“I was really interested in 20th century communalism and alternative communities, the boom of communes in the 60s and 70s. That led me back to the 19th century. I was shocked to find what I would describe as far more utopian ideas in the 19th century than in the 20th century. Not only were the ideas so extreme, but surprising people were adopting them.” PeopleIdeasCommunityCenturyExtremesAlternativesSurprisingShocked20th Century19th CenturyUtopianAdoptingCommunesCommunalism Author:Christine Jennings
“They [Rappites] were moving from Southern Indiana to Pennsylvania, where they had originally settled when they came from Germany. They were looking for someone who wanted to buy a pre-built town, which wouldn't have been appropriate for any kind of normal settlement. That's when Robert Owen [Welsh industrialist and utopian socialist] buys the village and founds New Harmony.” KindHas BeensWantedMovingFoundNormalBuiltTownsHarmonyGermanyAppropriateVillageSouthernSocialistSettlementUtopianIndianaPennsylvaniaWelsh Author:Christine Jennings
“The vision shared by both [French utopian] Charles Fourier and Robert Owen was for an entire town to fit into one structure. Owen's design for what he called a "parallelogram" was essentially to have a whole city in one building, laid out around a huge quadrangle. Fourier's scheme was to build a massive Versailles-like structure that he called a "phalanstery." In both cases they had these architectural dreams that we now recognize as pretty unappealing.” WholeDreamCitiesVisionCasesDesignBuildingHugeFitTownsStructureMassiveSchemesUtopianVersaillesFourierParallelogram Author:Christine Jennings
“The Oneida Perfectionists, along with some of the others, believed that feminism, and abolitionism, and other causes that they pursued in their own way without participating with other people outside of their communities, were all piecemeal reforms. That's what makes a utopian a utopian, this idea that they were going to create a whole new world from scratch.” PeopleWorldWayIdeasWholeCausesCommunityFeminismReformNew WorldScratchesPursuedPerfectionistParticipatingUtopian Author:Christine Jennings
“Utopian fiction is really boring. I had to read a lot of it, and it's not that much fun. But they're fascinating to me as historical documents. Cabet [Icaria's founder and author of the utopian novel, Travels in Icaria], is writing in the 1830s, and his idea of the perfect society reveals a lot about his time. But his book is uniquely bad.” WritingBookIdeasFunPerfectFictionNovelHistoricalBoringFascinatingFoundersDocumentsUtopianPerfect Society Author:Christine Jennings
“The fatal flaw of most utopian visions is that they're fundamentally static, and that's not a comfortable place for humans to live. Fourier was very good at imagining a utopia that is constantly changing and very busy, but a vision of paradise that would have been most tantalizing to an underfed overworked factory worker in 1840 doesn't have much appeal in fiction because it's not a story.” HumansHas BeensStoriesFictionVisionComfortableWorkersBusyVery GoodAppealsParadiseFlawsFactoriesUtopiaStaticUtopianFactory WorkersTantalizingFatal FlawsFourier Author:Christine Jennings
“The thing that had fueled these utopian communities was a literal belief, and not just a general sense of optimism, that the earth was about to become a paradise. That idea cannot hold water after the war.” IdeasWarEarthBeliefWaterCommunityOptimismParadiseLiteralUtopian Author:Christine Jennings
“So there's that change of general consciousness, and then there's this boom after the war, this expansion into the West. It was like the 1950s. The American economy was pumping at top speed. The kinds of people who would move into these communities and organize their lives around a utopian dream now had dreams about the West.” PeopleKindWarDreamMovingCommunityConsciousnessEconomyWestSpeedOrganizeExpansionUtopianAmerican Economy Author:Christine Jennings
“The thought was, 'We're going to go to California, where the soil is black and ten feet deep, and there are no rocks, and there's gold in the hills.' The West becomes the surface onto which people project their fantasies, where once the future had been the place they projected their fantasies. So it's not just the war that ends the utopian communities, but what follows.” PeopleWarEndsBlackCommunityFantasyFeetRocksTenProjectsGoldWestSurfaceHillsCaliforniaSoilUtopian Author:Christine Jennings
