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Ordinary Quotes

“What is called “apathy” is, I believe, a feeling of helplessness on the part of the ordinary citizen, a feeling of impotence in the face of enormous power. It’s not that people are apathetic; they do care about what is going on, but don’t know what to do about it, so they do nothing, and appear to be indifferent.”

People Knows Believe Feelings Care Faces I Believe Citizens Ordinary Enormous Apathy Indifferent Helplessness Impotence Apathetic Ordinary Citizens

Author:Howard Zinn

“I have always directed my attempts at the figurative representation of objects by way of summary and not very descriptive brushstrokes, diverging greatly from the real objective measurements of things, and this has led many people to talk about childish drawing.. ..this position of seeing them (the objects) without looking at them too much, without focussing more attention on them than any ordinary man would in normal everyday life..”

People Men Way Real Attention Too Much Seeing Position Objects Normal Ordinary Everyday Drawing Objectives Representation Everyday Life Measurement Ordinary Man Summary

Author:Jean Dubuffet

“The successful sale of British Telecom... reveals a vast and untapped yearning among ordinary people for a direct stake in the ownership of British enterprise. Investment in shares has begun to take its place, with ownership of a home and either a bank or building society deposit, as a way for ordinary people to participate in enterprise and wealth creation. We are seeing the birth of people's capitalism.”

“I would like to be a parson on this island. Explain the Sermon on the Mount to ordinary people and let the world be the world.”

People World Ordinary Islands Sermons Ordinary People Sermon On The Mount

Author:Joseph Goebbels

“I don't particularly care about having [my characters] talk realistically, that doesn't mean very much to me. Actually, a lot of people speak more articulately than some critics think, but before the 20th century it really didn't occur to many writers that their language had to be the language of everyday speech. When Wordsworth first considered that in poetry, it was considered very much of a shocker. And although I'm delighted to have things in ordinary speech, it's not what I'm trying to perform myself at all: I want my characters to get their ideas across, and I want them to be articulate.”

People Thinking Want Writing Trying Firsts Mean Ideas Character Care Speak Language Century Speech Ordinary Critics Everyday 20th Century Delighted Wordsworth

Author:Louis Auchincloss

“Unlike every other product that is now manufactured for the table, wine exists in as many varieties as there are people who produce it. Variations in technique, climate, grape, soil and culture ensure that wine is, to the ordinary drinker, the most unpredictable of drinks, and to the connoisseur the most intricately informative, responding to its origins like a game of chess to its opening move.”

Source: I Drink Therefore I Am: A Philosopher's Guide to Wine

“Ordinary Americans, and especially the small minority active in Democrat and Republican primaries, must learn more of what people across the globe are thinking and saying about the US. For if you follow that, you realise that the erosion of American power is happening faster than most of us predicted -- while the politicians in Washington behave like rutting stags with locked antlers.”

People Ifs Thinking America Politician Republican Happenings Ordinary Democrat Active Primaries Faster Behave Minorities Realising Locked Globes Erosion American Power Stags Antlers

Author:Timothy Garton Ash

“What we try to do as Elders is help those who are trying to change their own societies and communities for the better. We hope that by supporting the good work that is being done, especially at the grass roots, we can help to alleviate the suffering of human beings. That is our core mission - to draw attention to the impact that conflict, injustice and poverty have on ordinary people.”

“He's a tremendous breath of fresh air. The things he [Pope Francis] has done in a short period of time: the fact that he does not live in a huge papal mansion and just dropped by in the dining room where ordinary people have meals. You think of his background, where he didn't use limousines in South America, that he used public transport. I'm so, so thrilled that he is there at this crucial moment in the history of our world.”

“I only please myself. I figure I'm just one of many people. I'm not that different from anybody else and I don't have great language - I'm very ordinary.”

People Different Language Figures Please Ordinary Just One

Author:Carl Reiner

“Is it any wonder why Princes & Kings, Are clowns that caper in their sawdust rings, When ordinary people who are like you and me, Are the builders of their destiny...”

People Wonder Destiny Like You Kings Ordinary Rings Ordinary People Clown Builder Sawdust Capers

Author:Noel Gallagher

“Only he who loves and is loved for his own sake can be happy, and what produces that happiness is not so much the sense of sexual communion as of two people being together ... the sexual act viewed as a whole probably affords less happiness than a totally ordinary kiss or often indeed one simple word from the one you love.”

