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Bigotry Quotes

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Bigotry Quotes

“Just because some idiots can't comprehend any gender other than man and woman, doesn't mean the transgender people don’t exist, just like, just because some idiots can't comprehend ideas of progress, except in terms of left and right, doesn’t mean the world doesn’t exist beyond red and blue.”

“Eastward and westward storms are breaking,--great, ugly whirlwinds of hatred and blood and cruelty. I will not believe them inevitable.”

“Ella warned Ruby, "Let me tell you, the life lead is not an easy one. There are many dangers in the world for us - it's dangerous if other people find out because of what they might do to us. Some will want to hurt us or put us into mental institutions. Some will want to get rid of us altogether. Others will try to 'cure' us by forcing us into marriage, thinking that all we need is a 'good man.' Let me assure you, sweet lady, there is no cure for what ails us, because we are not ill.”

“The effect of the mortification of the domestic affections upon the general character was probably very pernicious. The family circle is the appointed sphere, not only for the performance of manifest duties, but also for the cultivation of the affections; and the extreme ferocity which so often characterised the ascetic was the natural consequence of the discipline he imposed upon himself. Severed from all other ties, the monks clung with desperate tenacity to their opinions and to their Church, and hated those who dissented from them with all the intensity of men whose whole lives were concentrated on a single subject, whose ignorance and bigotry prevented them from conceiving the possibility of any good thing in opposition to themselves, and who had made it a main object of their discipline to eradicate all natural sympathies and affections.”

“As the bus headed into the night, I noticed that the bench seat in the back of the bus was vacant. So I took my blanket and pillow, made my way to the back and stretched out. Rumbling along I was vaguely aware of the stops we made, but the night passed quickly. Eventually it started getting light outside, but looking around I saw that most people were still sleeping, including a Negro woman wearing a Navy uniform. She was a WAVE and must have boarded the bus sometime during the night. I had no idea where we were, but it didn’t matter as long as we were heading west. Slowly the passengers woke up and looked around, including the young Negro lady. I never had a problem talking to people, so, striking up a conversation, I discovered that she was going home to Oklahoma City. I told her about being a cadet at Farragut and that I was now heading to California for the summer. Time always goes faster when there is someone to talk to and we had the entire back of the bus to ourselves. The first inkling that something was wrong came when we got off the bus for a rest stop in Little Rock, Arkansas. The driver told me that it wasn’t fitting to sit in the back of the bus with a Negro. I was dumbfounded, and coming from the North, I didn’t understand. I tried to explain that this woman was wearing the uniform of her country, but it didn’t make any difference. That’s just the way it was in the South! We ran into the same kind of bigotry in the diner at our next rest stop, but before I could make an issue out of it, she hushed me up and explained that she just wanted to go home and didn’t need any problems. The two of us sat in the section for “Negroes Only,” where they served her but not this white boy, which is what I was called, along with other derogatory remarks. Never mind, I shared her sandwich and I guess they were just glad to get rid of us when we boarded the bus again. Behind me, I heard someone say something about my being a “nigger lover”.... Big as life, I sat in the back again! This time no one said anything and everything seemed forgotten by the time she got off in Oklahoma City. Another driver came aboard and took over. Saying goodbye to my friend, I got up and moved back to the seat I had had originally -- the one over the big hump for the rear tires!”

“When a philosopher happens to read some of his older texts, and most of the time he shakes his head in disapproval, he can be sure that he is on the right path. For this is an infallible sign that his thought has evolved and that he possesses the capacity to learn, to unlearn, to adapt. He is brave enough to acknowledge that he may have been naive, and this, at the same time, is a useful reminder that he might be wrong even with his current views. Thus, he protects himself against arrogance and intransigence.”

“Freedom of speech is a fallacy, it is not absolute. It can be hailed absolute only if the person possessing it, has the conscience to distinguish the right from the wrong, justice from injustice, acceptance from discrimination.”

“The Caretaker, Sonnet What was good enough for the fiction fearing men of the past, is no yardstick for the civilized us. Just like what we carve out for ourselves, may not be sufficient for future generations. Every generation must carve their own destiny, taking lessons from the past, not edicts. No generation is authority of the other, each generation must write their own rights, lingo and ethics. Every generation needs caretakers, and the caretaker of your generation is you. There is no such thing as a golden age, age gets golden or gutted by the likes of you. What was good enough for the apes, is no yardstick for the sapiens. My world, my responsibility - voices the Caretaker thundersaint!”