“Because the utopian's worldview was framed around moving toward this perfected future, it helped stimulate the private exertions that add up to social progress. Progress is work. People need to build things and sacrifice and have a harder life for things to get better. On its own, I don't think even the most brilliant critique stimulates that kind of effort as well as an appealing vision of the future.” PeopleThinkingNeedsWellsKindMovingSocialEffortVisionProgressSacrificeHarderAddBrilliantGet BetterWorldviewCritiqueUtopianExertionFramedSocial ProgressVisions Of The Future Author:Christine Jennings
“It is clear that several countries, in the Balkans for example, need to be considered countries of safe origin. But others like, in my opinion, Eritrea, undoubtedly need to be considered a country of origin with a valid claim to asylum. And with a third group of states, like Nigeria for example, each individual case needs to be evaluated. Then there are also very controversial cases like Afghanistan. In any case, united European action is needed. This argument for Europeanization may sound utopian, but there is no alternative.” NeedsMayCountryStatesActionIndividualSoundUnitedOpinionCasesClearGroupsExampleNeededSafeArgumentThirdsClaimsAlternativesAfghanistanControversialNigeriaUtopianAsylumsBalkansEritrea Author:Paolo Gentiloni
“It isn't humanly possible for the things radical leftists want to bring about the desired results that they choose. They claim they want a utopian happiness, and they are further and further away from it the more successful they are.” WantResultsSuccessfulClaimsRadicalUtopianLeftists Author:Rush Limbaugh
“Lagos was the ultimate dysfunctional city - but actually, in terms of all the initiatives and ingenuity, it mobilised an incredibly beautiful, almost utopian landscape of independence and agency.” BeautifulTermCitiesUltimateIndependenceLandscapeAgencyInitiativeIngenuityUtopian Author:Rem Koolhaas
“The dreams get anchored in aged wisdom not some utopian fantasy.” DreamFantasyUtopian Author:Shane Claiborne
“I'm not an activist by nature. I am suspicious of Utopian thinking and equally suspicious of its alternate.” ThinkingActivistSuspiciousUtopian Author:Margaret Atwood
“When you have a vision of where you need to go, it sounds utopian. But when you get to the tipping point, your understanding switches.” NeedsUnderstandingSoundVisionUtopianTippingTipping Point Author:Christiana Figueres
“Maybe the realisation of the full human potential is the utopian thing. Maybe that is our collective struggle, is to find a way to get there. But right now it seems like we're duplicating what was written in the Bible, a millennium ago, which is "An eye for an eye." Revenge policy; "If you hit me, we'll hit you back worse"; ad infinitum.” IfsWayHumansSeemsEyeStruggleWrittenPolicyRight NowRevengeCollectivesAdsUtopianMillenniumRealisationHuman PotentialEye For An Eye Author:Chris Pine
“I still believe in what I believed in for 20 years as a Socialist in Parliament, and being a Socialist is not the same as being a utopian.” YearsBelieveStillsI BelieveSocialistParliamentUtopianI Still Believe Author:Salvador Allende
“I gravitate towards the utopian potentials of digital space (post race, post gender, post human etc.), but understand that people live in real bodies that experience real consequences based on how they are gendered, sexed, raced and classed.” PeopleHumansRealBodySpaceRaceConsequenceGenderPostsEtcDigitalUtopian Author:Saya Woolfalk
“Captain Fantastic touches on that [division]. You meet this family that lives off the grid in the woods and you go, "Oh, it's some kind of liberal utopian fantasy. The enemy is gonna be all these conservative types that they'll probably run into, and that's going to be the story."” KindStoriesRunningEnemyFantasyTypeConservativeWoodsFantasticDivisionCaptainsUtopianGrids Author:Viggo Mortensen
