400 Quotes About State

There has never been a humane communist regime. Marxism is inherently totalitarian. It recognizes no moral limits on the state. It’s the most convenient ideology for aspiring tyrants; it also retains its appeal for intellectuals, who have proved equally skillful at rationalizing abuses of power and at exculpating themselves.

إذا رأيت عناوين الصحف متشابهة فأنت في دولة ديكتاتورية، إذا رأيت إسم الحاكم يتكرر في كل خبر وفي كل عنوان فإعلم أنك في دولة يحكمها فرد واحد وكل شعبها من الأصفار والعبيد

The sense of national emergency engendered by war transforms the destruction of dissident opinion into patriotism.

It constantly amazes me that defenders of the free market are expected to offer certainty and perfection while government has only to make promises and express good intentions. Many times, for instance, I’ve heard people say, "A free market in education is a bad idea because some child somewhere might fall through the cracks," even though in today’s government school, millions of children are falling through the cracks every day.

There are no such things as nations, States and societies existing as collective common realities which stand on a higher level than personality and turn it into part of themselves.

Observation is a state of matter.

Δύσκολο ακόμα και να μιλήσεις γι' αυτό", μου είπε. "Αισθάνομαι αλλαγμένη. Πες πως είμαι ένα πουλόβερ. Και πιάνεται ένα νήμα που έχει ξεφύγει και τραβιέται και αρχίζει να ξετυλίγεται το πουλόβερ και δε μένει παρά μονάχα ένας μεγάλος μαλακός σωρός από το νήμα. Μπορείς να κάνεις κάτι μ' αυτό, με τον σωρό από το νήμα, αλλά δε θα γίνει ποτέ ξανά πουλόβερ. Αυτή είναι η κατάσταση των πραγμάτων".

If we accept that police forces arose at a particular point in history, to address specific social conditions, then it follows that social change could also eliminate the institution. The first half of this syllogism is readily admitted, the second half is heresy.

It is a bad habit of mind, a form of power-worship, to assume that things must be as they are, that they will continue to be as they have been. It soothes the conscience of the privileged, dulls the will of the oppressed. The first step toward change is the understanding that things can be different. This is my principal recommendation, then: we must recognize the possibility of a world without police.