Quotessence
Home / Topics / Paranoia Quotes

Paranoia Quotes

Browse 304 quotes about Paranoia.

Related topics

KnowsThinkingPeopleIfsWayFeelsPersonsWantWellsWorld

Paranoia Quotes

“Government surveillance, with its invasive reach into the private lives of citizens, is an egregious violation of the principles that underpin a free and just society. The emotional toll is staggering, as the constant awareness of being monitored erodes the sense of autonomy and security essential for individual well-being. Trust, a cornerstone of any healthy democracy, is shattered, breeding an environment of suspicion and fear. The historical resonance of unlawful surveillance, from oppressive regimes to modern controversies, serves as a stark reminder of the perilous consequences when the state oversteps its bounds. The unlawfulness of such surveillance is not just a legal matter but a moral imperative to safeguard the sanctity of private lives and preserve the emotional health of a free society.”

GovernmentDemocracyTrustPsychologicalWell BeingAssaultSurveillanceParanoiaUnlawfulSelf Censorship
Author:James William Steven Parker
Create image

“Government surveillance is a direct assault on the essence of democracy, a betrayal of the trust citizens place in their elected representatives. The emotional toll inflicted by the knowledge that every move is monitored is a corrosive force that eats away at the psychological well-being of individuals, fostering an environment of paranoia and self-censorship. The damage is not just personal but extends to societal trust, creating a chasm between the governed and those in power. Examples of surveillance overreach, from the dystopian pages of history to contemporary revelations, underscore the urgent need to confront and dismantle the machinery of unlawful surveillance that poses a clear and present danger to the very fabric of our free society.”

GovernmentDemocracyTrustPsychologicalWell BeingAssaultSurveillanceParanoiaUnlawfulSelf Censorship
Author:James William Steven Parker
Create image

“Government surveillance, beyond its legal implications, wreaks havoc on the emotional landscape of individuals, transforming the very essence of personal freedom into a monitored spectacle. The damage inflicted is not confined to the erosion of privacy; it extends into the realm of trust, fracturing the delicate covenant between citizens and their government. The emotional toll of constant surveillance is immeasurable, creating a pervasive culture of anxiety and self-censorship as individuals grapple with the knowledge that their every move is being scrutinized. Historical instances of surveillance excesses, from the Stasi to contemporary controversies, underscore the urgency of recognizing the unlawfulness of such practices and the imperative to reclaim our right to privacy for the sake of our collective well-being.”

GovernmentDemocracyTrustPsychologicalWell BeingAssaultSurveillanceParanoiaUnlawfulSelf Censorship
Author:James William Steven Parker
Create image

“When no one’s word is authoritative, any crank is as credible as the next person. It is the irony at the heart of conspiracy thinking: You can’t trust anyone these days, so you may as well place some credence in some stranger who just tweeted something exciting, if unproven. ... When someone whispers, “Trust no one,” they are inevitably also saying, “Trust me.”

PoliticsTrustContradictionParanoiaConspiracy Theories
Book:Trust: America's Best Chance
Create image

“Benjamin Franklin said, "The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason." I disagree. To truly believe Franklin's statement in the simple terms of the quote, not qualified in any capacity, I propose that you would actually have to be insane, particularly in the realm of extreme paranoia. For instance, to merely take a breath of air, one must have some measure of faith in the vast majority of normal circumstances. One must have the faith that there is not any invisible, odorless, & lethal substance that has gone airborne in your area. To eat or drink something prepared by others, such as at a restaurant, one must have the faith that no one has poisoned your food. You can certainly examine your food prior to eating it, but to run a countless number of tests to see if it is poisoned in a way that is undetectable by sight, scent, or taste is ridiculous on a daily basis. Regardless of your belief in God, gods, atheism, or agnosticism, to completely abstain from faith in life as we know it would make the movie "Bubble Boy" seem like child's play. No, Franklin misunderstands faith and in his error has put a box around reason whose exclusion of faith can't rationally exist in order to further try to justify self-determination of morality. The man who has no faith in anything is unreasonable, and the man who has no reason is incapable of faith.”

ReasonGodFaithChristianityTrustFaith QuotesFaith In GodParanoiaApologeticsFaith Quotations
Author:Adam Garrett
Create image

“Benjamin Franklin said, "The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason." I disagree. To live faithless I propose that you would actually have to be insane, particularly in the realm of extreme paranoia. For instance, to merely take a breath of air, one must have some measure of faith. One must have the faith that there is not any invisible, odorless, & lethal substance that has gone airborne in your area. To eat or drink something prepared by others, such as at a restaurant, one must have the faith that no one has poisoned your food. You can certainly examine your food prior to eating it, but to run a countless number of tests to see if it is poisoned in a way that is undetectable by sight, scent, or taste is ridiculous on a daily basis & there are poisonous substances that could remain undetected. Regardless of your belief in God, gods, atheism, or agnosticism, to completely abstain from faith in life as we know it would make the movie "Bubble Boy" seem like child's play. No, Franklin misunderstands faith and in haste has put a box around reason whose exclusion of faith can't rationally exist in order to further try to justify his disbelief in God including the perceived allowance for self-determination of morality. The man who has no faith in anything is unreasonable, and the man who has no reason is incapable of faith.”