“The idea that Bentham and Mill were maximizers is the greatest stretch of all. They were progressivists, committed to improving the societies in which they lived, not utopian maximizers.” IdeasCommittedImprovingMillsUtopian Author:Dale Jamieson
“I think if I were living in a utopian world, then it wouldn't be political commentary; it would be about daffodils.” IfsThinkingWorldWould BePoliticalCommentaryUtopianDaffodil Author:Emily Haines
“In my imaginary utopian world there would be a greater allegiance between music writers and musicians.” WorldWould BeGreaterMusicianImaginaryAllegianceUtopian Author:Emily Haines
“These Utopian idealists like the Clintons who think they really do have the answers. They think they're following the best minds of their generation, but they're not the best minds. They don't realize that they may be the worst minds of their generation.” ThinkingMindMayRealizingAnswersGenerationsWorstClintonFollowingUtopianIdealist Author:Michael Savage
“Wherever you go, whether it be a college campus or the New York Times or ABC News or Venezuela or Cuba or the former Soviet Union, it's amazing how the speech codes and the trying to shut up dissent is a defining aspect of the left because they believe so firmly in their utopian ideals that anyone who would disagree with that utopia is an enemy of the state, and they treat them as such.” TryingBelieveStatesLeftEnemyNew YorkCollegeSpeechNewsAspectIdealsTreatsUnionsFormerCodeDisagreeSovietShut UpSoviet UnionDefiningDissentUtopiaCubaNew York TimesCampusUtopianVenezuelaCollege Campus Author:Andrew Breitbart
“This oppressor/oppressed cultural Marxist thing is you're an authentic woman and an authentic black even only if you support liberal causes. If you are a woman, if you are a Hispanic, if you are black, and you abide by a value system that believes in limited government and constitutional principles, you are an apostate to the utopian ideals of the left, and you are not protected, and you are pilloried, and that is why I became a conservative because I thought it was fundamentally unfair, fundamentally un-American.” IfsBelieveGovernmentValuesLeftCausesBlackPrinciplesSupportIdealsConservativeProtectedUnfairOppressedOppressorsLimited GovernmentUtopianMarxistHispanicValue Systems Author:Andrew Breitbart
“I think [John Adams] developed a much deeper suspicion of France and the other European powers than he had earlier. He lost much if not all of the utopian thinking about international politics and diplomacy expressed in his Model Treaty of 1776 and became much more cynical about the world.” IfsThinkingWorldLostModelsInternationalDeeperFranceCynicalSuspicionDiplomacyTreatiesUtopian Author:Gordon S. Wood
“You just overwhelm the system with so many dependents and so many middle class benefits having to be paid that the money isn't there. It causes a system-wide collapse, capitalism implodes upon itself, and somebody comes into the breach and restructures the government as a socialist utopian paradise - and the guy's dead serious about it.” GovernmentGuyCausesClassMiddleSeriousBenefitsCapitalismPaidWideParadiseMiddle ClassCollapseSocialistUtopianBreachRestructure Author:Rush Limbaugh
“I'm not an activist by nature. I am suspicious of Utopian thinking and equally suspicious of its alternate. I would prefer to stay in the Writing Burrow and play with my imaginary friends and enemies. I get sucked into these things.” ThinkingWritingPlayEnemyActivistImaginarySuspiciousUtopianFriends And EnemiesImaginary Friend Author:Margaret Atwood
“Take cyberspace as an example. We had this wonderful utopian vision of a new home for the mind. What we've reaped isn't cyberspace. It's cyberbia. It's this vast, bland wasteland of vulgar people and trivial ideas and pictures of half-naked starlets. But despite all the uncertainty, has there ever been a more fascinating moment to be alive?” PeopleMindIdeasMomentsHomeHalfVisionAliveWonderfulExampleNakedDespiteUncertaintyFascinatingVulgarUtopianBlandNew HomeCyberspaceWastelandStarlets Author:Paul Saffo
“I know it's very idealistic and utopian, but I believe we need to just let everyone not be judged in terms of religion, groups or nations or region.” KnowsNeedsBelieveI BelieveNationsTermGroupsRegionsJudgedUtopianIdealistic Author:Shahrukh Khan
