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Social Commentary Quotes

Browse 162 quotes about Social Commentary.

Social Commentary Quotes

“Bizzaro Time by Stewart Stafford I took dawn selfies on a bridge, Geneva worms conferred in slime, A woman's dog slithered serpentine, It snapped and hissed in bizarro time. A businessman's briefcase in flight, Went public in a philanthropist sky, Umbrellas blossomed into trees, Peacenik pigeon medal caught the eye. Coffee shops served liquid light, Brewed up pagan code of yore, Pedestrians' morphed molten form, Glass-blown in tangerine pour. We shared loop shrugs, muted pleas, Sober intoxication's escapist twist, A uniquely-marketed Tuesday morn, Dreamt up to commodify every tryst. © 2025, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”

TechnologyAuthenticitySatireDystopianSurrealismSocial CommentaryAbsurdismCommodificationSocial Commentary HumorSocial Commentary Satire
Author:Stewart Stafford
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“The Almighty Jar by Stewart Stafford Protestors in the street chanted: "Crackpot!" Mocking supreme leader The Almighty Jar, Rattling it into swift and oleaginous action, It flipped its lid and sought vengeance. The jar ordered its troops to open fire, On the defiant yet unarmed crowd, But the army flatly refused to obey, Until the jar started oozing sneakily. Too late came a decree that military personnel, Smear Deindividuation serum on themselves, Freedom fighters stormed the jar's shelf palace, Smashing it and replacing it with an urn. © 2021, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”

Science FictionSatireDictatorshipDystopianTotalitarianismDark HumorSocial CommentaryAbsurdismPolitical SatireOrwellian
Author:Stewart Stafford
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“Points of views that are expressed on Twitter don’t intend to offend, but rather defend and open the conversation up to everyone so that no one has to pretend.”

LifeLeadershipBusinessSocial JusticeSocial MediaSocial ChangeTwitterFacebookTwitter QuotesSocial CommentaryBe Yourself InspirationalSocial Media AdviceBe Yourself QuoteSocial Media BehaviourSpeakerSocial Media MindTwitter NationTwitter AdviceTwitter AddictionSocial Media AuthorsSuccesssSocial Media Audience
Author:Germany Kent
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“Many hesitate to even start an open discussion that could awaken the people, knowing they must be prepared to face online trolls who constantly post counterarguments against what is right. They must also confront the mediocrity of public discourse, where individuals who have been conditioned to justify what is not right argue blindly for their political idols.”

CourageActivismFreedom Of SpeechCritical ThinkingSocial CommentaryMedia ManipulationPolarizationPolitical DiscoursePublic DebateOnline Trolls
Book:Bansang Pinipilas
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“Last summer, in London at least, the hoodie was transformed from a benign piece of leisurewear into a uniform for the disaffected, the angry, the malevolent. So much so that ‘hoodie’ was no longer a piece of clothing. It was a whole person. A hoodie was somebody likely to steal, plunder and do you unimaginable harm. People were crossing the street when a hoodie crossed their path - even if it was a 70-year-old gentleman walking his dog. That’s how quickly the fear had permeated the collective consciousness. And lifting the hood was tantamount to cocking a gun.”

CrimeRiotSocial CommentaryLondon Riots
Book:RIOT MURDER - Myles Morgan Undercover #2
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“Matthew Hopkins: Witchfinder General (1645 – 1647) by Stewart Stafford ‘Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live’ – Exodus, Nor allow legalised killing too cheaply, Twenty shillings of blood money per witch, A charlatan’s extortion for ‘cleansing.’ Witchcraft, the capital crime of the age, Lawyer Hopkins, parasitising laws, Self-appointed Witchfinder General, A reign of terror brought to God-fearing doors. Evildoing’s hunter was its embodiment; A Judas purse wed brutality’s handmaiden, With Stearne, stoked Essex witch hunt mania, Puritanical zeal’s sadistic cruelty. His victims were cast into dungeon pits; Bloodied and broken in outcast desperation; Disease helped some cheat the hangman; The only fortune anyone deemed fair. Extracting confessions through torture’s pain; Their skin pricked to find Satan’s mark, Victims, forced to run until collapse, Sleepless starvation hastened their bleak end. Then to the wicked ducking stool gauntlet, Lowered into muddy ditches or icy water, A survivor’s noose or drowned exoneration? None met the Witchfinder’s imperious eyes. “I, John Lowes, a minister of God, Was martyred so. Hopkins, thou pestilent knave! Bade me to run, held aloft by mocking hands, Funeral rites as I dug mine own grave.” Sensing his gaslit flames turn back on him, Hopkins went to ground with his ill-gotten gains, Slowly he faded, from infamous to obscure, Scars linger on 300 unmarked graves. Some say that Hopkins was executed as a witch, Or faced a tubercular end in his village, Where he is buried, no one knows or cares, Hexed in a barren field for karmic tillage. Rat-catcher to an imagined pestilence, Communities, not covens, he did churn, A toxic chalice for New World lips, Fanning Salem’s pernicious turn. © 2024, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”

