Quotessence
Home / Topics / Blank Slates Quotes

Blank Slates Quotes

Browse 39 quotes about Blank Slates.

Related topics

Slate

Blank Slates Quotes

“I no longer believe the conservative message that children are naturally selfish and destructive creatures who need civilizing by hierarchies or painful controls. On the contrary, I believe that hierarchy and painful controls create destructive people. And I no longer believe the liberal message that children are blank slates on which society can write anything. On the contrary, I believe a unique core self is born into every human being; the result of millennia of environment and heredity combined in an unpredictable way that could never happen before or again.”

PeopleWayNeedsWritingBelieveHumansChildrenSelfHappensI BelieveBornHuman BeingsResultsFamilyEnvironmentCreaturesMessagesUniqueConservativePainfulContrarySelfishCoreDestructiveBlankUnpredictableHierarchySlateHeredityBlank Slates
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“Inside each of us is a unique person resulting from millennia of environment and heredity combined in a way that could never happen again and could never have happened before. We aren't blank slates, but we are also communal creatures who are born before our brains are fully developed, so we're very sensitive to our environment. The question is: How to find the support and the circumstances that allow you to express what's inside you?”

WayPersonsHappensBornBrainSupportEnvironmentHappenedCircumstancesCreaturesUniqueSensitiveBlankOur EnvironmentSlateHeredityBlank Slates
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“The religion that has transformed Western civilization for two millennia is a blank slate for liberals. Their closest reference point is conservative Christians, meaning people you're not supposed to hire. And these are the people who carp about George Bush's alleged lack of intellectual curiosity.”

PeopleTwoChristianCivilizationIntellectualWesternCuriosityConservativeTransformedClosestBlankWestern CivilizationSlateIntellectual CuriosityBlank SlatesCarp
Author:Ann Coulter
Create image

“I've never been about trying to promote a brand of Squarepusher. I've never been keen on that idea that these are the character traits that I've got to stick with and amplify and keep pushing forward and pushing on the public. I'm really happy to throw it all away and start each record with a blank slate but I concede you've got a point, there are things I can't get rid of, no matter how hard I try.”

TryingI CanIdeasMatterHardCharacterRecordsSticksBrandsPushingTraitsBlankReally HappySlateAmplifyBlank SlatesCharacter TraitPushing OnPushing Forward
Author:Squarepusher
Create image

“Don't get seduced by your own stuff. Don't get high on your own supply. The hardest thing as a filmmaker is when you're watching a film that you've worked on for several years. You know every frame so intimately that holding lots of the objectivity of a new viewer who has just seen it for the first time is the hardest thing. Every aesthetic decision you make - and you make thousands of them every day, have to - in theory, must be done from you being a blank slate. You almost have to run a program, like a mind wipe, every time you watch the movie.”

KnowsYearsMindFirstsDoneRunningFilmStuffDecisionWatchesTheoryFirst TimeProgramHardestFilmmakerAestheticBlankViewersHardest ThingWipeObjectivityGetting HighSlateDecisions You MakeBlank Slates
Author:James Cameron
Create image

“The strongest argument against totalitarianism may be a recognition of a universal human nature; that all humans have innate desires for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The doctrine of the blank slate... is a totalitarian's dream.”

HumansMayDreamDesireLibertyHuman NatureArgumentUniversalPursuitDoctrineRecognitionStrongestBlankInnatePursuit Of HappinessTotalitarianismSlateLife Liberty And The Pursuit Of HappinessBlank Slates
Author:Steven Pinker
Create image

“The desirable virgin is sexy but not sexual. She's young, white, and skinny. She's a cheerleader, a babysitter; she's accessible and eager to please (remember those ethics of passivity!). She's never a woman of color. SHe's never a low-income girl or a fat girl. She's never disabled. "Virgin" is a designation for those who meet a certain standard of what women, especially young women, are supposed to look like. As for how these young women are supposed to act? A blank slate is best.”

LooksRememberYoungCertainGirlWhiteColorPleaseLowsStandardsEthicsSexyIncomeFatsBlankYoung WomenVirginsDesirableSkinnyDisabledSlatePassivityCheerleaderLow IncomeBabysitterDesignationBlank SlatesFat Girl
Author:Jessica Valenti
Create image

“My loneliness...still comes over me sometimes...It's a liminal, lost sensation of having wandered wide, endless boulevards, among rows of orange trees, winter butterflies, seasons reversed and out of order, dogs barking from behind fences meant to keep out intruders. It's not the place that impoverishes me but I who bring my own sense of poverty, of loss, to the place. It's a sense of near nothingness, as though I were not so much a blank slate as an erased chalkboard, still bearing illegible smudges of smoothed-over writing.”

WritingStillsSometimesOrderLostMy OwnLossBehindsPovertyTreeDogLonelinessSeasonsWinterWideEndlessSensationsButterflyBlankNothingnessFenceOrangeSlateBoulevardIntrudersBlank SlatesChalkboardsOrange Trees
Author:Marco Roth
Create image

“When a dancer comes onstage, he is not just a blank slate that the choreographer has written on. Behind him he has all the decisions he has made in life. Each time, he has chosen, and in what he is onstage, you see the result of those choices. You are looking at the person he is, and the person who, at this point, he cannot help but be Exceptional dancers, in my experience, are also exceptional people, people with an attitude toward life, a kind of quest, and an internal quality. They know who they are, and they show this to you, willingly.”

PeopleKnowsKindPersonsMadeHelpingShowsChoicesDecisionResultsBehindsAttitudeQualityWrittenChosenDancerInternalsQuestsBlankExceptionalSlateChoreographersBlank Slates
Author:Mikhail Baryshnikov
Create image