Best Moral Superiority Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings

“He did not know why she pulled out the hair of the dead. Accordingly, he did not know whether her case was to be put down as good or bad. But in his eyes, pulling out the hair of the dead in the Rashomon on this stormy night was an unpardonable crime. Of course it never entered his mind that a little while ago he had though of becoming a thief”

Social Justice Hypocrisy Contradiction Japanese Literature Moral Superiority Ryunosuke Akutagawa

Book:Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

Source: Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“Like prison, I'm never getting out of trouble. The only thing I can do is make my trouble your joy - because here's the thing about reading my memoir: it will make you feel good about yourself. You feel morally superior even as you identify with me. You slip into the supple skin of a cannibal for nearly three hundred pages, and enjoy it; then you can slough it off, go about your happy moral business, and feel like you are a better person.”

Escapism Moral Superiority Memoi

Book:A Certain Hunger

Source: A Certain Hunger

“You can build the Empire State Building. Train the Prussian army. Elevate the hierarchy of a totalitarian state higher than the throne of the Most High. But there are still people whose moral superiority defeats your own.”

Morality Achievement Moral Superiority

Book:The First Circle

Source: The First Circle

“It is vital that we avoid any hint of moral superiority in our dealings with one another in the environmental movement; if it developed into factionalism it would destroy us, as factionalism has destroyed so many other progressive movements in America.”

Moral Superiority Environmental Movement Factionalism

Book:Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast

Source: Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast

“My parents joined the Communist Party but left it in their twenties. My father encouraged me to read Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s exposés of the Soviet Union and argue about them at the dinner table. He knew how bad the Left could get, but this knowledge did not stop him from remaining very left wing. He would never have entertained the notion that communism was as bad as fascism. In this, he was typical. Anti-communism was never accepted as the moral equivalent of anti-fascism, not only by my parents but also by the overwhelming majority of liberal-minded people. The Left was still morally superior. Even when millions were murdered and tens of millions were enslaved and humiliated, the ‘root cause’ of crimes beyond the human imagination was the perversion of noble socialist ideals.”

Communism Leftists Moral Superiority Leftist Dogmatism

Book:What's Left?

Source: What's Left?

“Veganism needs a PR makeover. Most people think it's a nutty cult where, at initiation, new members receive the International Step of Moral Superiority from which they look down their noses at non-vegans.”

Vegan Cult Veganism Public Relations Snobbery Vegan Diet Moral Superiority Vegans Makeover Change Of Image

Author:Stewart Stafford

“Japan suffered terribly from the atomic bomb but never adopted a pose of moral superiority, implying: 'We would never have done it!' The Japanese know perfectly well they would have used it had they had it. They accept the idea that war is war; they give no quarter and accept none. Total war, they recognize, knows no Queensberry Rules. If you develop a devastating new weapon during a total war, you use it; you do not put it into the War Museum.”

Source: The land of the rising yen: Japan

“All political movements are like this - we are in the right, everyone else is in the wrong. The people on our own side who disagree with us are heretics, and they start becoming enemies. With it comes an absolute conviction of your own moral superiority. There's oversimplification in everything, and a terror of flexibility.”

“The terrorism of the suicide bomber and the terrorism of aerial bombardment are indeed morally equivalent. To say otherwise (as either side might) is to give one moral superiority over the other, and thus serve to perpetuate the horrors of our time.”

Giving Might Sides Moral Horror Suicide Terrorism Our Time Superiority Bombers Suicide Bombers Moral Superiority

Author:Howard Zinn

“Scandal is great entertainment because it allows people to feel contempt, a moral emotion that gives feelings of moral superiority while asking nothing in return. With contempt you don't need to right the wrong (as with anger) or flee the scene (as with fear or disgust). And the best of all, contempt is made to share. Stories about the moral failings of others are among the most common kinds of gossip, they are a stable of talk radio, and they offer a ready way for people to show that they share a common moral orientation.”

Source: The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom

“But there are still people whose moral superiority defeats your own.”

People Stills Moral Defeat Superiority Moral Superiority

Author:Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

“Although God's people find many successes in the world, they must not fall prey to a spirit of pride. We succeed not because of our moral superiority but because of the faithfulness of our divine intercessor and because of the great mercy of God.”

People World Spirit Fall Moral Divine Pride Succeed Mercy Superiority Prey Faithfulness Mercy Of God Intercessors Moral Superiority

Author:Max Anders

“When moral superiority combines with billowing ignorance, they fill up a hot-air balloon that's awfully hard not to poke.”

Hard Moral Air Ignorance Hot Superiority Balloons Poke Hot Air Moral Superiority Air Balloons Hot Air Balloons

Book:Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: Our Year of Seasonal Eating

Source: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: Our Year of Seasonal Eating

“Smiley Bone: You can't feel safe unless there's something to be safe against! Phoney Bone: Exactly! People like to be victims! There's a certain unassailable moral superiority about it.”

People Feels Certain Moral Safe Victim Bones Superiority Smiley Moral Superiority

Author:Jeff Smith

“The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion […] but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact; non-Westerners never do.”

Source: The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order

“The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creatures that cannot.”

Source: Mark Twain’s Book of Animals

“I normally can't stand vice-free people. They conflate a narcissistic instinct for self-preservation with moral superiority. Plus, they suck the life right out of a party.”

People Self Party Moral Instinct Vices Plus Superiority Preservation Narcissistic Self Preservation Moral Superiority

Author:Dennis Lehane

“Then he is a monster!" the Prince crowed, "and I must slay him at once. The Formula works!" "Your Formula must result in a great deal of fighting," I mused. "Oh, yes, when applied correctly mighty and noble battles result! Of course I always win—the value of Prince X is a constant. It cannot be lesser than that of Monster Y—this is the Moral Superiority Hypothesis made famous five hundred years ago by my ancestor Ethelred, the Mathematician-King. We have never seen his equal, in all these centuries.”

“Scandal is great entertainment because it allows people to feel contempt, a moral emotion that gives feeling of moral superiority while asking nothing in return.”

People Giving Feels Feelings Emotion Moral Return Morality Asking Entertainment Contempt Superiority Scandal Moral Superiority

Book:The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom

Source: The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom

“The greatest threat to compassion is the temptation to succumb to fantasies of moral superiority.”

Compassion Moral Fantasy Threat Temptation Superiority Moral Superiority

Author:Stephen Batchelor

“It is Toussaint's supreme merit that while he saw European civilisation as a valuable and necessary thing, and strove to lay its foundations among his people, he never had the illusion that it conferred any moral superiority. He knew French, British, and Spanish imperialists for the insatiable gangsters that they were, that there is no oath too sacred for them to break, no crime, deception, treachery, cruelty, destruction of human life and property which they would not commit against those who could not defend themselves.”

“Pretensions to moral superiority are devastatingly destructive.”

Moral Destructive Superiority Pretension Moral Superiority

Author:Mary Douglas

“Humility is the essence of repentance. Humility is selfless, not selfish. It doesn't demand its own way or speak with moral superiority. Instead, humility answers softly and listens kindly for understanding, not vindication. Humility recognizes that no one can change someone else, but with faith, effort, and the help of God, we can undergo our own mighty change of heart.”

“In the spiritual domain, criticism is love turned sour... If criticism becomes a habit, it will destroy the moral energy of the life and paralyze the spiritual force... Whenever you are in a critical temper, it is impossible to enter into communion with God. Criticism makes you hard and vindictive and cruel, and leaves you with the flattering unction that you are a superior person. It is impossible to develop the characteristics of a saint and maintain a critical attitude.”