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Decency Quotes

Browse 448 quotes about Decency.

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Decency Quotes

“I'd better get going or Valek will be wondering where I am." "Yes, by all means go. I noticed you and Valek have become close. Tell him, for me, not to kill anybody, will you?" Sarcasm rendered Rand's voice sharp. I lost control and slammed the oven door shut. It echoed in the quiet kitchen. "At least Valek has the decency to inform me when he's poisoning me.”

MeanLostVoiceWonderDoorsQuietKitchenSarcasmDecencyPoisoningOvens
Book:Poison Study
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“Until a few months ago we had a code of honor, and even the worst ruffians behaved with decency. You could leave your gold in a tent with no guard and no one would touch it, but now all that has changed. The law of the jungle rules, the only ideology is greed. Don't let yourself be parted from your weapons, and always travel in pairs or groups, because this is a land of thieves.”

LawGroupsLandWorstChangedMonthsHonorWeaponsGoldGreedIdeologyCodePairsThievesJungleDecencyTentsRuffianCode Of Honor
Author:Isabel Allende
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“How shall Integrity face Oppression? What shall Honesty do in the face of Deception, Decency in the face of Insult, Self-Defense before Blows? How shall Desert and Accomplishment meet Despising, Detraction, and Lies? What shall Virtue do to meet Brute Force? There are so many answers and so contradictory; and such differences for those on the one hand who meet questions similar to this once a year or once a decade, and those who face them hourly and daily.”

YearsSelfHandsFacesLyingForceDifferencesAnswersVirtueHonestyIntegrityBlowDefenseDecadesOppressionDesertDeceptionAccomplishmentInsultDecencyContradictoryBrutesSelf DefenseBrute Force
Author:W. E. B. Du Bois
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“She understood the genre constraints, the decencies were supposed to be observing. The morally cosy vision allows the embrace of monstrosity only as a reaction to suffering or as an act of rage against the Almighty. Vampire interviewee Louis is in despair at his brother’s death when he accepts Lestat’s offer. Frankenstein’s creature is driven to violence by the violence done to him. Even Lucifer’s rebellion emerges from the agony of injured price. The message is clear: By all means become an abomination—but only while unhinged by grief or wrath.”

MeanDoneSufferingGriefAcceptingVisionClearViolenceBrotherOffersCreaturesDespairMessagesUnderstoodEmbraceDrivenRageReactionsVampireSupposed To BeGenreRebellionAgonyAlmightyWrathDecencyObservingInjuredConstraintsLuciferAbominationMonstrosityLestatCosy
Author:Glen Duncan
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“School days, I believe, are the unhappiest in the whole span of human existence. They are full of dull, unintelligible tasks, new and unpleasant ordinances, brutal violations of common sense and common decency. It doesn't take a reasonably bright boy long to discover that most of what is rammed into him is nonsense, and that no one really cares very much whether he learns it or not.”

BelieveHumansLongWholeCareSchoolI BelieveCommonExistenceBoysTasksCommon SenseDullNonsenseBrutalDecencyViolationHuman ExistenceOrdinancesUnschoolingSchool DaysCommon Decency
Book:Mencken Chrestomathy
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“A great number of those working for liberal causes are not only shy but borderline collusive. They want change to happen nicely, and it won't. They want decency to come about without anybody suffering or being embarrassed, and it won't. And most of all they want to give many of the enemies of open government the benefit of the doubt, and I don't. It's not just a difference of approach, it's a complete schism in our respective philosophy. You can't go about disclosure in the hope that it won't spoil anybody's dinner.”

WantGivingPhilosophyGovernmentHappensSufferingCausesDifferencesNumbersEnemyDoubtBenefitsApproachDinnerShyEmbarrassedDecencySpoilDisclosureBorderlineBenefit Of The DoubtSchism
Book:Julian Assange: The Unauthorised Autobiography
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“The Fundamentalist Christians have told me that I am a slave of Satan and should have my demons expelled with an exorcism. The Fundamentalist Materialists inform me that I am a liar, charlatan, fraud and scoundrel. Aside from this minor difference, the letters are astoundingly similar. Both groups share the same crusading zeal and the same lack of humor, charity and common human decency. These intolerable cults have served to confirm me in my agnosticism by presenting further evidence to support my contention that when dogma enters the brain, all intellectual activity ceases.”

