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5aa4483 Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction. violence inspirational complexity elegance simplicity genius E.F. Schumacher
4fb4f62 Learn this now and learn it well. Like a compass facing north, a man's accusing finger always finds a woman. Always. You remember that, Mariam. violence men women man-s-heart sad Khaled Hosseini
8a81245 If somebody says 'I love you' to me, I feel as though I had a pistol pointed at my head. What can anybody reply under such conditions but that which the pistol holder requires? 'I love you, too'. violence love Kurt Vonnegut
e3ed06b Physical love is unthinkable without violence. violence relationships romance Milan Kundera
21e87db This calls for a very special blend of psychology and extreme violence. violence vyvyan Ben Elton
ff113bc I get it,' said the prisoner. 'Good Cop, Bad Cop, eh?' If you like.' said Vimes. 'But we're a bit short staffed here, so if I give you a cigarette would you mind kicking yourself in the teeth? violence interrogation police Terry Pratchett
708fb85 "Humm humm haaa. Rahmumm humm haaaa," intoned Opal, finishing her chant. "Peace be inside me, tolerance all around me, forgiveness in my path. Now, Mervall, show me where the filthy human is so that I may feed him his organs." violence revenge fun humor Eoin Colfer
b897732 The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame. violence intemperance Edgar Allan Poe
499b832 Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor. violence war Robert A. Heinlein
cb869ea Thou shalt not be a victim, thou shalt not be a perpetrator, but, above all, thou shalt not be a bystander. violence inspirational holocaust Yehuda Bauer
7a943cd Honey, no offense, but sometimes I think I could shoot you and watch you kick. violence love offense shoot kick sweet joke intimacy Raymond Carver
1f7aad5 "It may well be that we will have to repent in this generation. Not merely for the vitriolic words and the violent actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say, "Wait on time." violence silence social-justice change indifference good-people vitriol social-movements repentance generations Martin Luther King Jr.
26b118b Violence does, in truth, recoil upon the violent, and the schemer falls into the pit which he digs for another. violence Arthur Conan Doyle
eda9ca8 Moderate strength is shown in violence, supreme strength is shown in levity. violence strength G.K. Chesterton
cfe2ad2 "... in a cycle as old as tribalism, ignorance of the Other engenders fear; fear engenders hatred; hatred engenders violence; violence engenders further violence until the only "rights", the only law, are whatever is willed by the most powerful." -- hatred violence ignorance power David Mitchell
b26057a The things people say of a man do not alter a man. He is what he is. Public opinion is of no value whatsoever. Even if people employ actual violence, they are not to be violent in turn. That would be to fall to the same low level. After all, even in prison, a man can be quite free. His soul can be free. His personality can be untroubled. He can be at peace. And, above all things, they are not to interfere with other people or judge them in any way. Personality is a very mysterious thing. A man cannot always be estimated by what he does. He may keep the law, and yet be worthless. He may break the law, and yet be fine. He may be bad, without ever doing anything bad. He may commit a sin against society, and yet realize through that sin his true perfection. violence personality freedom soul-of-a-man wilde oscar prison soul Oscar Wilde
7973817 "I forgive you," I said. I said what I had to. I would die by pieces to save myself from real death." rape violence Alice Sebold
4becac7 We have become a Nazi monster in the eyes of the whole world--a nation of bullies and bastards who would rather kill than live peacefully. We are not just Whores for power and oil, but killer whores with hate and fear in our hearts. We are human scum, and that is how history will judge us. . . . No redeeming social value. Just whores. Get out of our way, or we'll kill you. Well, shit on that dumbness. George W. Bush does not speak for me or my son or my mother or my friends or the people I respect in this world. We didn't vote for these cheap, greedy little killers who speak for America today--and we will not vote for them again in 2002. Or 2004. Or ever. Who does vote for these dishonest shitheads? Who among us can be happy and proud of having all this innocent blood on our hands? Who are these swine? These flag-sucking half-wits who get fleeced and fooled by stupid little rich kids like George Bush? They are the same ones who wanted to have Muhammad Ali locked up for refusing to kill gooks. They speak for all that is cruel and stupid and vicious in the American character. They are the racists and hate mongers among us--they are the Ku Klux Klan. I piss down the throats of these Nazis. And I am too old to worry about whether they like it or not. Fuck them. violence war politics peace Hunter S. Thompson
cff6438 "If we can use an H-bomb--and as you said it's no checker game; it's real, it's war and nobody is fooling around--isn't it sort of ridiculous to go crawling around in the weeds, throwing knives and maybe getting yourself killed . . . and even losing the war . . . when you've got a real weapon you can use to win? What's the point in a whole lot of men risking their lives with obsolete weapons when one professor type can do so much more just by pushing a button?' Zim didn't answer at once, which wasn't like him at all. Then he said softly, 'Are you happy in the Infantry, Hendrick? You can resign, you know.' Hendrick muttered something; Zim said, 'Speak up!' I'm not itching to resign, sir. I'm going to sweat out my term.' I see. Well, the question you asked is one that a sergeant isn't really qualified to answer . . . and one that you shouldn't ask me. You're supposed to know the answer before you join up. Or you should. Did your school have a course in History and Moral Philosophy?' What? Sure--yes, sir.' Then you've heard the answer. But I'll give you my own--unofficial--views on it. If you wanted to teach a baby a lesson, would you cuts its head off?' Why . . . no, sir!' Of course not. You'd paddle it. There can be circumstances when it's just as foolish to hit an enemy with an H-Bomb as it would be to spank a baby with an ax. War is not violence and killing, pure and simple; war is controlled violence, for a purpose. The purpose of war is to support your government's decisions by force. The purpose is never to kill the enemy just to be killing him . . . but to make him do what you want him to do. Not killing . . . but controlled and purposeful violence. But it's not your business or mine to decide the purpose of the control. It's never a soldier's business to decide when or where or how--or why--he fights; that belongs to the statesmen and the generals. The statesmen decide why and how much; the generals take it from there and tell us where and when and how. We supply the violence; other people--"older and wiser heads," as they say--supply the control. Which is as it should be. That's the best answer I can give you. If it doesn't satisfy you, I'll get you a chit to go talk to the regimental commander. If he can't convince you--then go home and be a civilian! Because in that case you will certainly never make a soldier." violence war moral-philosophy military training Robert A. Heinlein