“There was a period when the utopian scenario was almost true - when we felt that you could do almost anything in a club, as long as it was any good. There was no rigid expectation from the audience as to how it had to be delivered. But this didn't last very long. It was almost palpable, the decline of this in the new millennium.” LongAudienceExpectationsUtopian Author:Thomas Koner
“I feel as if dystopian and utopian representations are historically the most effective way of criticizing modern society. You know, because you don't have to be factually accurate. You can kind of construct some awesome strawman arguments in your fictional world.” WorldKindModernArgumentCriticizeRepresentationDystopianUtopianModern Society Author:Owen Pallett
“Design is interesting because it's utopian. Art is often a jaundiced commentary on contemporary life. Design is always about the future; it's always about something great and new that's come out that will make the future brighter. It has this weird 18th - century positivism about it.” ArtInterestingDesignArt IsUtopianPositivism Author:Momus
“For example, you now look at pictures from 1968, they are hugely misleading in terms of standing in as an absolute image of the time. Because maybe two percent of the people looked the way that we now associate with that time. I was also aware that what I was aiming for is an idealized, utopian version of how people could be together. I found photography to be a very powerful tool because as long as it looks real, it is perceived as real.” PeopleLongRealTogetherTermPowerfulPhotographyVery PowerfulMisleadUtopian Author:Wolfgang Tillmans
“How do we get utopian thinking in a dystopian world? These days we aren't talking to each other - we're screaming and trying to hit each other over the head with rocks and sticks. A primitive fury has been unleashed by a president who has no culture, who cannot read, and who wants to determine power and aggression.” ThinkingWorldTryingCulturePresidentDeterminePrimitiveAggressionDystopianFuryUtopian Author:Carolee Schneemann
“There's a book of interviews with John Cage by Joan Retallack called Musicage that was finished the summer that he died, in 1992. And in one of the last interviews, he was very excited to talk about nanotechnology. There's real technophilia from him, a kind of utopian embrace of the idea that nanotechnology will free people up to do what they really want to do.” PeopleKindBookRealSummerEmbraceExcitedUtopian Author:David Grubbs
“Michel Aflaq - is bad poetry wrapped in the guise of utopian politics, or great poetry wrapped in the guise of horrible politics.” HorribleUtopianGreat PoetGreat Poetry Author:Elliott Colla
“Detroit is a fascinating place, because things are so bad there that the dystopia has almost become utopian. People know they can't rely on the state, that public infrastructure is broken, and they've taken their own measures. People are growing their own food and selling their produce to local stores and restaurants. It's certainly not a fix-all; Detroit's problems are too deep-rooted for quick-fix solutions. But it's a hopeful sign. Detroiters are crafting their own solutions rather than being passive in the face of the city's and state's actions and inactions.” PeopleProblemActionTakenBrokenSolutionsSellingRelyHopefulPassiveInactionDystopiaUtopian Author:Sasha Abramsky
“I'm an anxious person in general, but something about being pregnant and awaiting the release of my first book, The Monsters Of Templeton, made me into an insane anxious person. I didn't sleep at night. I ended up sleeping all day. In a strange way I felt like the world was going to end. I found myself so deeply depressed at times that I started to read about happiness, and that took me into books about idealism and utopianism. Reading books about people who tried to build utopian societies of different kinds gave me a kind of lift.” PeopleWorldKindBookDifferentNightReadingSleepStrangeInsaneAnxiousDifferent KindsReading BooksPregnantIdealismUtopian Author:Lauren Groff
