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Formality Quotes

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Formality Quotes

“It is one of the defining features of any bureaucracy that those who staff it are selected by formal, impersonal criteria. Most often, some kind of test. That is, bureaucrats are not, say, elected like politicians. But neither should they get the job just because they are someone's cousin. In theory, they are meritocracies. In fact, everyone knows that the system is compromised in a thousand different ways. Many of the staff are, in fact, there just because they are someone's cousin. And everybody knows it.”

PoliticsHypocrisyBureaucracyComplicityMeritocracyFormalityNepotismStaffing
Book:The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy
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“Believers should be open to and encourage the Spirit's moving within each one, including the spontaneity from individual initiatives when gathered together. Believers need to be vigilant to prevent formality of liturgy where the Spirit is stifled, and individual initiatives are not allowed.”

ChristianityHoly SpiritLiturgyFormalityHouse ChurchOrganic Church
Book:ONE: Unfolding God's Eternal Purpose from House to House
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“Therefore in one line why don't these (The higher authority of an office) people just say, "You are our sex toy. We will use you as our vibrator until we derive pleasure in earning profits from you. Once we learn that you are of no use and you are not giving the pleasure we need, we will kick you or throw you in a dustbin as we throw a condom in dustbin after sex.”

PeopleOfficeDepressionFormalityOffice PeopleIt Started With A Friend Request
Book:It Started With a Friend Request
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“Psychobabble is... a set of repetitive verbal formalities that kills off the very spontaneity, candor, and understanding it pretends to promote. It's an idiom that reduces psychological insight to a collection of standardized observations, that provides a frozen lexicon to deal with an infinite variety of problems.”

ProblemLanguageUnderstandingDealsInfiniteInsightPsychologicalObservationVarietyCollectionsFrozenSpontaneityCandorRepetitiveJargonIdiomFormalityLexicon
Author:Richard Rosen
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“The inhabitant of London could order by telephone, sipping his morning tea in bed, the various products of the whole earth -- he could at the same time and by the same means adventure his wealth in the natural resources and new enterprise of any quarter of the world -- he could secure forthwith, if he wished, cheap and comfortable means of transit to any country or climate without passport or other formality.”

IfsWorldMeanCountryWholeEarthOrderPeaceNaturalWealthMorningAdventureProductsBedComfortableResourcesEconomicsClimateVariousLondonSecureTeaEnterpriseQuartersTelephonesNatural ResourcesPassportsFormalitySipping
Author:John Maynard Keynes
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“Where are these rational practices to be taught and acquired? Not within the four walls of a bare building, in which formality predominates... But in the nursery, play-ground, fields, gardens, workshops, manufactures, museums and class-rooms. ...The facts collected from all these sources will be concentrated, explained, discussed, made obvious to all, and shown in their direct application to practice in all the business of life.”

MadePlayFactsRoomsClassPracticeFourFieldsBuildingTaughtSourceWallGardenDirectObviousRationalMuseumsApplicationWorkshopsNurseryFormalityFour Walls
Author:Robert Owen
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“One of the nice things about our marriage, at least to my way of thinking, is that my wife and I no longer have to argue every thing through. We each know what the other will say, and so the saying becomes an unnecessary formality. No doubt some marriage counselor would explain to us that our problem is a failure to communicate, but to my way of thinking we've worked long and hard to achieve this silence, Lily's and mine, so fraught with mutual understanding.”

ThinkingKnowsWayLongHardProblemUnderstandingSilenceDoubtNiceWifeAchieveMinesCommunicateMy WifeArguingMy WayNo DoubtMutualUnnecessaryWay Of ThinkingLiliesNice ThingsCounselorFormalityMutual Understanding
Book:Straight Man
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“Boredom has to be the most life sapping, mental disease you can be afflicted with.The most accurate definition of boredom I have ever heard is this - Boredom is the absence of a creative idea. But there is a simple cure - begin to think immediately of a better way to do something. The creative juices are within you but you must turn on the tap. Those who are bored are not living; they are dying. When their heart stops beating, it will be a mere formality. The best way to do anything has never been thought of. Get on a creative improvement kick and jar others mentally into the same activity.”

ThinkingWayHeartIdeasTurnsSimpleCreativeHeardDyingActivityDiseaseMereDefinitionsAbsenceImprovementBest WayCuresBoredKicksBoredomAccurateWithin YouJuiceTurn-onBetter WaysJarsCreative IdeasFormalityCreative Juices
Author:Bob Proctor
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“Great part of that order which reigns among mankind is not the effect of government. It has its origin in the principles of society and the natural constitution of man. It existed prior to government, and would exist if the formality of government was abolished. The mutual dependence and reciprocal interest which man has upon man, and all the parts of civilised community upon each other, create that great chain of connection which holds it together.”