ec9ab2f "I don't want unnecessary violence, sergeant," said Blouse. "Right you are, sir!" said the sergeant. "Carborundum! First man comes through that door runnin', I want him nailed to the wall!" He caught the lieutenant's eye, and added: "But not too hard!" violence military Terry Pratchett
da591a5 When you vote, you are exercising political authority, you're using force. And force, my friends, is violence. The supreme authority from which all other authorities are derived. violence democracy Robert A. Heinlein
192e708 The human psyche has two great sicknesses: the urge to carry vendetta across generations, and the tendency to fasten group labels on people rather than see them as individuals. Abrahamic religion mixes explosively with (and gives strong sanction to) both. Only the willfully blind could fail to implicate the divisive force of religion in most, if not all, of the violent enmities in the world today. Without a doubt it is the prime aggravator of the Middle East. Those of us who have for years politely concealed our contempt for the dangerous collective delusion of religion need to stand up and speak out. Things are different now. 'All is changed, changed utterly. violence vendetta Richard Dawkins
5c67f26 There is a comfort in conformity, a security in control, that is appealing. There is a thrill in domination, and we are all secretly attracted to violence. violence war Tom Robbins
2ce4963 Violence does not always take visible form, and not all wounds gush blood. violence pain Haruki Murakami
dd81962 the story is not a pretty one. there is violence in it. And cruelty. But stories that are not pretty have a certain value, too, I suppose. Everything, as you well know (having lived in this world long enough to have figured out a thing or two for yourself), cannont always be sweetness and light. violence light despereaux Kate DiCamillo
2f02565 Senseless violence is a prerogative of youth, which has much energy but little talent for the constructive. violence youth Anthony Burgess
b25b6ad Rape is a crime against sleep and memory; it's after image imprints itself like an irreversible negative from the camera obscure of dreams. Though their bodies would heal, their souls had sustained a damage beyond compensation rape violence Pat Conroy
afa1957 What sparks wars? The will to power, the backbone of human nature. The threat of violence, the fear of violence, or actual violence, is the instrument of this dreadful will. You can see the will to power in bedrooms, kitchens, factories, unions and the borders of states. Listen to this and remember it. The nation state is merely human nature inflated to monstrous proportions. QED, nations are entities whose laws are written by violence. Thus it ever was, so ever shall it be. violence war David Mitchell
29af0de Women are often belittled for trying to resurrect these men and bring them back to life and to love. They are in a world that would be even more alienated and violent if caring women did not do the work of teaching men who have lost touch with themselves how to love again. This labor of love is futile only when the men in question refuse to awaken, refuse growth. At this point it is a gesture of self-love for women to break their commitment and move on. violence futility life love labor self-love growth resurrection Bell Hooks
ad0547a There are few genuine conservatives within the U.S. political system, and it is a sign of the intellectual corruption of the age that the honorable term 'conservatism' can be appropriated to disguise the advocacy of a powerful, lawless, aggressive and violent state, a welfare state for the rich dedicated to a lunatic form of Keynesian economic intervention that enhances state and private power while mortgaging the country's future. violence politics keynesianism welfare-states conservatism united-states politics-of-the-united-states economics law intellectuals Noam Chomsky
41333a4 All authority is quite degrading. It degrades those who exercise it, and degrades those over whom it is exercised. When it is violently, grossly, and cruelly used, it produces a good effect by creating, or at any rate bringing out, the spirit of revolt and individualism that is to kill it. When it is used with a certain amount of kindness, and accompanied by prizes and rewards, it is dreadfully demoralising. People, in that case, are less conscious of the horrible pressure that is being put on them, and so go through their lives in a sort of coarse comfort, like petted animals, without ever realising that they are probably thinking other people's thoughts, living by other people's standards, wearing practically what one may call other people's second-hand clothes, and never being themselves for a single moment. violence Oscar Wilde
7df3fb8 This world's anguish is no different from the love we insist on holding back. violence tragedy pain war grief faith fear hope love anguish casualties-of-war child-victims-of-war children-killed-in-war gun-laws peacemaking russia-and-ukraine-conflict spiritual-love gun-violence world-suicide-prevention-day syrian-civil-war unconditional-love agape-love conflict-resolution nonviolent-conflict-resolution police-reform police-shootings peace-movement peace Aberjhani
c150255 I looked at her, with her hair spilled out on the pillows and the warmth of her body warming mine. And I thought, god-dang, if this ain't a heck of a way to be in bed with a pretty woman. The two of you arguing about murder, and threatening each other, when you're supposed to be in love and you could be doing something pretty nice. And then I thought, well, maybe it ain't so strange after all. Maybe it's like this with most people, everyone doing pretty much the same thing except in a different way. And all the time they're holding heaven in their hands. violence murder love human-condition crime-fiction Jim Thompson
fc20afd Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and their freedoms violence pascifism Robert A. Heinlein
4ef8f05 Everyone who is not happy must be shot. violence shooting oppression John le Carré
2a4f972 That's the law, son. But you were never much of a one for following the law. good-and-evil violence laws Anthony Burgess
a8b28a1 violence is an evil thing, but when the guns are all in the hands of the men without respect for human rights, then men are really in trouble. violence rights Louis L'Amour
758b2ec You barbarians!' he yelled. 'I'll sue the council for every penny it's got! I'll have you hung, drawn and quartered! And whipped! And boiled...until...until...until...until you've had enough.' Ford was running after him. Very very fast. 'And then I will do it again!' yelled Arthur, 'And when I've finished I will take all the little bits, and I will jump on them! violence humor science-fiction Douglas Adams