People Two Whole Together Simple Produce Kissing Ordinary Sake Communion One You Love Being Together Simple Words

Author:Elfriede Jelinek

“As we have come to understand the psychology of evil, we have realized that such transformations of human character are not as rare as we would like to believe. Historical inquiry and behavioral science have demonstrated the "banality of evil" -- that is, under certain conditions and social pressures, ordinary people can commit acts that would otherwise be unthinkable.”

“We want to believe we are good, we are different, we are better, or we are superior. But this body of social-psychological research--and there are obviously many more experiments in addition to mine and Milgram's--shows that the majority of good, ordinary, normal people can be easily seduced, tempted, or initiated into behaving in ways that they say they never would. In 30 minutes we got them stepping across that line.”

People Way Want Believe Different Shows Body Social Lines Minutes Mines Normal Research Ordinary Majority Experiments Superiors Psychological Tempted Psychological Research

Author:Philip Zimbardo

“People used to wear ordinary clothes weekdays, and formal attire on Sunday. Today it is the exact reverse.”

People Today Used Clothes Ordinary Sunday Reverse Formal Attire Weekdays

Book:Incerto 4-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness The Black Swan The Bed of Procrustes Antifragile

Source: Incerto 4-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness The Black Swan The Bed of Procrustes Antifragile

“Extraordinary potential exists in all of us. With the right environment, resources, skills and knowledge, 'ordinary' people can produce extraordinary results.”

People Results Environment Produce Skills Ordinary Resources Extraordinary Ordinary People Skills And Knowledge

Author:Kevin Eikenberry

“Most people are middle class. Most people do wish their lives were better than they are. And I think by making my main characters ordinary, average guys, it helps readers identify with their problems. It also helps ground the supernatural events that follow in a recognizable reality and perhaps gives some of my wilder scenarios a little verisimilitude.”

People Thinking Giving Littles Character Helping Problem Reality Guy Wish Class Middle Events Reader Ordinary Average Middle Class Scenarios Main Characters Wilder

Author:Bentley Little

“The majority falls prey to the delusion–popular in some circles–that ordinary people are too careless and stupid to own guns, and we would be far better off leaving all weapons in the hands of professionals on the government payroll. But the simple truth–born of experience–is that tyranny thrives best where government need not fear the wrath of an armed people.”

“Knowledge is a continuous fabric, in which ideas are connected to other ideas. Reason-free zones, in which people can assert arbitrary beliefs safe from ordinary standards of evaluation, can only corrupt this fabric, just as a contradiction can corrupt a system of logic, allowing falsehoods to proliferate through it.”

People Ideas Reason Belief Safe Standards Ordinary Logic Connected Contradiction Zone Allowing Falsehood Fabric Rationality Arbitrary Evaluation

Author:Steven Pinker

“Improv Everywhere tramples the lines drawn between spectacle and spectator, theatre and real life, public and private, performance and protest, and reclaims the streets for ordinary people.”

People Real Lines Streets Ordinary Performances Theatre Real Life Protest Ordinary People Spectators

Author:Lyn Gardner

“Readily people do not accept any ordinary to behave like an extraordinary unless and until some extraordinary but preferably wealthy approves him to be not ordinary.”

People Accepting Ordinary Extraordinary Behave Wealthy

Author:Anuj

“Hillary Clinton is now in Iowa. She's spending every waking minute of her day meeting ordinary people, and it's to prepare her for a job in which she will never again meet an ordinary person.”

People Persons Jobs Minutes Ordinary Meetings Clinton Spending Waking Ordinary People Iowa Ordinary Person

Author:David Letterman

“Medical thinking usually sees stress as highly disturbing but isolated events such as, for example, sudden unemployment, a marriage breakup, or the death of a loved one. These major events are potent sources of stress for many, but there are chronic daily stresses in people's lives that are more insidious and more harmful in their long-term biological consequences. Internally generated stresses take their toll without in any way seeming out of the ordinary.”

“The enduring realization that when a great challenge comes, the most ordinary people can show that they value something more than they value their own lives. When the last of the veterans had gone, and the sorrows and bitterness which the war created had at last worn away, this memory remained.”

People War Shows Lasts Values Challenges Memories History Gone Sorrow Ordinary Endure Realization Civil War Bitterness Worn Veteran Ordinary People American Civil War

Author:Bruce Catton

“You know, heroes are ordinary people that have achieved extraordinary things in life.”

People Knows Sports Hero Ordinary Extraordinary Things In Life Ordinary People Extraordinary Things Ordinary Things

Author:Dave Winfield

“The American people are not uniquely, but characteristically the most spontaneously generous in the world and you're seeing that all over this country in Web sites of charitable organizations that are crashing because of the overwhelming desire on the part of ordinary people to help out.”