InjusticeWitchWitchesWitchcraftSocial CommentaryBritish HistoryWitch TrialsWitchhuntMatthew HopkinsWitchfinder General
Author:Stewart Stafford
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“The Edge of Reason by Stewart Stafford I do not want to die or take my own life, I cling to the outside of skyscraper metal, Thick, choking smoke rakes my shoulder, Scorching flames lash my back and legs. I showered, dressed and went to work, I arrived early, said hello, found my desk, Then the building shifted, smiles faded, Everything changed, and here we are. God, please take me quickly, I beg you, Bless my loved ones, I hope they understand, A Rorschach test for shocked rubberneckers, I let the air pressure suck me out and drop. The initial relief of vacating impossibility, Turns to violent buffeting in wind currents, Clothes ripped off as I spin, falling faster, Crowds point, the ground rushes towards me. © 2024, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”

SurvivalTragedyDisasterDeath And DyingSocial CommentaryWorld Trade CenterExistential CrisisSeptember 11thTwin Towers9 11 Poem
Author:Stewart Stafford
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“So you've been gone a couple days,' Alison said. 'Hmm, what'd you miss...A celebrity did drugs. Politicians disagreed. A different celebrity wore a bikini that revealed a bodily imperfection. A team won a sporting event, but another team lost.' I smiled. 'You can't go disappearing on everybody like this, Hazel. You miss too much.”

HumorSatireAmerican SocietySocial CommentaryContemporary SocietySocial Mores
Book:The Fault in Our Stars
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“We have gone completely, universally soft. The bastardization of the English language is now officially complete because the word 'trauma' has become the new black. It’s the absolute must-have accessory for the modern, emotionally stunted narcissist.”

TruthLife QuotesPsychologySocietyTraumaCynicismNarcissismDark HumorSocial CommentaryModern Culture
Book:Notes From Exile: The "Manual for the Broken”
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“Richard Burton by Stewart Stafford Jester’s coxcomb to a fool’s translator? A brothel-creeper in a neon-puked alley, A bean-counter totalling rice grains; Surreptitious, scrumptious attic grub. Stand back, witness me Manspread! Lease me your lobes while I Mansplain! Overcome, I expire in an orchestra pit From the fumes of acute "Toxic Masculinity." Hear my epitaph: "Women aren't funny... so put on the Earl Grey, love!" Coup de grâce! Many have said where I should stick my opinion, But I leave the worst to the collective imagination. © 2025, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”

PoetryIronySatireSexismPersonaDark HumorSocial CommentaryToxic MasculinityMansplainingManspreading
Author:Stewart Stafford
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“Dystopolis by Stewart Stafford Phantasmagoria in the mirror, A bribed witness is my whore, Plastic surgery getting dearer, I must go work out my core. Swallowing carcinogen smog, Painful panting, freezing air, Neutered day of the old dog, On my hamster wheel there. Crawled down to the plague pits, Crab-like, they crept up on me, Sour milk séance of the obits, Drowning in a mausoleum sea. Mild convulsions on a night cold, Cram triage bodies in my bed, Fights reheated getting so old, Awake to find myself dead. © Stewart Stafford, 2024. All rights reserved.”