f959192 Eastward and westward storms are breaking,--great, ugly whirlwinds of hatred and blood and cruelty. I will not believe them inevitable. violence war faith wisdom hate-crimes civil-unrest faith-in-humanity peacism political-aggression political-turmoil syrian-civil-war we-can-do-better intolerance war-crimes black-history-month national-history-day nonviolent-conflict-resolution hope-for-the-future ukraine bigotry peace-movement cruelty prophecy peace crimean-war diplomacy russia W.E.B. Du Bois
6e18dfb "You stubborn bastard. Take it from someone who knows firsthand, there's a lot to be said for forgiveness. Grudges seldom hurt anyone except the one bearing them." "And there's a lot to be said for knocking enemies upside their heads and cracking skulls open." Ash & Urian" violence revenge stubborn grudge Sherrilyn Kenyon
f3e78e6 Violence is spiritual junk food, and boredom is spiritual anorexia. violence christianity spirituality philosophy jesus-shock sloth catholicism theology Peter Kreeft
41f3477 Man is complete in himself. When they go into the world, the world will disagree with them. That is inevitable. The world hates Individualism. But that is not to trouble them. They are to be calm and self-centred. If a man takes their cloak, they are to give him their coat, just to show that material things are of no importance. If people abuse them, they are not to answer back. What does it signify? The things people say of a man do not alter a man. He is what he is. Public opinion is of no value whatsoever. Even if people employ actual violence, they are not to be violent in turn. That would be to fall to the same low level. After all, even in prison, a man can be quite free. His soul can be free. His personality can be untroubled. He can be at peace. And, above all things, they are not to interfere with other people or judge them in any way. Personality is a very mysterious thing. A man cannot always be estimated by what he does. He may keep the law, and yet be worthless. He may break the law, and yet be fine. He may be bad, without ever doing anything bad. He may commit a sin against society, and yet realise through that sin his true perfection. violence personality freedom soul-of-a-man wilde oscar prison soul Oscar Wilde
2c28354 Of course it was horrible,' smiled Dr. Branom. 'Violence is a very horrible thing. That's what you're learning now. Your body is learning it. violence Anthony Burgess
8531bd3 And what, brothers, I had to escape into sleep from then was the horrible and wrong feeling that it was better to get the hit than give it. If that veck had stayed I might even have like presented the other cheek. violence biblical-reference Anthony Burgess
631a383 Our subject is, you see, impelled towards the good by, paradoxically, being impelled towards evil. The intention to act violently is accompanied by strong feelings of physical distress. To counter these the subject has to switch to a diametrically opposed attitude. good-and-evil violence paradox Anthony Burgess
dc917fa The old days are dead and gone days. For what I did in the past I have been punished. I have been cured. good-and-evil violence Anthony Burgess
48c35e7 "The convoluted wording of legalisms grew up around the necessity to hide from ourselves the violence we intend toward each other. Between depriving a man of one hour from his life and depriving him of his life there exists only a difference of degree. You have done violence to him, consumed his energy. Elaborate euphemisms may conceal your intent to kill, but behind any use of power over another the ultimate assumption remains: "I feed on your energy." violence time politics power Frank Herbert
0852a64 That's what violence was: emotion leaking out from consciousness into the physical world, linking up with the muscles of the arms and shoulders and diaphragm and, inevitably, the face. Stifle emotion during an act of violence and the face becomes a blank, unreadable mask. violence inspirational bad-ass Ryū Murakami
79d393b Delimitation is always difficult. The world is one, life is one. The sweetest and most heavenly of activities partake in some measure of violence - the act of love, for instance; music, for instance. violence music lovemaking Anthony Burgess
740894f Violence is not the answer. Terrorism is the most dangerous of answers. violence war Elie Wiesel
321ad7d The cost of growth is always a small act of violence. violence Jodi Picoult
e8dc429 As a teacher of fourth-graders in a public school, where corporal punishement was not allowed, she had years of violence stored up and was, truth be told, sort of enjoying letting it out on Kona, who she felt could have been the poster child for the failure of public education. violence education moore Christopher Moore
7aca8d1 But people like the doll guy who sells women and the dog guy who buys women, and other guys who, say, rape women, or maybe don't go as far as violent rape but treat women like objects instead of people--sure, there's a difference in the level of crime, but it's all the same thing, where women become a canvas for throwing emotional baggage, Jackson Pollock style. rape violence violence-against-women Taylor Stevens
192451e How much violence, Marshal, do you think a man can carry before it breaks him? violence Dennis Lehane
02709cb "It's rare that anyone says what this medical study does, even if in the driest way possible "Being male has been identified as a risk factor for violent criminal behavior in several studies, as have exposure to tobacco smoke before birth, having antisocial parents, and belonging to a poor family". It's not that I want to pick on men. I just think that if we noticed that women are, on the whole, radically less violent, we might be able to theorize where violence come from and what we can do about it a lot more productively. Clearly the ready availability of guns is a huge problem for United States, but despite this availability to everyone, murder is still a crime committed by men 90 percent of the time." violence feminism rebecca-solnit gender Rebecca Solnit
2096865 You see Carter, people are two things: greedy and cruel. So we have a perfect set-up here. The greed part - a kid pays a buck for a chance to win a hundred. Plus fifty boxes of chocolates. The cruel part - watching two guys hitting each other, maybe hurting each other, while they're safe in the bleachers. That's why it works, Carter, because we're all bastards. violence greed Robert Cormier
f4bb574 The silences after his last gasp were sung together by a blackbird. I lay there, my eyes unable to close. His were unable to open. I listed the places where I hurt, and how much. My loins felt ripped. Something inside had torn. There were seven places on my body where he had sunk his fangs into my skin and bitten. He'd dug his nails into my neck, and twisted my head to one side, and clawed my face. I hadn't made a noise. He had made all the noise for both of us. Had it hurt him? rape violence pain David Mitchell
01b16d9 One tended to lose one's bearings in the presence of willful and persistent acts of craziness, and the more gentle the act, the crazier it seemed, as if rage and violence, being closer to the norm, were easier to accommodate. violence gentleness nonviolence Tom Robbins