People World Country Helping Desire Seeing Ordinary Organization Generous Overwhelming Site Ordinary People Charitable Overwhelming Desire Charitable Organizations

Author:Richard Norton Smith

“David Halberstam often wrote about the powerful, but his real sympathies lay with ordinary people. He was very uncomfortable with bigfoot Washington journalism - he thought it was lazy and self-serving.”

People Real Self Powerful Ordinary Lays Journalism Uncomfortable Lazy Serving Ordinary People Self Serving Bigfoot

Author:Jonathan Yardley

“They [people of Afghanistan] didn't want Al-Qaeda in their country. They didn't appreciate the Taliban taking control. But they really have an incredible amount of dignity. And by that, they are grateful for America's help in ridding them of the Taliban. The average, ordinary person is glad that their daughter can go to school now. There's no public executions, no banning of soccer games. The difference is, they're appreciative, but they don't want any prolonged military presence of the United States there.”

“The average ordinary person, in the worst slums of America, someone who might even hate the law and disagree with the government, they would do something about that [abandoned child]. But in Afghanistan, people hardly have the means to take care of themselves, let alone a random child on the street.”

People Mean Children Persons Government Might Care America Law Hate Streets Worst Ordinary Average Take Care Disagree Afghanistan Abandoned Slums Ordinary Person

Author:Immortal Technique

“Im drawn to stories about ordinary people who get tangled up in an extraordinary event or idea or emotion. Im not saying I dont love films about super-people or super-doctors, but my preference is for stories about how we get through this life, what it is to be human, because Im always struggling with it myself.”

People Humans Ideas Stories Film Emotion Struggle Events Ordinary Doctors Extraordinary This Life Preference Ordinary People Tangled Love Films

Author:Sophie Okonedo

“We are all ordinary people. And it's the extraordinary people Who know it.”

People Knows Ordinary Extraordinary Ordinary People

Author:Gilbert K. Chesterton

“The first race of mankind used to dispute, as our ordinary people do now-a-days, in a kind of wild logic, uncultivated by rule of art.”

People Firsts Kind Art Used Race Mankind Ordinary Argument Logic Ordinary People Disputes

Book:The Works of Joseph Addison: The Spectator

Source: The Works of Joseph Addison: The Spectator

“The trouble is that when most people are apathetic ordinary people ... have to go too far, have to ruin their lives and be made an object of scorn just to get the point across. Did they really think I'd rather be camping by a polluted river than sitting in my own flat with my things about me?”

People Thinking Made My Own Trouble Objects Ordinary Sitting Rivers Ruins Flats Ordinary People Scorn Camping Apathetic

Book:Sexing the Cherry

Source: Sexing the Cherry

“Crazy people who are judged to be harmless are allowed an enormous amount of freedom ordinary people are denied.”

People Crazy Amount Ordinary Enormous Judged Denied Ordinary People Crazy People

Book:Jacob Have I Loved

Source: Jacob Have I Loved

“Publishers, theatrical managers, and critics ask not for the quality inherent in creative art, but will it meet with a good sale, will it suit the palate of the people? Alas, this palate is like a dumping ground; it relishes anything that needs no mental mastication. As a result, the mediocre, the ordinary, the commonplace represents the chief literary output.”

Source: Anarchism: Top Crime Collections

“There are some people who don't conform to the signals. An ordinary well-regulated locomotive slows down or pulls up when it sees the red light hoisted against it. Perhaps I was born color blind. When I see the red signal -- I can't help forging ahead. And in the end, you know, that spells disaster.”

People Knows Wells I Can Ends Helping Light Born Color Ordinary Red Blind Disaster Spells Conform Signals Slow Down Pull Ups Forging Red Lights Locomotives Forging Ahead

Author:Agatha Christie

“[On Russia:] In every way, there is something gigantic about this people: ordinary dimensions have no applications whatever to it. I do not mean by this that true greatness and stability are never met with; but their boldness, their imaginativeness knows no bounds. With them everything is colossal rather than well-proportioned, audacious rather than well-considered, and if they do not attain their goals, it is because they exceed them.”

People Ifs Knows Way Wells Mean Goal Greatness Mets Ordinary Bounds Russia Dimensions Stability Application Boldness Exceed Colossal Audacious True Greatness

Author:Madame de Stael

“I began to wonder - I knew I was an artist or wanted to be one - but I was wondering whether I really was an artist. I was doing such ordinary things that I could feel the difference. Most people would look at those things and say, 'Well, that's nothing. What did you do that for? That's just a wreck of a car or a wreck of a man. That's nothing. That isn't art.' They don't say that anymore.”