ShouldHumansChristianDifferencesCommonBrainSupportGroupsShareActivityIntellectualEvidenceLettersShould HaveSlaveCharityCeaseSatanDemonLiarsFraudDogmaMinorsCultDecencyZealPresentingAgnosticismFundamentalistContentionScoundrelsCharlatansExorcism
Author:Robert Anton Wilson
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“It is this idea 'decency' should be attached to wealth -and 'indecency'' to poverty - that forms the core of one strand of skeptical complaint against the modern status-ideal. Why should failure to make money be taken as a sign of an unconditionally flawed human being rather than of a fiasco in one particular area if the far larger, more multifaceted, project of leading a good life? Why should both wealth and poverty be read as the predominant guides to an individual's morals ?”

IfsShouldHumansIdeasFormIndividualWealthHuman BeingsMoralPovertyTakenModernParticularProjectsAreasIdealsGuidesCoreMaking MoneyGood LifeComplaintsFlawedDecencySkepticalStrandsFiascoWealth And Poverty
Author:Alain de Botton
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“In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, such as 'right-to-work.' It provides no 'rights' and no 'works.' Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining…. We demand this fraud be stopped.”

PurposeFightingRightsDemandLaborUnionsCivil RightsGloriousCollectivesWorking ItFraudDecencySlogansCivil Rights MovementFooledBargainingLabor UnionWorkers RightsCollective BargainingLabor Laws
Author:Martin Luther King, Jr.
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“We all have demons inside us, Nick. The Tsalagi have an old saying—every heart holds two wolves. One is the white wolf, who is made up of love, kindness, respect, decency, compassion, and all the things that are good in life. The black wolf is born of jealousy, hatred, pettiness, prejudice, vindictiveness, and all the poisons of the human personality. The two constantly war with each other for dominance. And one day, one wolf will overtake and devour the other.” - Acheron”

HumansHeartMadeTwoWarBlackBornWhiteCompassionKindnessPersonalityOne DayHatredPrejudicePoisonDemonDecencyDominanceOld SayingPettinessHuman PersonalityVindictivenessTwo Wolves
Book:Inferno: Chronicles of Nick
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“I watched as Humphrey Bogart’s character used beans as a metaphor for the relative unimportance in the wider world of his relationship with Ingrid Bergman’s character, and chose logic and decency ahead of his selfish emotional desires. The quandary and resulting decision made for an engrossing film. But this was not what people cried about. They were in love and could not be together. I repeated this statement to myself, trying to force an emotional reaction. I couldn’t. I didn’t care. I had enough problems of my own.”

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Author:Graeme Simsion
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“In a president, character is everything. A president doesn't have to be brilliant... He doesn't have to be clever; you can hire clever... You can hire pragmatic, and you can buy and bring in policy wonks. But you cant buy courage and decency, you cant rent a strong moral sense. A president must bring those things with him. He needs to have, in that much maligned word, but a good one nonetheless, a vision of the future he wishes to create.. But a vision is worth little if a president doesn't have the character - the courage and heart - to see it through.”

IfsNeedsHeartLittlesCharacterStrongWishPresidentMoralVisionCouragePolicyAmbitionBrilliantCleverCantDecencyPragmaticVisions Of The Future
Author:Peggy Noonan
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“With all their faults, trade unions have done more for humanity than any other organization of men that ever existed. They have done more for decency, for honesty, for education, for the betterment of the race, for the developing of character in men, than any other association of men.”