04577d8 "I shook my head. "I'm good, Nicky helped." Nicky looked at Edward. "She's having one of those what-if-killing-feels-really-good, doesn't-that-make-me-a-bad-person moments." Edward nodded as if that made perfect sense. "Then it feels good. We can't really control what flips our switch; don't judge it, Anita, and just accept it." I wanted to argue, but it would have been beyond stupid to argue with the two sociopaths in my life. "Why do I have moral quandary questions with the two of you?" "Because you don't really have moral quandaries about violence, Anita, but you're afraid of being judged for enjoying it, so you only bring it to the two people in your life who won't judge you." I wanted to argue with Edward, but I couldn't. "Well, fuck." violence humor enjoy-the-violence killing-feels-good sociopaths Laurell K. Hamilton
cf83e06 Krystal flung herself violently off the chair, away from her mother. She was surprised to feel warm liquid flowing down her cheeks, and thought confusedly of blood, but it was tears, only tears, clear and shining on her fingertips when she wiped them away. violence emotion tears despair J.K. Rowling
688be7c A place where something so terrible had happened shouldn't continue to exist in the world violence tragedy people places Ron Rash
eb0ce6f The germ of creation lies in violence. violence inspirational Rudolfo Anaya
203d3f7 The violence of language consists in its effort to capture the ineffable and, hence, to destroy it, to seize hold of that which must remain elusive for language to operate as a living thing. violence Judith Butler
496b679 And now submarines are armed with mass murder, our silly, only way of deterring mass murder. violence John Steinbeck
7146045 People were excited by violence. What, after all, was the sexual act but a voluntarily endured assault, a momentary death? violence sex P.D. James
6876fef I am very much concerned that American Negroes achieve their freedom here in the United States. But I am also concerned for their dignity, for the health of their souls, and must oppose any attempt that Negroes may make to do to others what has been done to them. violence dignity race James Baldwin
f65615f "They" hate us because they feel--and "they" are not wrong--that it is within our power to do so much more, and that we practice a kind of passive-aggressive violence on the Third World. We do this by, for example, demonizing tobacco as poison here while promoting cigarettes in Asia; inflating produce prices by paying farmers not to grow food as millions go hungry worldwide; skimping on quality and then imposing tariffs on foreign products made better or cheaper than our own; padding corporate profits through Third World sweatshops; letting drug companies stand by as millions die of AIDS in Africa to keep prices up on lifesaving drugs; and on and on. We do, upon reaching a very high comfort level, mostly choose to go from ten to eleven instead of helping another guy far away go from zero to one. We even do it in our own country. Barbara Ehrenreich's brilliant book describes the impossibility of living with dignity or comfort as one of the millions of minimum-wage workers in fast food, aisle-stocking and table-waiting jobs. Their labor for next to nothing ensures that well-off people can be a little more pampered. So if we do it to our own, what chance do foreigners have?" violence poverty suffering hate extremism irresponsible poverty-and-politics third-world passive-aggressive ignorance Bill Maher
7d2858b "They" hate us because they feel--and "they" are not wrong--that it is within our power to do so much more, and that we practice a kind of passive-aggressive violence on the Third World. We do this by, for example, demonizing tobacco as poison here while promoting cigarettes in Asia; inflating produce prices by paying farmers not to grow food as millions go hungry worldwide; skimping on quality and then imposing tariffs on foreign products made better or cheaper than our own; padding corporate profits through Third World sweatshops; letting drug companies stand by as millions die of AIDS in Africa to keep prices up on lifesaving drugs; and on and on. We do, upon reaching a very high comfort level, mostly choose to go from ten to eleven instead of helping another guy far away go from zero to one. We even do it in our own country. Barbara Ehrenreich's brilliant book describes the impossibility of living with dignity or comfort as one of the millions of minimum-wage workers in fast food, aisle-stocking and table-waiting jobs. Their labor for next to nothing ensures that well-off people can be a little more pampered. So if we do it to our own, what chance do foreigners have?" -- violence poverty suffering hate extremism irresponsible poverty-and-politics third-world passive-aggressive ignorance Bill Maher
17e75a6 Remember, I'm the only person her who's paid to be nice to you. But not too nice. Give me any lip and I'll break your face. OK? violence science Orson Scott Card
fd716cd They laid up in the shade of a rock shelf until past noon, scratching out a place in the gray lava dust to sleep, and they set forth in the afternoon down the valley following the war trail and they were very small and they moved very slowly in the immensity of that landscape. Come evening they hove toward the rimrock again and Sproule pointed out a dark stain on the face of the barren cliff. It looked like the black from old fires. The kid shielded his eyes. The scalloped canyon walls rippled in the heat like drapery folds. violence landscape desert journey Cormac McCarthy
33ac459 Confession is an act of violence against the unoffending. violence Tom Stoppard
3de036d People have a greater tolerance for evil than for violence. If crooked gamboling, thieving and robing are covered over folks will tolerate it longer than out right violence, even when the violence may be cleansing. violence Louis L'Amour
f04eb89 That's my town,' Joaquin said. 'What a fine town, but how the buena gente, the good people of that town, have suffered in this war.' Then, his face grave, 'There they shot my father. My mother. My brother-in-law and now my sister.' 'What barbarians,' Robert Jordan said. How many times had he heard this? How many times had he watched people say it with difficulty? How many times had he seen their eyes fill and their throats harden with the difficulty of saying my father, or my brother, or my mother, or my sister? He could not remember how many times he heard them mention their dead in this way. Nearly always they spoke as this boy did now; suddenly and apropos of the mention of the town and always you said, 'What barbarians. violence war family Ernest Hemingway
81ae5c8 "In the preface of "The Rifles" "Another rule we followed was never kill an animal that we were not going to use for food or clothing." Barnabas Piryuaq "Well, in those high latitudes we found such quantities of seals and walruses that we simply did not know what to do with them.There were thousands and thousands lying there; we walked among them and hit them on the head, and laughed heartily in the abundance which God had created." Jan Welzi 1933. " violence native-americans slaughter environment hunters William T. Vollmann
