Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Comment on this quote Share via Email Print this Page [101-120] of 173 Dissent quotesDissent QuotesDissent Previous 20 quotes Next 20 quotes Toward no crimes have men shown themselves so cold-bloodedly cruel as in punishing differences of opinion.~ James Russell Lowell Without general elections, without unrestrained freedom of press and assembly, without a free struggle of opinion, life dies out in every public institution…in which only the bureaucracy remains as the active element.~ Rosa Luxemburg The dissenter is every human being at those times of his life when he resigns momentarily from the herd and thinks for himself.~ Archibald Macleish It is impossible for ideas to compete in the marketplace if no forum for their presentation is provided or available.~ Thomas Mann Only oppression should fear the full exercise of freedom.~ Jose Marti y Perez The poor despise labor when performed by slaves.~ George Mason The whole drift of our law is toward the absolute prohibition of all ideas that diverge in the slightest form from the accepted platitudes, and behind that drift of law there is a far more potent force of growing custom, and under that custom there is a natural philosophy which erects conformity into the noblest of virtues and the free functioning of personality into a capital crime against society.~ H. L. Mencken I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.~ H. L. Mencken The worst government is the most moral. One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane. But when the fanatics are on top there is no limit to oppression.~ H. L. Mencken Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.~ H. L. Mencken That erroneous assumption is to the effect that the aim of public education is to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence, and so make them fit to discharge the duties of citizenship in an enlightened and independent manner. Nothing could be further from the truth. The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all, it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to put down dissent and originality. That is its aim in the United States, whatever the pretensions of politicians, pedagogues and other such mountebanks, and that is its aim everywhere else.~ H. L. Mencken Human progress is furthered, not by conformity, but by aberration.~ H. L. Mencken Religious liberty is primarily a man’s liberty to profess a faith different from that of the dominant religion, and to unite in public worship with those who share his faith.~ Giovanni Miegge Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling, against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them.~ John Stuart Mill Everything we shut our eyes to, everything we run away from, everything we deny, denigrate or despise, serves to defeat us in the end. What seems nasty, painful, evil, can become a source of beauty, joy, and strength, if faced with an open mind.~ Henry Miller If you do not specify and confront real issues, what you will do will surely obscure them. If you do not alarm anyone morally, you will yourself remain morally asleep. If you do not embody controversy, what you say will be an acceptance of the drift to the coming human hell.~ C. Wright Mills When complaints are freely heard, deeply considered, and speedily reformed, then is the utmost bound of civil liberty obtained that wise men look for.~ John Milton If you stop struggling, then you stop life.~ Huey P. Newton The first lesson a revolutionary must learn is that he is a doomed man. Unless he understands this, he does not grasp the essential meaning of his life.~ Huey P. Newton There will be no prison which can hold our movement down... The walls, the bars, the guns and the guards can never encircle or hold down the idea of the people.~ Huey P. Newton Previous 20 quotes Next 20 quotes Share on Facebook Tweet Email Print