People Men Feels Wells Looks Art Wanted Artist Differences Wonder Car Ordinary Photographer Wrecks Ordinary Things

Author:Walker Evans

“There is nothing to compare with the courage of ordinary people whose names are unknown and whose sacrifices pass unnoticed. The courage that dares without recognition, without the protection of media attention, is a courage that humbles and inspires and reaffirms our faith in humanity.”

People Humanity Names Attention Courage Sacrifice Media Inspire Ordinary Dare Protection Recognition Compare Ordinary People Unnoticed Ordinariness Faith In Humanity

Book:Letters From Burma

Source: Letters From Burma

“It is the love of ordinary people, in Burma, in Japan or anywhere else in the world, for justice and peace and freedom that is our surest defense against the forces of unreason and extremism.”

People World Force Justice Ordinary Defense Japan Ordinary People Extremism Peace And Justice Burma Ordinariness

Book:Letters From Burma:

Source: Letters From Burma:

“in reading ... stories, you can be many different people in many different places, doing things you would never have a chance to do in ordinary life. It's amazing that those twenty-six little marks of the alphabet can arrange themselves on the pages of a book and accomplish all that. Readers are lucky - they will never be bored or lonely.”

“One of the marks of true genius is a quality of abundance. A rich, rollicking abundance, enough to give indigestion to ordinary people. Great artists turn it out in rolls, in swatches. They cover whole ceilings with paintings, they chip out a mountainside in stone, they write not one novel but a shelf full. It follows that some of their work is better than other. As much as a third of it may be pretty bad. Shall we say this unevenness is the mark of their humanity - of their proud mortality as well as of their immortality?”

Source: The Nature of the Artist: An Address Delivered at the Dedication Ceremonies for Lee Pattison Recital Hall, Wilbur Hall, Mary Kimberly Residence Hall

“Not everyone in an organization is in a position to accumulate power through competent performance because most people are just carrying out the ordinary and the expected - even if they do it very well. The extent to which a job is routinized fails to give an advantage to anyone doing it because 'success' is seen as inherent in the very establishment of the position and the organization surrounding it. Neither persons nor organizations get 'credit' for doing the mandatory or the expected.”

People Ifs Giving Wells Persons Jobs Work Failing Position Ordinary Advantage Performances Organization Credit Expected Establishment Inherent Competence Competent

Author:Rosabeth Moss Kanter

“Medicine people are truly citizens of two worlds, and those who continue to walk the path of medicine power learn to keep their balance in both the ordinary and the non-ordinary worlds.”

People World Two Walks Path Balance Citizens Ordinary Medicine Two Worlds Ordinary World

Book:Grandmothers of the Light: A Medicine Woman's Sourcebook

Source: Grandmothers of the Light: A Medicine Woman's Sourcebook

“love is ... something extraordinary that happens to ordinary people.”

People Happens Love Is Ordinary Extraordinary Ordinary People

Book:The Last Time They Met

Source: The Last Time They Met

“The fact is every single day in the ordinary American people, America's families have to make decisions about their families and that should be made by them, not by the Texas or United States.”

People Should Made States Facts America Decision United United States Ordinary Texas

Author:Barack Obama

“If you're black, you can't just be ordinary. All successful black people are extraordinary. If you are tremendously successful, and you're black, you are extraordinary, or you wouldn't stand out in this world.”

People Ifs World Black Successful This World Ordinary Extraordinary Black People Standing Out

Author:Tyler Perry

“The culture of the United States has flooded the world. It's the inevitable result of a powerful culture, art. We've got an instinctive touch when it comes to the popular mind because we've had no aristocracy. It is a democratic country. And we know without knowing it, without bothering to understand it, how to reach ordinary people, sometimes with the most vulgar, worthless junk on the face of the earth, but we know how to do it [laughter].”

“Expectations are usually predicated on the idea that the everyday things that happen to ordinary people shouldn't happen to you. People hold the idea of being ordinary in absolute contempt, so when they face an illness, poverty, or any kind of catastrophe, they say, 'I can't believe this happened to me.' And who did you think it was going to happen to - the woman across the street?”

“I felt permanently exiled from 'normality.' Whether imposed by self or society, this outsider status - and not the disability itself - constitutes the most daunting barrier for most people with physical impairments, because it, even more than flights of steps or elevators without braille, prevents them from participating fully in the ordinary world, where most of life's satisfactions dwell.”

People World Self Felt Steps Normal Ordinary Satisfaction Flight Barriers Disability Outsiders Participating Elevators Normality Ordinary World Braille

Author:Nancy Mairs