0f5f5e4 "Among the many symbols used to frighten and manipulate the populace of the democratic states, few have been more important than "terror" and "terrorism." These terms have generally been confined to the use of violence by individuals and marginal groups. Official violence, which is far more extensive in both scale and destructiveness, is placed in a different category altogether. This usage has nothing to do with justice, causal sequence, or numbers abused. Whatever the actual sequence of cause and effect, official violence is described as responsive or provoked ("retaliation," "protective reaction," etc.), not as the active and initiating source of abuse. Similarly, the massive long-term violence inherent in the oppressive social structures that U.S. power has supported or imposed is typically disregarded. The numbers tormented and killed by official violence-wholesale as opposed to retail terror-during recent decades have exceeded those of unofficial terrorists by a factor running into the thousands. But this is not "terror," [...] "security forces" only retaliate and engage in "police action." These terminological devices serve important functions. They help to justify the far more extensive violence of (friendly) state authorities by interpreting them as "reactive" and they implicitly sanction the suppression of information on the methods and scale of official violence by removing it from the category of "terrorism." [...] Thus the language is well-designed for apologetics for wholesale terror." violence terrorism united-states terror Noam Chomsky
a0fc027 The fiendlike skill we display in the invention of all manner of death-dealing engines, the vindictiveness with which we carry on our wars, and the misery and desolation that follow in their train, are enough of themselves to distinguish the white civilized man as the most ferocious animal on the face of the earth. violence war white-people Herman Melville
95c99f3 "How come he cannot recognize his own cruelty now turned against him? How come he can't see his own savagery as a colonist in the savagery of these oppressed peasants who have absorbed it through every pore and for which they can find no cure? The answer is simple: this arrogant individual, whose power of authority and fear of losing it has gone to his head, has difficulty remembering he was once a man; he thinks he is a whip or a gun; he is convinced that the domestication of the "inferior races" is obtained by governing their reflexes. He disregards the human memory, the indelible reminders; and then, above all, there is this that perhaps he never know: we only become what we are by radically negating deep down what others have done to us." violence Jean-Paul Sartre
470b646 A terrorist, I think, is simply another kind of pornographer. The pornographer pretends he is disgusted by his work; the terrorist pretends he is uninterested in the means. The ends, they say, are what they care about. But they are both lying. Ernst loved his pornography; Ernst worshiped the means. It is never the ends that matter -- it is only the means that matter. The terrorist and the pornographer are in it for the means. The means is everything to them. The blast of the bomb, the elephant position, the Schlagobers and blood -- they love it all. Their intellectual detachment is a fraud; their indifference is feigned. They both tell lies about having 'higher purposes.' A terrorist is a pornographer. violence means-and-ends pornographer terrorist pornography John Irving
a07d95a Even now when I'm furious, what I would like to do is to punch the infuriating person flat on the ground. That solves nothing I know, and I spent a lot of time understanding my own violence, which is not of the pussycat kind. There are people who could never commit murder; I am not one of those people. It's better to know it, better to know who you are, and what lies in you, and what you could do, might do, under extreme provocation. violence working-class Jeanette Winterson
ee29e3a One time I took my knife and sliced off the end of a hog's nose, just like a piece of salami. The hog went crazy for a few seconds. Then it sat there looking kind of stupid. So I took a handful of salt and rubbed it on the wound. Now that hog really went nuts. It was my way of taking out frustration. Another time, there was a live hog in the pit. It hadn't done anything wrong, wasn't even running around. It was just alive. I took a three-foot chunk of pipe and I literally beat that hog to death. It was like I started hitting the hog and I couldn't stop. And when I finally did stop, I'd expended all this energy and frustration, and I'm thinking what in God's sweet name did I do. violence slaughterhouse vegetarianism pigs meat sadism brutality cruelty frustration Gail A. Eisnitz
00cc953 Implicit in the stare of those eyes, the power of those knobbly hands, was labor's historic threat of violence against capital. violence socialism labor synecdoche capitalism Edmund Morris
c9fe539 "You make someone into a object of - not so much of pity as of weakness, sickness, stupidity, inefectiveness, do you see what I mean? You hit them for their stupidity and their inability to respond, and when you've hurt them, marked them, they're even more sick and ugly, aren't they? And they're afraid and cringing too. Oh, I know this isn't very pleasant, but you did ask." "Go on" he said. "So you've got a frightened, stupid, even disabled person, silenced, made ugly, and what can you do with someone like that, someone who's unworthy of being treated well? You treat them badly because that's what they deserve. One thinks of poor little kids that no one love because they're dirty, sovered in snot and shit, and always screaming. So you beat them because they're hateful, they're low, they're sub-human. That's all they're good for, being hit, being reduced even further." hatred prejudice injustice violence Ruth Rendell
240523c It's despair at the lack of (I'm cheating, I didn't say all these things - but I'm going to write what I want to say as well as what I did) feeling, of love, of reason in the world. It's despair that anyone can even contemplate the idea of dropping a bomb or ordering that it should be dropped. It's despair that so few of us care. It's despair that there's so much brutality and callousness in the world. violence humanity pacifism John Fowles
12680c5 If you remembered somebody was as real as yourself, how could you kill anybody? violence life nonviolence Sena Jeter Naslund
2d4e1d2 "I am glad," he said, "that I do not dwell in your country among such savage peoples. Here, in Caspak, men fight with men when they meet - men of different races - but their weapons are first for the slaying of beasts in the chase and defense. We do not fashion weapons solely for the killing of man as do your peoples. Your country must indeed be a savage country, from which you are fortunate to have escaped to the peace and security of Caspak." violence men society weapons Edgar Rice Burroughs
ceb07e0 Don't you ever think,' he asked cautiously, 'that it would be better to be a bully than to be bullied? At least that way no one could ever hurt you.' Katarina turned to him in amazement. 'No,' she said definitively, shaking her head. 'No Pieter, I never think that, not for a moment. violence doubt John Boyne