MenDoneCharacterHumanityRaceHonestyLaborOrganizationTradeUnionsFaultsDevelopingAssociationDecencyBettermentLabor UnionLabor DayTrade UnionsOrganized LaborUnion Solidarity
Author:Clarence Darrow
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“For my own part I would as soon be descended from that heroic little monkey, who braved his dreaded enemy in order to save the life of his keeper; or from that old baboon, who, descending from the mountains, carried away in triumph his young comrade from a crowd of astonished dogs-as from a savage who delights to torture his enemies, offers up bloody sacrifices, practices infanticide without remorse, treats his wives like slaves, knows no decency, and is haunted by the grossest superstitions.”

KnowsLittlesYoungOrderMy OwnEnemyPracticeWifeSacrificeDogEvolutionOffersMountainTreatsSlaveCrowdsDelightTriumphTortureHeroicSuperstitionsBloodySavagesMonkeysRemorseDecencyComradeKeepersCarried AwayDescendingBaboonsInfanticide
Author:Charles Darwin
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“The puritanical potentialities of science have never been forecast. If it evolves a body of organized rites, and is established as a religion, hierarchically organized, things more than anything else will be done in the name of 'decency.' The coarse fumes of tobacco and liquors, the consequent tainting of the breath and staining of white fingers and teeth, which is so offensive to many women, will be the first things attended to.”

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Author:Wyndham Lewis
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“There is no telling to what extremes of cruelty and ruthlessness a man will go when he is freed from the fears, hesitations, doubts and the vague stirrings of decency that go with individual judgement. When we lose our individual independence in the corporateness of a mass movement, we find a new freedom- freedom to hate, bully, lie, torture, murder and betray without shame and remorse. Herein undoubtedly lies part of the attractiveness of a mass movement”

MenLyingHateIndividualLosesDoubtMovementMassMurderShameIndependenceExtremesTyrannyCrueltyJudgementTortureTyrantsBetrayVagueBullyRemorseDecencyHesitationStirringAttractivenessRuthlessnessIndividual Independence
Book:Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer
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“I have observed that the world has suffered far less from ignorance than from pretensions to knowledge. It is not skeptics or explorers but fanatics and ideologues who menace decency and progress. No agnostic ever burned anyone at the stake or tortured a pagan, a heretic, or an unbeliever.”

WorldProgressAtheismHumilityIgnoranceAtheistPositive AtheismInsightfulStakesBurnedAgnosticDecencyFanaticsPaganSkepticThere Is No GodAgnosticismMenaceExplorersPretensionHereticUnbelieversIf There Is A GodThere Being No GodIdeologues
Author:Daniel J. Boorstin
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“Comforts that were rare among our forefathers are now multiplied in factories and handed out wholesale; and indeed, nobody nowadays, so long as he is content to go without air, space, quiet, decency and good manners, need be without anything whatever that he wants; or at least a reasonably cheap imitation of it.”

WantNeedsLongSpaceProgressAirComfortQuietMannersGood ManFactoriesConsumerismImitationCultDecencyOverconsumptionGood MannersForefathersWholesale
Author:Gilbert K. Chesterton
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“We entered a synagogue which was packed with the greatest stinking bunch of humanity I have ever seen. Either these Displaced Persons never had any sense of decency or else they lost it all during their period of internment by the Germans. My personal opinion is that no people could have sunk to the level of degradation these have reached in the short space of four years.”

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Author:George S. Patton
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“Every old man complains of the growing depravity of the world, of the petulance and insolence of the rising generation. He recounts the decency and regularity of former times, and celebrates the discipline and sobriety of the age in which his youth was passed; a happy age which is now no more to be expected, since confusion has broken in upon the world, and thrown down all the boundaries of civility and reverence.”

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Author:Lyndon B. Johnson
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“It is a good idea to be ambitious, to have goals, to want to be good at what you do, but it is a terrible mistake to let drive and ambition get in the way of treating people with kindness and decency. The point is not that they will then be nice to you. It is that you will feel better about yourself.”

PeopleWayWantLoveInspirationalFeelsIdeasDreamGoalMistakeKindnessNiceTerribleAmbitionTreatsBe GoodAbout YourselfGood IdeasInteractionAmbitiousFeel BetterBeing NiceDecencyInteractingInteracting With Others
Author:Robert Solow
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