Schadenfreude Quotes

“Rumours should be juicy and gossips must be mouth-watering, since they have to uplift and make people feel better. Tittle-tattle can have a swift ripple effect and when the ball is rolling very fast, it kick-starts a flood of moral destruction. “Schadenfreude” can, then, be fully enjoyed. (“Juicy rumours”)”
― Erik Pevernagie

“We are all the judges and the judged, victims of the casual malice and fantasy of others, and ready sources of fantasy and malice in our turn. And if we are sometimes accused of sins of which we are innocent, are there not also other sins of which we are guilty and of which the world knows nothing?”
― Iris Murdoch, Nuns and Soldiers

“The times are too difficult and the crisis too severe to indulge in schadenfreude. Looking at it in perspective, the fact that there would be a financial crisis was perfectly predictable: its general nature, if not its magnitude. Markets are always inefficient.”
― Noam Chomsky

“The English feel schadenfreude even about themselves.”
― Martin Amis

“Don't reach for the halo too soon. You have plenty of time to enjoy yourself, even a little maliciously sometimes, before you settle down to being a saint.”
― Ellis Peters, Monk's Hood

“(About a woman's funeral) Do you remember the part in The Wizard of Oz when the witch is dead and the Munchkins start singing? Think that kind of happiness. I swear every woman there was ready to break into song. Maybe a few of the men, too. (p. 80)”
― Julie Mulhern, The Deep End

“It is unwise, and potentially dangerous, to enjoy the misfortunes of others.”
― Wayne Gerard Trotman

“Maybe we're all just broken inside. Unable to really grasp the difference between fictional people and people we just don't know. They're all just abstract ideas we're happy to have suffer for our enjoyment.”
― Jonathan Sims, The Magnus Archives: Season 3

“Look at that Barkovitch. He ain't in it to get no Prize. He's just walkin' to see other people die. He lives on it. When someone gets a ticket, he gets a little more go-power. It ain't enough. He'll dry up just like a leaf on a tree.”
― Richard Bachman, The Long Walk

“Ich lache immer, wenn etwas schiefläuft.
Denn es ist meine Schuld. Nicht die des Universums, des Teufels, des Zufalls oder irgendwelcher anderer bösen Mächte. Ich gebe es gerne zu.
Nur zu, schiebt die Schuld für eure Missgeschicke sowie für eure kleinen und großen Katastrophen in Zukunft gerne auf mich!
Wer ich bin?
Mein Name ist Murphy.”
― Nicole Gozdek, Murphy: Rache ist süß

“Some people want the whole world to go hungry so that they can appreciate the value of food in their plate.”
― Shon Mehta, Lair Of The Monster

“And then someone else would come out with another, even more appalling story: quick, quick, let’s hear about another misfortune that happened to someone else, something that could have happened to us if we were unlucky, although we weren’t.”
― Barbara Abel, Mothers' Instinct

“But it does make you feel smaller, which is a relief in some ways. When you screw up, it seems less terrible. all these people, everybody screwing up.”
― Rebecca Scherm

“... but I have learned that bad things happen to you in an instant. For anything good to happen it takes a lot of time.”
― Alok Karkera, Isles of Mambo and other stories

“Rarely, if ever, does our conscience realizes the crisis our evil deeds cause. Seems the human mind is wired to find joy in another's misfortune. The Germans call it Schadenfreude.”
― Sushil Rungta

“The Beshrewing of Tom o' Bedlam by Stewart Stafford

Fie and a plague on thee!
Nay, a pox!
May legions of hellions float through thee,
And may thou fall in the dung of an ox.

May the thing below thine eyes,
Take on the appearance of a sprout,
And may the things above thy chin,
Resemble a harlot's spout.

May Heaven strike thee dumb,
Aye, dumber than thou art now,
May thy words become those of a lunatic,
And thy breathing the grunting of a sow.

Verily, I do not wish thee misfortune,
Lest it rebounds back upon me,
But, as long as it befalls thee first,
I may live quite merrily.

© Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.”
― Stewart Stafford

“I have always thought that the horrific sadist who concocted the escalating ladder of pain known as crucifixion, should have been the first one to try it.”
― Stewart Stafford

“They want me to give them something new, things they'd never dare look at, things that are far beyond their imagination, which is why Gregory asks, "But whats the worst thing you ever saw?" rather than "How is that girl doing now? Were you able to help her, by any chance?”
― Hanna Bervoets, We Had to Remove This Post

“There are two contrasting social processes in which the envious man plays a considerable role: inhibiting processes, which serve tradition by thwarting innovation, and the destructive processes of revolution. The ostensible contradiction disappears as soon as it is realised that in both cases envy is the motive for the same action: the sarcasm, sabotage, and menacing Schadenfreude towards anyone who seeks to introduce something new, and the gloating, spiteful envy with which revolutionaries seek to tear down the existing order and its symbols of success.

Anyone who inveighs against innovation in the name of tradition because he is unable to tolerate the individual successes of the innovator, or anyone who rages, in the name of the downfall of all tradition, against its upholders and representatives, is likely to be impelled by an identical, basic motive. Both are enraged at another's having, knowing, believing, valuing, possessing, or being able to do, something which they themselves do not have, and could not imagine having.”
― Helmut Schoeck, ENVY: A Theory of Social Behaviour