96e36c3 As history has also shown, especially in the twentieth century, one of the first things an ideologue will do after achieving absolute power is kill. violence history politics ideologue progressives revolt rule political-philosophy government revolution power oppression Thomas Sowell
a1d51ec "Despite our earnest efforts, we couldn't climb all the way up to God. So what did God do? In an amazing act of condescension, on Good Friday, God climbed down to us, became one with us. The story of divine condescension begins on Christmas and ends on Good Friday. We thought, if there is to be business between us and God, we must somehow get up to God. Then God came down, down to the level of the cross, all the way down to the depths of hell. He who knew not sin took on our sin so that we might be free of it. God still stoops, in your life and mine, condescends. "Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?" he asked his disciples, before his way up Golgotha. Our answer is an obvious, "No!" His cup is not only the cup of crucifixion and death, it is the bloody, bloody cup that one must drink if one is going to get mixed up in us. Any God who would wander into the human condition, any God who has this thirst to pursue us, had better not be too put off by pain, for that's the way we tend to treat our saviors. Any God who tries to love us had better be ready to die for it. As Chesterton writes, "Any man who preaches real love is bound to beget hate ... Real love has always ended in bloodshed." violence love crucifixion divine-condescension good-friday incarnation salvation cross jesus-christ easter William H. Willimon
d11a619 All at once he feels weary of ganefs and prophets, guns and sacrifices and the infinite gangster weight of God. He's tired of hearing about the promised land and the inevitable bloodshed required for its redemption. violence war Michael Chabon
e1cc518 No, my career as a warrior princess, short as it had been, was over, I thought morosely. Violence only works if you're good at it. Otherwise, it hurts too much. violence warrior Sherwood Smith
0fc96cb She was struck by the selfish thought that this was not fair to her. That she'd been in the middle of a different story, one that had nothing to do with this. She was a person who was finding her daughter, making things right with her daughter, and there was no room in that story for the idiocy of extreme religion, the violence of men she'd never met. Just as she'd been in the middle of a story about divorce when the towers fell in New York City, throwing everyone's careful plans to shit. Just as she'd once been in a story about raising her own brother, growing up with her brother in the city on their own, making it in the world, when the virus and the indifference of greedy men had steamrolled through. She thought of Nora, whose art and love were interrupted by assassination and war. Stupid men and their stupid violence, tearing apart everything good that was ever built. Why couldn't you ever just go after your life without tripping over some idiot's dick? violence war violence-and-humans terrorism Rebecca Makkai
dbaaa07 It was a piece of thoroughly picturesque and proper violence. I like a violent man, really, a man who's a bit of a brute in a decent straightforward way. violence Iris Murdoch
57eefab You can take the barbarian out of the tavern, but he can take the blood out of your body. violence humor short-stories Greg X. Graves
93a6607 Human nature favors the tribal. Tribalism engenders violence. It was ever thus and so it will ever be. violence Kate Atkinson
669fb13 If German boys had learned to be contemptuous of violence, Hitler would have had to take up knitting to keep his ego warm. violence war J.D. Salinger
e1d1967 A head can be beaten small enough until it fits the hat. violence G.K. Chesterton
800af65 It was uncanny. You press a button and a man drops dead a hundred meters away. It seemed hollow and remote, falsifying everything. It was a trick of the lenses. The man is an accurate picture. Then he is upside down. Then he is right side up. You shoot at a series of images conveyed to you through a metal tube. The force of a death should be enormous but how can you know what kind of man you've killed or who was the braver and stronger if you have to peer through layers of glass that deliver the image but obscure the meaning of the act? War has a conscience or it's ordinary murder. violence war technology Don DeLillo
b0124a0 They leave the genitals off Barbie and Ken, but they manufacture every kind of war toy. Because sex is more threatening to us than aggression. There have been strict rules about sex since the beginning of written rules, and even before, if we can believe myth. I think that's because it's in sex that men feel most vulnerable. In war they can hype themselves up, or they have a weapon. Sex means being literally naked and exposing your feelings. And that's more terrifying to most men than the risk of dying while fighting a bear or a soldier. violence war sex men men-s-fears men-suck vulnerability Marilyn French
f8529a1 I think Bonzo died. I dreamed about it last night. I remembered the way he looked after I jammed his face with my head. I think I must have pushed his nose back into his brain. The blood was coming out of his eyes. I think he was dead right then. violence Orson Scott Card
8439bdb It was easy to share when there was enough, even barely enough, to go round. But when there was not enough? Then force entered in; might making right; power, and its tool, violence, and its most devoted ally, the averted eye. violence shame Ursula K. Le Guin
e3067fe By the time they're out of preschool, most children have already seen thousands of acts of violence. violence Brian K. Vaughan
0486ff2 In the immediate vicinity, there might well be stability and peace. In the garden, a breeze may be swaying the branches of the plum tree and dust may slowly be gathering on the bookshelves in the living room. But we are aware that such serenity does not do justice to the chaotic and violent fundamentals of existence and hence, after a time, it has a a habit of growing worrisome in its own way. violence concern serenity chaos news worry peace Alain de Botton
b748b4b Edward had a personal horror of violence and never endorsed or excused it, though in a documentary he made about the conflict he said that actions like the bombing of pilgrims at Tel Aviv airport 'did more harm than good,' which I remember thinking was (a) euphemistic and (b) a slipshod expression unworthy of a professor of English. violence tel-aviv euphemism Christopher Hitchens
2ea43fc Nothing is easier than to get peaceful people to renounce violence, even when they provide no concrete ways to prevent violence from others. violence war peace Thomas Sowell
2becaaf I came to see the streets and the schools as the arms of the same beast. One enjoyed the official power of the state while the other enjoyed its implicit sanction. But fear and violence were the weaponry of both. violence schools weaponry state Ta-Nehisi Coates
9b709a6 New Rule: The White House doesn't have to release the dead Bin Laden photos, but don't pretend we can't take it. We've seen pictures of Britney Spears's vagina getting out of a car. Television has desensitizes us to violence, and porn has desensitized us to people getting shot in the eye. violence humor osama-bin-laden porn culture Bill Maher
