Debbie Sochor > Debbie's Quotes

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#1

“Far from failing in its intended task, our educational system is in fact succeeding magnificently because its aim is to keep the American people thoughtless enough to go on supporting the system.”
― Richard Mitchell

tags: education, homeschool, homeschooling

36 likes

#2

“People who cannot put strings of sentences together in good order cannot think. An educational system that does not teach the technology of writing is preventing thought.”
― Richard Mitchell, Less Than Words Can Say

tags: education-system, logic, thought

28 likes

#3

“The plain fact is that education is itself a form of propaganda - a deliberate scheme to outfit the pupil, not with the capacity to weigh ideas, but with a simple appetite for gulping ideas ready-made. The aim is to make 'good' citizens, which is to say, docile and uninquisitive citizens.”
― H.L. Menchken

tags: education, homeschool, homeschooling

117 likes

#4

“Altho' I rarely waste time in reading on theological subjects, as mangled by our Pseudo-Christians, yet I can readily suppose Basanistos may be amusing. Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus. If it could be understood it would not answer their purpose. Their security is in their faculty of shedding darkness, like the scuttlefish, thro' the element in which they move, and making it impenetrable to the eye of a pursuing enemy, and there they will skulk.

[Letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp on 30 July 1810 denouncing the Christian doctrine of the Trinity]”
― Thomas Jefferson, Letters of Thomas Jefferson

tags: abracadabra, christians, priests, ridicule, superstition, the-trinity, trinity, weapon

211 likes

#5

“The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, and intolerable...”
― H.L. Mencken, Prejudices: Third Series

477 likes

#6

“There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.”
― Ayn Rand

tags: crime, government, innocence, law, libertarian

353 likes

#7

“By what right do men exercise power over each other?”
― Auberon Herbert

5 likes

#8

“Blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth.”
― Albert Einstein

tags: dissent, freedom-of-thought, independent-thought, skepticism

1633 likes

#9

“The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it.”
― H.L. Mencken, Minority Report

112 likes

#10

“Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen.”
― Albert Einstein

tags: adolescence, attributed, attributed-no-source, prejudice

677 likes

#11

“You don’t have a soul, Doctor. You are a soul. You have a body, temporarily.”
― Walter M. Miller Jr., A Canticle for Leibowitz

tags: body-soul, misattributed-to-c-s-lewis

21116 likes

#12

“Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters”
― Albert Einstein

tags: character, honesty, integrity

2682 likes

#13

“No matter how happily a woman may be married, it always pleases her to discover that there is a nice man who wishes that she were not.”
― H.L. Mencken

tags: romance

77 likes

#14

“If you can't say "Fuck" you can't say, "Fuck the government.”
― Lenny Bruce

tags: censorship, fuck, government, profanity

281 likes

#15

“There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

tags: responsibility

60 likes

#16

“There is no virtue in compulsory government charity, and there is no virtue in advocating it. A politician who portrays himself as "caring" and "sensitive" because he wants to expand the government's charitable programs is merely saying that he's willing to try to do good with other people's money. Well, who isn't? And a voter who takes pride in supporting such programs is telling us that he'll do good with his own money—if a gun is held to his head.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

26 likes

#17

“I'm worried that students will take their obedient place in society and look to become successful cogs in the wheel - let the wheel spin them around as it wants without taking a look at what they're doing. I'm concerned that students not become passive acceptors of the official doctrine that's handed down to them from the White House, the media, textbooks, teachers and preachers.”
― Howard Zinn

tags: autonomy, complacency, ethics, independence, politics, proactivity, self-determination, society

640 likes

#18

“Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders…and millions have been killed because of this obedience…Our problem is that people are obedient allover the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves… (and) the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
― Howard Zinn

599 likes

#19

“Any humane and reasonable person must conclude that if the ends, however desireable, are uncertain and the means are horrible and certain, these means must not be employed.”
― Howard Zinn, Passionate Declarations: Essays on War and Justice – A Revisionist Critique of American Ideology for Peace and Active Citizenship

83 likes

#20

“History can come in handy. If you were born yesterday, with no knowledge of the past, you might easily accept whatever the government tells you. But knowing a bit of history--while it would not absolutely prove the government was lying in a given instance--might make you skeptical, lead you to ask questions, make it more likely that you would find out the truth.”
― Howard Zinn, You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train: A Personal History of Our Times

tags: critical-thinking, government, history, knoweldge, proof, questions

30 likes

#21

“Here's all you have to know about men and women: women are crazy, men are stupid. And the main reason women are crazy is that men are stupid.”
― George Carlin, When Will Jesus Bring The Pork Chops?

tags: crazy, men, stupid, truth, women

7644 likes

#22

“Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.”
― Winston S. Churchill

tags: truth

6762 likes

#23

“No matter what happens, somebody will find a way to take it too seriously.”
― Dave Barry

tags: caprice, levity, solemnity

265 likes

#24

“No one is free who has not obtained the empire of himself. No man is free who cannot command himself.”
― Pythagoras

tags: individuation, know-thyself

200 likes

#25

“What is the matter with universities is that the students are school children, whereas it is of the very essence of university education that they should be adults.”
― George Bernard Shaw, Misalliance

tags: academia, education

31 likes

#26

“There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it would be good for him.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

tags: condescending, income-tax, pay, taxes, tyranny

659 likes

#27

“Sex, whatever else it is, is an athletic skill. The more you practice, the more you can, the more you want to, the more you enjoy it, the less it tires you.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls

tags: humour, practice, sex, skills

456 likes

#28

“Political tags — such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth — are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort.”
― Robert A. Heinlein

tags: communist, conservative, control, controlled, democrat, fascist, liberal, political-tags, politics, populist, royalist

204 likes

#29

“At least once every human should have to run for his life, to teach him that milk does not come from supermarkets, that safety does not come from policemen, that 'news' is not something that happens to other people. He might learn how his ancestors lived and that he himself is no different--in the crunch his life depends on his agility, alertness, and personal resourcefulness.”
― Robert A. Heinlein

188 likes

#30

“Some people insist that 'mediocre' is better than 'best.' They delight in clipping wings because they themselves can't fly. They despise brains because they have none.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, Have Space Suit—Will Travel

tags: critics, excellence, inspirational, life, philosophy, truth, wisdom

185 likes

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