“There are no other heaven and hell outside the human mind. Goodness is heaven, hatred is hell. Acceptance is religion, sectarianism is blasphemy. Love is holiness, discrimination is sin.”

“Bigotry is the disease of ignorance, of morbid minds; enthusiasm of the free and buoyant. Education and free discussion are the antidotes of both. We are destined to be a barrier against the returns of ignorance and barbarism. Old Europe will have to lean on our shoulders, and to hobble along by our side, under the monkish trammels of priests and kings, as she can. What a Colossus shall we be when the Southern continent comes up to our mark! What a stand will it secure as a ralliance for the reason & freedom of the globe! I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past. So good night. I will dream on, always fancying that Mrs Adams and yourself are by my side marking the progress and the obliquities of ages and countries.”

“Tierratitan, Sonnet I only have one advice for you, own your life, from head to toe - unapologetically alive and original, not a carbon copy, with second hand woe. Civilization is not a conjuring trick, Civilization is a long labor of life. You don't figure out everything overnight, You figure out things over time. Sweet dreams are made of sweat-n-dare. Sweat makes it sweet, dare brings it true. Sweet society is made of reason-n-care, When I'm your shelter, my shelter is you. I be your vision, you be my mission. Divided we drown, together, Tierratitan.”

“As a species, we have wasted a lot of our time on this planet holding on to the purely discriminatory and non-variant versions of our exclusively personal realities. Great many ages have passed this way – and it made us lose a lot – our sisters, our brothers, our loved ones – all because, while some of us were trying to hold on to our own “pure” “personal” world, others were doing the same. And all through history it has only led to death and destruction. And after all this, if we still can’t whole-heartedly embrace the beauty and the magnificence of diversity, then I am sad to say that we don’t deserve to call ourselves human.”

“My parents taught me never to judge others based on whom they love, what color their skin is, or their religion. Why make life miserable for someone when you could be using your energy for good? We don’t need to share the same opinions as others, but we need to be respectful. When you hear people making hateful comments, stand up to them. Point out what a waste it is to hate, and you could open their eyes.”

“You're a Black educated fool, son. These white folk have newspapers, magazines, radios, spokesmen to get their ideas across. If they want to tell the world a lie, they can tell it so well that it becomes the truth; and if I tell them you're lying, they'll tell the world even if you prove you're telling the truth. Because it's the kind of lie they want to hear.”

“Notice how selective that logic is. When a member of a group we already distrust commits harm, the group becomes suspect. When a member of our own group commits harm, the explanation becomes individual, complex, and tragic. We instinctively widen context for those we identify with and narrow it for those we do not. While that reflex is common to all of us, the question is whether we will let it rule us.”

“Choose to fight physical infection or not, your body will do it for you, but as for psychological contaminations, you have to fight them yourself - the faculties are already carved in your brain circuits, but you have to be willing to use them, defying the comforting fantasies of convention, that's how an ape evolves into human.”

“The mindless ferocity of this man, and all those like him, their real loathing born of nothing more solid than insecurity and fear... it was a channel. Will knew that he had been gazing into the channel down which the powers of the Dark, if they gained their freedom, could ride in an instant to complete control of the earth. He was filled with a terrible anxiety, a sense of urgency for the Light, and knew that it would remain with him, silently shouting at him, far more vividly than the fading memory of a single bigot like Mr. Moore.”

“We can choose to try to persuade people who are repeating demagogic talking points while choosing not to get into arguments with them. Demagoguery about 'them' is undone by empathy. Generalizations about 'them' are complicated, and sometimes shattered, by experiences with individual members of 'them,' or even humanizing stories. Tell those stories, mention those friends, talk about those experiences, and just refuse to argue. Invite your interlocutor to meet 'them,' point out the individuals who don't fit the stereotype, and, if you are a member of their out-group, then resist your interlocutor's desire to treat you as an exception. Many of the people who explain how they came to reject demagoguery about some out-group say they were changed when they got to know (and love) people in that group, or when they discovered that people whom they had long loved were members of the out-group. Just bear witness to the glory of diversity and pluralism.”