7a44d20 The poison that is war does not free us from the ethics of responsibility. There are times when we must take this poison - just as a person with cancer accepts chemotherapy to live. We can not succumb to despair. Force is and I suspect always will be part of the human condition. There are times when the force wielded by one immoral faction must be countered by a faction that, while never moral, is perhaps less immoral. We in the industrialized world bear responsibility for the world's genocides because we had the power to intervene and did not. We stood by and watched the slaughter in Chechnya, Sri Lanka, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Rwanda where a million people died. The blood for the victims of Srebrenica- a designated UN safe area in Bosnia- is on our hands. The generation before mine watched, with much the same passivity, the genocides of Germany, Poland, Hungary, Greece, and the Ukraine. These slaughters were, as in, Gabriel Garcia Marquez's book Chronical of a Death Foretold, often announced in advance violence war morality genocide morals Chris Hedges
75e623a The news that is brought to us is nearly always bad news, but for every act of violence or destruction that occurs there are a million acts of peaceful friendliness. violence humans Desmond Morris
ebee7e0 Never plan an act of violence. Just let it happen natural. violence planning Garth Ennis
ff69680 There is violence in this supposedly tender heart of mine. violence Julian Barnes
96ece0d Even though some individual scholars try to tell us there is no direct connection between images of violence and the violence confronting us in our lives, the commonsense truth remains- we are affected by the images we consume and by the states of mind we are in when watching them. If consumers want to be entertained, and the images shown us as entertaining are images of violent dehumanization, it makes sense that these acts become more acceptable in our daily lives and that we become less likely to respond to them with moral outrage or concern. Were we all seeing more images of loving human interaction, it would undoubtedly have a positive impact on our lives. violence television mass-media pop-culture violent movies bell hooks
6cda9f4 ... on the historical scale, the damages wrought by individual violence for selfish motives are insignificant compared to the holocausts resulting from self-transcending devotion to collectively shared belief-systems. It is derived from primitive identification instead of mature social integration; it entails the partial surrender of personal responsibility and produces the quasi-hypnotic phenomena of group-psychology. violence depersonalization disease evil Arthur Koestler
200b511 Private ownerships of a ...slave chip is illegal in many polities. It tends to be a government monopoly, much like other forms of violence. But I had fallen among pirates and life insurance underwriters. violence slavery Charles Stross
b882bee The police can use violence to say, expel citizens from a public park because they are enforcing duly constituted laws. Laws gain their legitimacy from the Constitution. The Constitution gains its legitimacy from something called 'the people.' But how did 'the people' actually grant legitimacy to the Constitution? As the American and French revolutions make clear: basically, through acts of illegal violence. So what gives the police the right to use force to suppress the very thing-a popular uprising-that granted them their right to use force to begin with? violence politics society rights democracy police David Graeber
717933c While opposing injustice nonviolently, he (Gandhi) insisted, is always morally superior to opposing it violently, opposing injustice violently is still morally superior to doing nothing to oppose it at all. violence political gandhi protests democracy resistance David Graeber
b71e1d0 The fury of those nativists advocating wholesale slaughter was what struck Nadia most, and it struck her because it seemed so familiar, so much like the fury of the militants in her own city. She wondered whether she and Saeed had done anything by moving, whether the faces and buildings had changed but the basic reality of their predicament had not. violence migration refugees Mohsin Hamid
092fdcd To cope, he and his siblings - older and younger sisters, a younger brother - created a game called Henry Kissinger. Palahniuk remembers that as their parents fought, lots would be drawn to see who would play Kissinger. 'This was the early to mid-70s, when Kissinger was a hero, forging peace in the Middle East,' he explains. 'Whoever became Henry Kissinger would have to go and redirect our parents' attention or anger to a different crisis.' The child who drew the short straw would severely hurt himself, presenting himself as 'this injured thing' in an effort to diffuse conflict. violence fight-club damned-lies chuck-palahniuk dysfunctional-families Antonella Gambotto-Burke
6a57a75 There are very subtle shades of violence, I can assure you. A civilization that renounces the possibility of resorting to violence in thought or deed destroys itself. It becomes a flock of sheep that will get their throats cut by the first person to come along. The same thing happens to men. violence Arturo Pérez-Reverte
f19c19c The last thing we wanted was for the Machiguenga to be sad again. Sadness appeared to bring out their violence. violence Tahir Shah
8c853bb I aint sure we've seen these people before. Their kind. I dont know what to do about em even. If you killed em all they'd have to build a annex on to hell. violence Cormac McCarthy
67111b7 Marko: No matter what mistakes you've see your daddy make, violence---magical or otherwise---is never acceptable. Petrichor: Nonsense, Marko. Violence is often : in self-defense, the arts foreplay... Hazel: I want to four-play! violence pacifism peace Brian K. Vaughan
c8c0072 "Against the claims of a violent "human nature" there is enormous historical evidence that people, when free of a manufactured nationalist or religious hysteria, are more inclined to be compassionate than cruel. When citizens have an opportunity to learn of vicious acts committed by their own governments, they react with indignation and protest. So long as atrocities remain remote, abstract, they will be tolerated, even by decent people." violence war Howard Zinn
064d25d "You appear to be a mass of contradictions," Dr Washburn said. "There's a subsurface violence almost always in control, but very much alive. There's also a pensiveness that seems painful for you, yet you rarely give vent to the anger that pain must provoke." violence pain pensiveness identity Robert Ludlum
4a3a3c6 I dont believe knowing can save us. What is constant in history is greed and foolishness and a love of blood and this is a thing that even God--who knows all that can be known--seems powerless to change. violence history world people society-problem society Cormac McCarthy
