Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Robert Fisk

Quote by Robert Fisk

“In just a few moments, the so called liberal Fisk who had worked in the Middle East for a quarter of a century-who had lived among Arabs for almost half of his life, whose own life had been saved by Muslims on countless occasions in Lebanon, Iraq and Iran-yes, that nice, friendly Fisk had turned into a racist, profiling the innocent on board his aircraft because they had beards or brown eyes or dark skin. I felt dirty. But this, I already suspected, was one of the purposes of this day. To make us feel dirty, to make us so fearful-or so angry-that we no longer behaved rationally.”

Quote by Robert Fisk

Book:The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East
Create image

Work

The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East

Browse quotes and source details for this work. more

Author

Robert Fisk
Robert Fisk

Robert Fisk, born on July 12, 1946, is a British writer renowned for his coverage of the Middle East. His work spans politics, history, and society, offering profound insights into the conflicts and transformations in the region. more

You May Also Like

“Even the sociologists who conceded that modernity meant progress over ignorance, chronic poverty, and pervasive subjection still viewed it as an impoverishment of our capacities to tell beautiful stories and to live in richly textured cultures. Modernity sobered people up from the powerful but sweet delusions and illusions that had made the misery of their lives bearable. Devoid of these fantasies, we would lead our lives without commitment to higher principles and values, without the fervor and ecstasy of the sacred, without the heroism of saints, without the certainty and orderliness of divine commandments, but most of all without those fictions that console and beautify.”

SocietyModernity
Book:Why Love Hurts: A Sociological Explanation
Create image

“Tolstoy's novels are about the planet Earth and Solzhenitsyn's are about Pluto. Tolstoy is writing about a society and Solzhenitsyn is writing about the lack of one... surely there is something wilfully unhistorical about being disappointed that Pierre Bezhukov or Andrey Bolkonsky or Natasha Rostov find no equivalents in Cancer Ward. Characterization in such wealthy detail has become, in Solzhenitsyn's Russia, a thing of the past, and to expect it is like expecting the fur-lined brocades and gold-threaded silks of the Florentine Renaissance to crop up in Goya's visions of the horrors of war. Solzhenitsyn's contemporary novels- I mean the novels set in the Soviet Union- are not really concerned with society. They are concerned with what happens after society has been destroyed.”

SocietyRussiaSoviet UnionTolstoySolzhenitsynCancer Ward
Book:Cultural Cohesion: The Essential Essays
Create image

“Growing up in a world that wasn't created for even the most basic level of my existence meant that I grew up incredibly ostracised and ridiculed. I was taught from a young age that my mind wasn't valued, that my existence wasn't important, that I wasn't supposed to be here. How can a little girl ever find herself when every part of society is telling her that she can't be the only version of herself she has ever known?”

SocietyMental IllnessRejectionSocial NormsNeurodivergence
Book:Different, Not Less: A Neurodivergent's Guide to Embracing Your True Self and Finding Your Happily Ever After
Create image

“Daily, I get messages that invalidate me as a human because I'm autistic, with people asking me why I would ever be proud of something like that. Daily, I see, hear and experience people try to diminish my identity, and refuse to acknowledge the identity of their children, their patients, their students. When I look at the world around me, I'm reminded by the media, by politicians, by the very essence of our culture that my mind is wrong, that I'm not needed, that neurodivergence as a whole is indisputably delinquent, and that our identities are not considered important or whole.”

CultureSocietyIdentityAutismNeurodivergenceAutism AcceptanceSocial ExclusionSocial RejectionCultural Rejection
Book:Different, Not Less: A Neurodivergent's Guide to Embracing Your True Self and Finding Your Happily Ever After
Create image

“Talk to me about the truth of religion and I'll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I'll listen submissively. But don't come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don't understand. Unless, of course, you can literally believe all that stuff about family reunions 'on the further shore,' pictured in entirely earthly terms. But that is all unscriptural, all out of bad hymns and lithographs. There's not a word of it in the Bible. And it rings false. We know it couldn't be like that. Reality never repeats. The exact same thing is never taken away and given back. How well the Spiritualists bait their hook! 'Things on this side are not so different after all.' There are cigars in Heaven. For that is what we should all like. The happy past restored.”

LifeDeathHeavenGrief
Book:A Grief Observed
Create image

“Women from the enslaved class were forced and trained to dance and sing in royal courts and in front of men from the upper class, becoming, for the first time in history, “objects to be enjoyed”. This objectification and loss of authority of women gradually extended beyond the world of slave women and infiltrated the bedrooms of ordinary women across society, permeating all domains of human culture.”

HumansHistorySocietyWomen S RightsWomen S InspirationalSlavery QuotesJustice QuotesHistory Of Mankind
Book:For Humans To Know: New Revised Edition
Create image