneducated, the faceless masses, and all the women."
6
"But the plans were on display."On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them."That's the display department."With a flashlight."Ah, well, the lights had probably gone."So had the stairs."But look, you found the notice, didn't you?"Yes, said Arthur, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard."
6
"Who really owns the Earth?Corporations? Governments?Charity Organizations?Or...Should it be the people?You decide!"
6
"Conflict is much the same, injustice and inequality is nothing new to our generation only the contest has changed because not only that everyone has opinion but they also have an opportunity to voice it and that is a bit dangerous."
6
"I stand for simple justice, equal opportunity and human rights. The indispensable elements in a democratic society - and well worth fighting for."
6
"I welcomed the organization of the Anti-slavery Society."
6
"Books, you know, they're not just commodities. The profit motive often is in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art-the art of words."
6
"This topic brings me to that worst outcrop of herd life, the military system, which I abhor... This plague-spot of civilization ought to be abolished with all possible speed. Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism -- how passionately I hate them!"
6
"At one time,' Golenishchev continued, either not observing or not willing to observe that both Anna and Vronsky wanted to speak, 'at one time a freethinker was a man who had been brought up in the conception of religion, law, and morality, who reached freethought only after conflict and difficulty. But now a new type of born freethinkers has appeared, who grow up without so much as hearing that there used to be laws of morality, or religion, that authorities existed. They grow up in ideas of negation in everything -- in other words, utter savages."
6
"You like every one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one."
6
"We will never forget those like my great-grandfather who fought at Vicksburg."
5
"One of the sad commentaries on the way women are viewed in our society is that we have to fit one category. I have never felt that I had to be in one category."
5
"The modern mind is in complete disarray. Knowledge has stretched itself to the point where neither the world nor our intelligence can find any foot-hold. It is a fact that we are suffering from nihilism."
5
"What I do deny is that you can build any enduring society without some such mystical ethos."
5
"Atheists in our midst are proof that all consciences can be accommodated here, even those that have no ground for holding that conscience is sacred, inalienable, and prior to civil society."
5
"Because Social Security is specifically designed to boost the retirement income of low earners with a progressive benefit formula, the program has played an enormous and necessary role in keeping Latinas out of poverty."
5
"It's a repressive society where you can't be horrible, I'm not horrible, they made me horrible, I'm just honest."
5
"No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth!"
5
"There is only one thing more harmful to society than an elected official forgetting the promises he made in order to get elected; that's when he doesn't forget them."
5
"The achievements which society rewards are won at the cost of diminution of personality."
5
"You can tell all you need to about a society from how it treats animals and beaches."
5
"An idealist believes the short run doesn't count. A cynic believes the long run doesn't matter. A realist believes that what is done or left undone in the short run determines the long run."
5
"We can't just have mainstream behavior on television in a free society, we have to make sure we see the whole panorama of human behavior."
5
"If God would have wanted us to live in a permissive society He would have given us Ten Suggestions and not Ten Commandments."
5
"Having the benefit to our society, not only here in the United States but throughout the world with the amount of invention you get from having a space program, is well worth the risk that an individual like myself has to take by flying in the vehicle."
5
"The judge said I was a menace to society because I had put crime on a scientific basis."
5
"Be able to be alone. Lose not the advantage of solitude, and the society of thyself."
5
"So we have broad bipartisan support for the bill, and it's my hope that we can build on some of the things that have been talked about in Washington involving building a larger ownership society."
5
"We are born charming, fresh and spontaneous and must be civilized before we are fit to participate in society."
5
"Who can wonder at the attractiveness... of the bar, for our ambitious young men, when the highest bribes of society are at the feet of the successful orator?"
5
"It is ironic that the one thing that all religions recognize as separating us from our creator, our very self-consciousness, is also the one thing that divides us from our fellow creatures. It was a bitter birthday present from evolution."
5
"If those in charge of our society - politicians, corporate executives, and owners of press and television - can dominate our ideas, they will be secure in their power. They will not need soldiers patrolling the streets. We will control ourselves."
5
"I mean I look forward to the day when I can be Republican again."
5
"Literature that keeps employing new linguistic and formal modes of expression to draft a panorama of society as a whole while at the same time exposing it, tearing the masks from its face - for me that would be deserving of an award."
5
"Almost half of all Latinas currently on Social Security rely exclusively on their benefit check in retirement."
5
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