b1608d3 There were in the camp a number of Mexican slaves and these ran forth calling out in spanish and were brained or shot and one of the Delawares emerged from the smoke with a naked infant dangling in each hand and squatted at a ring of midden stones and swung them by the heels each in turn and bashed their heads against the stones so that the brains burst forth through the fontanel in a bloody spew and humans on fire came shrieking forth like berserkers and the riders hacked them down with their enormous knives and a young woman ran up and embraced the bloodied forefeet of Glanton's warhorse. violence war Cormac McCarthy
f3100da Pacifists have usually regarded the use of violence as absolutely wrong, irrespective of its consequences. This, like other 'no matter what' prohibitions, assumes the validity of the distinction between acts and omissions. Without this distinction, pacifists who refuse to use violence when it is the only means of preventing greater violence would be responsible for the greater violence they fail to prevent. violence pacifism ethics Peter Singer
475d6fa Being loud after drinking wine doesn't help. Being silent after drinking wine doesn't help. Nothing really ever gets solved either way. violence arguing dysfunction alcoholism-addiction-recovery fighting child drunk wine mental-illness Mariel Hemingway
2ad21a4 No matter that information abounds that lets the public know that gay males come from two-parent homes and can be macho and women-hating, misguided assumptions about what makes a male gay still flourish. Every day boys who express feelings are psychologically terrorized, and in extreme cases brutally beaten, by parents who fear that a man of feeling must be homosexual. Gay men share with straight men the same notions about acceptable masculinity. violence feminism feelings feminist emotional-men feelings-and-emotions gay-teens gay-men emotions masculinity gay bell hooks
d8d43db We will destroy the tyranny of the dull. But we can't destroy it with guns. Or whips. Violence is the dullard's Breakfast of Champions, and the logical end product of his or her misplaced pride. Violence fertilizes that which we would starve. But Debbie, we can't love the dull away either. We only pollute our own waters when we try to extend our true affection to those who don't know how to accept love or to give it. Love is very powerful, but it has limits and it's a costly mistake to spread it too thin. violence Tom Robbins
804798d He beat me when you not here, I say. Who do, she say, Albert? Mr ____, I say. I can't believe it, she say. She sit down on the bench next to me real hard, like she drop. What he beat you for? she ast. For being me and not you. violence jealousy abuse-survivor wife-beater envy alice walker
7bc4d0a Now driving in a wild frieze of headlong horses with eyes walled and teeth cropped and naked riders with clusters of arrows clenched in their jaws and their shields winking in the dust and pu the far side of the ruined ranks in a piping of boneflutes and dropping down off the sides of their mounts with one heel hung in the withers strap and their short bows flexing beneath the outstretched necks of the ponies until they had circled the company and cut their ranks in two and then rising up again like funhouse figures, some with nightmare faces painted on their breasts, riding down the unhorsed Saxons and spearing and clubbing them and leaping from their mounts with knives and running about on the ground with a peculiar bandylegged trot like creatures driven to alien forms of locomotion and stripping the clothes from the dead and seizing them up by the hair and passing their blades about the skulls of the living and the dead alike and snatching aloft the bloody wigs and hacking and chopping at the naked bodies, ripping off limbs, head, gutting the strange white torsos and holding up great handfuls of viscera, genitals, some of the savages so slathered up with gore they might have rolled in it like dogs and some who fell upon the dying and sodomized them with loud cries to their fellows. violence very-long-sentence Cormac McCarthy
5f01bf2 ... He was not for that moment a human being, but a frenzied creature possessed by rage, turned into an animal. All that could be seen in him was the urge to hurt, and it was, as it always will be, the most dreadful sight in the world. violence immaturity malice Susan Cooper
8c00707 Any one war seems rooted in its antecedents. violence revenge T.H. White
a58deef All this miraculous hatred. Christ, a man can't eat his breakfast for filling his belly full of it. hatred violence people-are-no-damn-good sectarian-divide the-human-condition viciousness Colum McCann
eea0b89 He had conquered murder only to be faced with war. There were no laws for that. violence warfare T.H. White
125f6e9 ...a freeze response (dissociation, collapse, numbing, paralysis, deadness) during the incident that threatened your life or limb. Sometimes it's difficult for people to understand that this is really survival response... violence ptsd traumatic-experiences trauma Babette Rothschild
1315291 How can you render the duties of justice to men when you're afraid they'll be so unaware of justice they may destroy you? ...especially since their attitude toward their own race is a destructive one. violence civil-rights disunity race-issues John Howard Griffin
e3716e0 IT TOOK a conscious effort for Tallow to keep his hand off his gun as he walked up the apartment building's stairs. There was no threat here. He told himself that with every step. But every step held memory. violence noir-style noir ptsd Warren Ellis
27cb21a Hate's not functional; why are we taught it? violence hate education science-fiction peace Ursula K. Le Guin
f0b284f It's just an old fella. Mostly bald. Walking dainty like his feet's tender. And still singing. With some things in his hand. He puts them down on a drum. Sits on a milk crate in the shade. Pulls on a pair of gumboots. Then he snatches up the things from beside him and shuffles out in the sun and leans against the verandah post and I see him clear enough. Singlet. Baggy arse shorts. Thick specs. He's short and thick this fella. Red in the face. And that stuff in his hand, it's a knife and steel. He looks around, kind of slow and lazy. Stops singing then and just hums a minute while he hones the knife. And he knows how to freshen up a blade, that I can see straight up. violence irony music Tim Winton
c1c7c4c This is of course why violence is so often the preferred weapon of the stupid. One might even call it the trump card of the stupid, since (and this is surely one of the tragedies of human existence) it is the one form of stupidity to which it is most difficult to come up with an intelligent response. violence David Graeber
a0a64be Fire is often the weapon of choice for the insane. violence insanity Douglas Preston
95d2033 His strike force stood around him, craning their necks, in awe of the massive emptiness all around. He was almost sorry to pull his attention back to the small, vaguely intimate necessities of violence. violence war space regret James S.A. Corey
91faff9 In keeping with your policy of bringing Pollution the latest in death and violence, and in living colour, there's going to be something entirely different... death without remediation. violence television living death christine-chubbuck remediation policy pop-culture colour pollution Rebecca McNutt
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