ReasonGodFaithChristianityTrustFaith QuotesFaith In GodParanoiaApologeticsFaith Quotations
Author:Adam B Garrett
Create image

“Often people that tell others they are "extremely polite" when the situation calls for tact and bluntness are not actually polite people. Instead, they hide behind the word “polite” because they have low self esteem or hidden agendas. Sadly, they impolitely confuse the hell out of everyone, send mixed signals, which then makes people question their sanity and motives.”

GamesFearHonestyAnxietyPolitenessParanoiaLow Self EsteemTactAgendaMotivesBluntness
Author:Shannon L. Alder
Create image

“My wife, my kids, my friends—they all think that having an imagination like mine must be quite nice; aside from making all this dough, I can have a little mind-movie whenever things get dull. Mostly they’re right. But every now and then it turns around and bites the shit out of you with these long teeth, teeth that have been filed to points like the teeth of a cannibal. You see things you’d just as soon not see, things that keep you awake until first light. I saw one of those things now, saw it with absolute clarity and certainty.”

ImaginationCreativityParanoia
Book:The Body
Create image

“When we are sad and upset and believe that things are against us, we are attuning our minds to a certain frequency. That frequency then tends to invite in similar circumstances to support and reinforce the main frequency. These circumstances are real, as far as 'real' goes, to the person involved! The universe is really out to get the paranoid person!!!”

SadnessParanoiaAttuningParanoid Person
Book:Beyond Duality: The Art of Transcendence
Create image

“Language stops being a tool; it becomes a map, not to truth but to the person who wrote it.”

LanguageSilencePowerIdentitySurvivalMirrorsObsessionControlParanoiaPredator
Book:Deer Here He Stares: A Neo-Noir Descent Into Obsession, Psychological Delusion, Digital Predators, and the Quiet Girl Who Watches the Watchers
Create image

“Now this word soul, which pops up frequently in Van Norden’s soliloquies, used to have a droll effect upon me at first. Whenever I heard the word soul from his lips I would get hysterical; somehow it seemed like a false coin, more particularly because it was usually accompanied by a gob of brown juice which left a trickle down the corner of his mouth. And as I never hesitated to laugh in his face it happened invariably that when this little word bobbed up Van Norden would pause just long enough for me to burst into a cackle and then, as if nothing had happened, he would resume his monologue, repeating the word more and more frequently and each time with more caressing emphasis. It was the soul of him that women were trying to possess—that he made clear to me. He has explained it over and over again, but he comes back to it afresh each time like a paranoiac to his obsession. In a sense, Van Norden is mad, of that I’m convinced. His one fear is to be left alone, and this fear is so deep and so persistent that even when he is on top of a woman, even when he has welded himself to her, he cannot escape the prison which he has created for himself.”

SoulFearWomenMadnessPrisonParanoiaThe SoulTropic Of CancerStone Walls Do Not A Prison MakeVan Norden
Book:Tropic of Cancer
Create image

“The pain of the narcissist is that, to him, everything is really a threat. What doesn't surrender in reverence is blasphemous to a high opinion of oneself - the burden of self-importance. The narcissist reconstructs his own law of gravity which states that all things and all creatures must adhere to his personal satisfaction, but when they do not, the pain is far more intense than it is for one who is free from the clamors of 'I'.”

PainFearPsychologyEgoThreatSatisfactionBurdenNarcissismParanoiaIntimidationSelf Centeredness
Book:Killosophy
Create image

“[T]he relentless note of incipient hysteria, the invitation to panic, the ungrounded scenarios--the overwhelming and underlying desire for something truly terrible to happen so that you could have something really hot to talk about--was still startling. We call disasters unimaginable, but all we do is imagine such things. That, you could conclude mordantly, is the real soundtrack of our time: the amplification of the self-evident toward the creation of paralyzing, preëmptive paranoia.”

FearDisasterPanicParanoiaHysteriaOverreaction
Author:Adam Gopnik
Create image

“Tulok feared something horrific was moving through the mountains and forests. Tall creatures that carried sticks that made loud noises, able to fire sharp hot objects into any living things. Tall creatures that killed predator and prey alike, and did not value wolves as families or individuals. This was a recurring nightmare Tulok had experienced several times recently. Was it becoming a grim omen? He wondered.”

FearParanoia
Book:The Yukon Wolf
Create image

“I slept in the closet that night. Paranoia and a wild imagination had me picturing a drunken man tearing into my bedroom with an automatic weapon, screaming like a lunatic while blasting holes in my mattress until fluffs of padding flew everywhere and no sleeping child could possibly be left breathing. The closet just felt safer.”

