Henry Steele CommagerHenry Steele Commager, (1902-1998) Historian and author

Henry Steele Commager Quote

“Censorship always defeats its own purpose, for it creates, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion... In the long run it will create a generation incapable of appreciating the difference between independence of thought and subservience.”

Henry Steele CommagerHenry Steele Commager
~ Henry Steele Commager

Freedom, Loyalty and Dissent, 1954

Ratings and Comments


Mike, Norwalk

The 3 stars is because censorship's ultimate purpose IS to create, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion ⋯ In the long run it will create a generation incapable of appreciating the difference between independence of thought and subservience.

Mann, Kalamazoo

Uncanny prescience.

E Archer, NYC

Mike's got a point. All this 'regulation' is designed to replace personal discernment with perpetual subservience. Somebody gets burned because they fell for a lie, now they want the government to 'do something about this.' So they empower some 'authority' to determine what we may see, hear, eat, drink, own, and now even 'breathe'! It's a lawyer's paradise.

djm, Durango

Saw this vividly this week with Mark Rice telling students he was gathing signatures on a (fake) petition to help have all all gun owners killed. He was blown away at the numbers who did! Our kids are being dangerously brainwashed by the creeping dictatorship/Marxism in our country.

E Archer, NYC

"a generation incapable of appreciating the difference between independence of thought and subservience."

That's the point!

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