IfsMenGovernmentTogetherOrderInterestCommunityNaturalPrinciplesMankindEffectsConnectionsConstitutionChainsMutualReignDependenceReciprocalCivilisedFormality
Book:The Thomas Paine Collection: Common Sense, Rights of Man, Age of Reason, An Essay on Dream, Biblical Blasphemy, Examination Of The Prophecies
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“I submit that tennis is the most beautiful sport there is, and also the most demanding....Basketball comes close, but it's a team sport and lacks tennis's primal mano a mano intensity. Boxing might come close- at least at the lighter weight divisions- but the actual physical damage the fighters inflict on each other makes it too concretely brutal to be really beautiful- a level of abstraction and formality (i.e., play) is necessary for a sport to possess true metaphysical beauty (in my opinion).”

PlayMightBeautifulSportsLevelsOpinionTeamBasketballWeightFighterDamageTennisBoxingDivisionIntensitySubmitBrutalMetaphysicalAbstractionPrimalLightersReally BeautifulSports TeamFormalityPhysical Beauty
Author:David Foster Wallace
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“The etiquette of intimacy is very different from the etiquette of formality, but manners are not just something to show off to the outside world. If you offend the head waiter, you can always go to another restaurant. If you offend the person you live with, it's very cumbersome to switch to a different family.”

IfsWorldPersonsDifferentShowsFamilyMannersIntimacyRestaurantsEtiquetteShowing OffOutside WorldWaiterFormalityFamily ManDifferent Families
Author:Judith Martin
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“In love affairs, there is no mediator like a merry, simple-hearted child - ever ready to cement divided hearts, to span the unfriendly gulf of custom, to melt the ice of cold reserve, and overthrow the separating walls of dread formality and pride.”

HeartChildrenSimpleReadyWallPrideColdAffairIceCustomsDividedDreadReservesHeartedMerryLove AffairCementSeparatingFormalityMediatorsUnfriendlyDivided Heart
Book:The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (Diversion Illustrated Classics)
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“There is scarcely a town or school in Russia from which boys have not run away to the war. Hundreds of girls have gone off in boys' clothes and tried to pass themselves off as boys and enlist as volunteers, and several have got through, since the medical examination is only a negligible formality required in one place, forgotten in another.”

WarRunningSchoolGirlBoysGoneClothesTownsForgottenMedicalRussiaRunning AwayVolunteerExaminationGreat WarFormality
Book:Russia in 1916
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“One of the biggest problems of mathematics is to explain to everyone else what it is all about. The technical trappings of the subject, its symbolism and formality, its baffling terminology, its apparent delight in lengthy calculations: these tend to obscure its real nature. A musician would be horrified if his art were to be summed up as "a lot of tadpoles drawn on a row of lines"; but that"s all that the untrained eye can see in a page of sheet music... In the same way, the symbolism of mathematics is merely its coded form, not its substance.”

IfsWayArtRealProblemWould BeEyeFormLinesSubjectsMusicianPagesMathematicsDelightMathSubstanceObscureSheetsCalculationsSymbolismTerminologyFormalityLengthyTadpolesSheet Music
Author:Ian Stewart
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“The officers do not beat the men; the officers and men receive equal treatment. Soldiers are free to hold meetings and speak out. Trivial formalities have been done away with and the accounts are open for all to inspect.”

MenHas BeensDoneSpeakHe ManEqualBeatsAccountsMeetingsSoldierTreatmentOfficersSpeaks OutHold MeFormalityEqual Treatment
Book:Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung (The Little Red Book) & Other Works
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“I probably sensed the serious formality of the ceremonies and felt what others were feeling then. Looking back, I'd guess that it had opened up a gaping hole in my psyche. In the process of creating art, I might be trying to fill that hole, or to reduce its depth, or to make it feel less hollow. I think that making art could have helped from that moment on.”

ThinkingFeelsTryingArtMomentsFeelingsMightFeltProcessSeriousCreatingDepthHolesThat MomentLooking BackCeremonyHollowFormalityCreating Art
Author:Araya Rasdjarmrearnsook
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“When your mother asks, 'Do you want a piece of advice?' it is a mere formality. It doesn't matter if you answer yes or no. You're going to get it anyway.”

IfsWantInspirationalMatterMotherAsksAnswersPiecesAdviceMomDaughterMereMy MomMotherhoodGrandmotherMothers DayBeing A MomYour MomBeing A MotherMotheringMother DaughterMother LoveFormalityGreat MotherYes Or NoJust A MomFunny Mothers DayFunny MotherhoodBest MomMother FlowerFunny MotherYoung MotherWonderful Mother
Author:Erma Bombeck
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