“Reading about utopianism, and eventually creating characters with their own utopian ambitions, was the way I learned to live with being a pregnant person, to stave off the sense of incipient disaster. You're bringing a person into this overcrowded world, knowing they're one day going to die and there's nothing you can do about it.” WorldCharacterReadingOne DayAmbitionDisasterPregnantUtopian Author:Lauren Groff
“I think attempting to make art is a utopian process in itself, definitely. Nothing I do is ever equal to the ideas in my head. You do the best you can, you do it with patience and love, and then you give up. The moment you give up is when you know the book is done.” ThinkingGivingArtBookDoneMomentsEqualGiving UpArt IsUtopian Author:Lauren Groff
“There is this fashionable progressive notion that everything is so completely political that the idea we could have some sort of neutral legal process is practically utopian - because we all know that the more money you have, the more rights you can exercise in this society. But I don't think that you deal with income inequality by limiting the First Amendment rights of affluent people. I'd rather see people screw around with the tax code to redistribute wealth a little bit than screw around with the First Amendment.” PeopleThinkingPoliticalWealthExerciseTaxesInequalityCodeProgressiveFirst AmendmentFashionableUtopian Author:Wendy Kaminer
“President Obama is a utopian at heart. He wants to improve the lives of the downtrodden, which is a good thing. But, he doesn't understand that damaging the free marketplace in pursuit of 'social justice' will eventually harm those whom he wants to help. The nation's crushing debt is a tsunami brewing off shore.” WantHeartHelpingNationsSocialPresidentJusticeSocial JusticeGood ThingsDebtHarmPursuitCrushShorePresident ObamaMarketplaceUtopianTsunamiBrewingDowntrodden Author:Bill O'Reilly
“Although images of perfection in people's personal lives can cause unhappiness, images of perfect societies - utopian images - can cause monstrous evil. In fact, forcefully changing society to conform to societal images was the greatest cause of evil in the twentieth century.” PeopleFactsEvilCausesPerfectCenturyPerfectionUnhappinessConformityConformPersonal LifeTwentieth CenturyMonstrousUtopianPerfect Society Author:Dennis Prager
“The designs of the paper euros, introduced in 2002, proclaim a utopian aspiration. Gone are the colorful bills of particular nations, featuring pictures of national heroes of statecraft, culture and the arts, pictures celebrating unique national narratives. With the euro, 16 nations have said goodbye to all that.” ArtSaidCultureNationsGoneDesignParticularHeroPaperUniqueBillsCelebrateNarrativeAspirationGoodbyeColorfulEuroUtopian Author:George Will
“A utopian future for the Internet could be secured if the heavy-duty influencers - and the grassroots influencers tweeting along - can create a new global organization peopled with defenders of Internet freedom.” IfsDutyInternetOrganizationHeavyDefendersUtopianSecuredGrassrootsInternet Freedom Author:Naomi Wolf
“When Oscar Niemeyer died on December 5, 2012, ten days before his 105th birthday, he was universally regarded as the very last of the twentieth century's major architectural masters, an astonishing survivor whose most famous accomplishment, Brasilia, was the climactic episode of utopian High Modern urbanism.” LastsModernCenturyMastersTenMajorsDiedAccomplishmentSurvivorEpisodesOscarsTwentieth CenturyAstonishingDecemberUtopian Author:Martin Filler
“Contrary to the utopian rhetoric of social media enthusiasts, the Internet often makes the jump from deliberation to participation even more difficult, thwarting collective action under the heavy pressure of never-ending internal debate.” ActionSocialDifficultMediaInternetPressureHeavySocial MediaContraryDebateInternalsCollectivesRhetoricParticipationNever EndingUtopianDeliberationCollective Action Author:Evgeny Morozov
“And the annual meetings of the League's Assembly are in effect official peace congresses binding on the participating states to an extent that most statesmen a quarter of a century ago would have regarded as utopian.” StatesEffectsCenturyMeetingsCongressLeagueOfficialsQuartersAssemblyStatesmenParticipatingBindingAnnualsUtopianQuarter Of A Century Author:Hjalmar Branting