FearRichelle GoodrichRichelle E GoodrichBook QuotesBook LoversParanoiaNovelsTragediesDramatic Stories
Book:Dandelions: The Disappearance of Annabelle Fancher
Create image

“When you lose your ego, you win. It really is that simple.”

WisdomWinningUnderstandingFreedomFamilyGrowing UpSeeingSelf EsteemCommunicationListeningFriendsConfidenceMembersEgoSettingsTargetGossipNarcissismSpeculationParanoiaLow Self EsteemSiblingsAuthentic SelfEgotisticalGuessingBeing FreeOpening UpNot CaringOverthinkingInternalizingSelf DirectedVictomizationReading Between The LinesAccepting PersonalitiesSocial CirclesLetting People InPersonalizingTaking Things PersonallyEverything Is Not About YouReading In To Everything
Author:Shannon L. Alder
Create image

“About his madmen Mr. Lecky was no more certain. He knew less than the little to be learned of the causes or even of the results of madness. Yet for practical purposes one can imagine all that is necessary. As long as maniacs walk like men, you must come close to them to penetrate so excellent a disguise. Once close, you have joined the true werewolf. Pick for your companion a manic-depressive, afflicted by any of the various degrees of mania - chronic, acute, delirious. Usually more man than wolf, he will be instructive. His disorder lies in the very process of his thinking, rather than in the content of his thought. He cannot wait a minute for the satisfaction of his fleeting desires or the fulfillment of his innumerable schemes. Nor can he, for two minutes, be certain of his intention or constant in any plan or agreement. Presently you may hear his failing made manifest in the crazy concatenation of his thinking aloud, which psychiatrists call "flight of ideas." Exhausted suddenly by this riotous expense of speech and spirit, he may subside in an apathy dangerous and morose, which you will be well advised not to disturb. Let the man you meet be, instead, a paretic. He has taken a secret departure from your world. He dwells amidst choicest, most dispendious superlatives. In his arm he has the strength to lift ten elephants. He is already two hundred years old. He is more than nine feet high; his chest is of iron, his right leg is silver, his incomparable head is one whole ruby. Husband of a thousand wives, he has begotten on them ten thousand children. Nothing is mean about him; his urine is white wine; his faeces are always soft gold. However, despite his splendor and his extraordinary attainments, he cannot successfully pronounce the words: electricity, Methodist Episcopal, organization, third cavalry brigade. Avoid them. Infuriated by your demonstration of any accomplishment not his, he may suddenly kill you. Now choose for your friend a paranoiac, and beware of the wolf! His back is to the wall, his implacable enemies are crowding on him. He gets no rest. He finds no starting hole to hide him. Ten times oftener than the Apostle, he has been, through the violence of the unswerving malice which pursues him, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of his own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren, in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Now that, face to face with him, you simulate innocence and come within his reach, what pity can you expect? You showed him none; he will certainly not show you any. Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, 0 Lord; and by thy great mercy defend us from all the perils and dangers of this night; for the love of thy only Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ. Amen. Mr. Lecky's maniacs lay in wait to slash a man's head half off, to perform some erotic atrocity of disembowelment on a woman. Here, they fed thoughtlessly on human flesh; there, wishing to play with him, they plucked the mangled Tybalt from his shroud. The beastly cunning of their approach, the fantastic capriciousness of their intention could not be very well met or provided for. In his makeshift fort everywhere encircled by darkness, Mr. Lecky did not care to meditate further on the subject.”

MadnessMurderKillingInsanityParanoiaManiaMadmanManiacParanoiac
Book:Castaway
Create image

“My former attitude was the luxury of a sheltered child who got to his twenties without ever doubting the stability (and, smugly, I know, the superiority) of his country, without disaster. As it did to so many of my generation, 9/11 broke a stupor that should have broken well before. It seems impossible to me that people who weren't alive then will soon be getting their driver's licenses. When I zoom out, much of this country's history since that day seems a fitful, graceless descent to overseas violence and domestic paranoia. Terrorism works.”

AmericaChangeUnited StatesViolenceTerrorismPatriotismSeptember 11Paranoia9 11
Book:Resistance, Rebellion, Life: 50 Poems Now
Create image

“Stop it!’ The girl jumped out of her chair, ‘Stop torturing me! Stop pretending you didn’t know each other, you planned all this, and then you waited for a wet day and then he was going to come in and then there is this story, and then he’d send the photos off, stop it! Leave me alone!’ She rushed to the door and tore it open and vanished down the hotel stairs.”

LovePainTraumaSuspenseIsolationUnusualParanoiaPsychicHeart BreakingExorcism
Book:A MAN WHO SEEMED REAL: A story of love, lies, fear and kindness
Create image