Quotes for All
I understand that unless you have a government of laws, rather than a government of people, you cannot protect dissent. And I understand, as a woman who probably would have been burned in the marketplace for witchcraft only about 200 years ago, that I need the First Amendment more than anybody does. And that even … Read more
Freedom released the energies of the masses not by exhilarating but by unbalancing, irritating, and goading. Eric Hoffer
Though dissenters seem to question everything in sight, they are actually bundles of dusty answers and never conceived a new question. What offends us most in the literature of dissent is the lack of hesitation and wonder. Eric Hoffer
The beginning of thought is in disagreement – not only with others but also with ourselves. Eric Hoffer
A dissenting minority feels free only when it can impose its will on the majority: what it abominates most is the dissent of the majority. Eric Hoffer
Ours is a golden age of minorities. At no time in the past have dissident minorities felt so much at home and had so much room to throw their weight around. They speak and act as if they were the people, and what they abominate most is the dissent of the majority. Eric Hoffer
If what the philosophers say be true, that all men’s actions proceed from one source; that as they assent from a persuasion that a thing is so, and dissent from a persuasion that it is not, and suspend their judgment from a persuasion that it is uncertain, so likewise they seek a thing from a … Read more
I find myself frequently placed where I dare give neither assent nor dissent to propositions that are submitted to me; for there is danger that any words I may speak shall be reported as something that the Lord has given me. It is not always safe for me to express my own judgment; for sometimes … Read more
Lonely dissent doesn’t feel like going to school dressed in black. It feels like going to school wearing a clown suit. Eliezer Yudkowsky
The only way to make sure people you agree with can speak is to support the rights of people you don’t agree with. Eleanor Holmes Norton