FutureDystopianUrban FantasySurrealDystopiaSocial CommentaryFuturisticDystopian FictionMetropolisNeologism
Author:Stewart Stafford
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“One of the most serious consequences of the expansion of the supervisory gaze of the state (and the intelligentsia) into the private sphere is the reduction of the difference between the moral and the legal — a difference that, by protecting vital areas of human behavior from official interference, has always been one of the basic guarantees of civil liberty. [...] The state uses individuals' demands for autonomy — demands that are particularly strong among young people, women, the discriminated, and the resentful of all kinds — as bait to trap them in the worst kind of tyranny. By “freeing” men from their ties to family, parish, and neighborhood, protecting them under the immense network of public services that frees them from the need to resort to the help of relatives and friends, offering them the lure of legal protection against the prejudices, antipathies, feelings, and even glances of their peers—legal protection against life, in short— the state actually divides, isolates, and weakens them, cultivating the neurotic susceptibilities that infantilize them, making it impossible for them, on the one hand, to create true bonds with each other and, on the other hand, to survive without state support.”

Political PhilosophyModernitySocial CommentaryLegalityTirannyThe State
Author:Olavo de Carvalho
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“I wrote Unwind for lots of reasons, and it poses questions about a lot of subjects. To state it briefly, I wanted to point out how when people take intractable positions on an issue, and stick to extreme sides, sometimes the result is a compromise that is worse than either extreme. I meant it as a wake up call to society -- and to point out that sometimes the problem IS that we take sides on an issue, when a different sort of approach is needed. It's also to pose questions about what it means to be alive. Where does life begin, where does it end -- and point out that there is no single answer to these questions. The problem is people who think there are simple answers. People who see things as simple black-and-white right-and-wrong are the type of people who will end up with a world like the world in Unwind.”

MoralityChoiceDystopianSocial CommentaryUnwindSanctity Of LifeValue In A Person
Author:Neal Shusterman
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“Friends are the family you choose (~ Nin/Ithilnin, Elven rogue).”

LoveLifeHumansTruthLife LessonsHumanityFriendshipFamilySocietyHuman NatureFriendsReflectionYoung AdultInsightMeaningMeaning Of LifeInsightfulYoung Adult FictionHumankindHuman BehaviorUrban FantasySocial IssuesSocial ScienceSocial CommentaryElvesReflectiveCyberpunkYoung Adult SeriesUrban Fantasy SeriesYoung Adult NovelsYoung Adult LiteratureElvenInside OurselvesYa Urban FantasyNq Mobile Omar KhanOmar Khan Nq Mobile
Book:The Other Side of Life
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“Put 'em who threaten possessions and power together with 'em who offend our tastes in sex and dope. Those who're touched, put 'em in asylums. Pack off old ones to 'senior communities,' nursing homes. Our children? Keep'em prisoner, baby-sitter as warden. School? Good for fifteen to twenty years. Army afterward. Liberated, we live in prison. No this, no that. Kill us before we die!”

ArmySocial JusticePrisonSocial CommentaryCultural DifferencesSenior CitizenCultural RevolutionElder Care
Book:M: Writings '67–'72
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“We're not people," he said. "We're the stories that people tell each other about us. Belters are crazy terrorists. Earthers are lazy gluttons. Martians are cogs in a great big machine." "Men are fighters," Naomi said, and then, her voice growing bleak. "Women are nurturing and sweet and they stay home with the kids. It's always been like that. We always react to the stories about people, not who they really are.”

ScifiSocial CommentaryAnthro
Book:Babylon’s Ashes
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“Every day people sleep, wake up, work, and eat according to the established set of rules we call time. In other words, we set our lives by the clock. Human beings went through the trouble of inventing rules that imposed limits on their lives, boxing them up into hours, days, and years. And then they invented clocks to make time’s rule over us even more precise. The fact that we have these rules means that we’ve given up some of our freedom. And yet we’ve surrounded ourselves with reminders of that loss of freedom - by hanging clocks on walls and dotting them around our houses. And as if that weren’t enough, we make sure that there’s a clock wherever we go, no matter what we’re doing. We’ve even felt the need to wrap our bodies up in time by going so far as to wrap it around our wrists.”

PhilosophyTimeFreedomHuman NatureReflectionRoutineExistentialModern LifeSocial CommentaryCritique Of Society
Book:If Cats Disappeared from the World
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