Privilege Quotes
More Privilege Quotes
If we had had the privilege of giving hospitality to a Ho Chi Minh, with what respect and interest we would have served him, as a man of vision, as a patriot, a rebel against foreign invaders.
dorothy day— "On Pilgrimage," Catholic Worker (January 1970)
I am prepared to waive the privilege against self-incrimination and to tell you everything you wish to know about my views or actions if your committee will agree to refrain from asking me to name other people. If the committee is unwilling to give me this assurance, I will be forced to plead the privilege of the fifth amendment at the hearing.
lillian hellman— Letter to The House Committee on Un-American Activities (May 21, 1952).
It is not earthly rank, nor birth, nor nationality, nor religious privilege, which proves that we are members of the family of God; it is love, a love that embraces all humanity.
ellen g. white— Thoughts From The Mount Of Blessing (1896) Ch. 3, "The Spirituality of the Law", p. 75
When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love … then make that day count!
steve maraboli— p. 144 (Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010))
I've received many honors and I'm grateful for them; but I've already received the highest award I'll ever receive, and that has been the privilege and honor of serving very proudly in the United States Navy.
grace hopper— As appeared in the October 1986 issue of Chips, a Department of the Navy information technology magazine
Marriage as a community of interests unfailingly means the degradation of the interested parties, and it is the perfidy of the world's arrangements that no one, even if aware of it, can escape such degradation. The idea might therefore be entertained that marriage without ignominy is a possibility reserved for those spared the pursuit of interests, for the rich. But the possibility is purely formal, for the privileged are precisely those in whom the pursuit of interests has become second-nature they would not otherwise uphold privilege.
theodor adorno— E. Jephcott, trans. (1974), § 10
Rats and roaches live by competition under the laws of supply and demand; it is the privilege of human beings to live under the laws of justice and mercy.
wendell berry— "Economy and Pleasure"
Gratitude is one of the least articulate of the emotions, especially when it is deep. I can express with very limited adequacy the passionate devotion to this land that possesses millions of our people, born, like myself, under other skies, for the privilege that that this county has bestowed in allowing them to partake of its fellowship.
felix frankfurter— Speech accepting an award from the National Institute for Immigrant Welfare, Biltmore Hotel, New York (May 11, 1933).
Let us award a just, a brilliant homage to those rare men whom nature has endowed with the precious privilege of arranging a thousand isolated facts, of making seductive theories spring from them; but let us not forget to state, that the scythe of the reaper had cut the stalks before one had thought of uniting them into sheaves!
françois arago— Joseph Fourier, p. 409
We are convinced that liberty without socialism is privilege, injustice; and that socialism without liberty is slavery and brutality.
mikhail bakunin— "Federalism, Socialism, Anti-Theologism", presented by Bakunin as a Reasoned Proposal to the Central Committee of the League for Peace and Freedom, at the League's first congress held in Geneva (September 1867).
— Variant translation: We are convinced that freedom without Socialism is privilege and injustice, and that Socialism without freedom is slavery and brutality.As quoted in The Political Philosophy of Bakunin : Scientific Anarchism (1953) edited by Grigori? Petrovich Maksimov, p. 269
Beware of privilege. It stinks of rotten rotten fish heads, many of which were lapping the shore beneath the jetties.
ralph steadman— The America's Cup, p. 47
Representing the people of Oregon's Second District is an honor and a privilege. Covering more than 70,000 square miles in twenty counties throughout eastern, southern and central Oregon, our district is breathtaking and diverse.
— Greg Walden, Welcome Message, United States House of Representatives, page, United States Congressman Greg Walden.
The full expression of personality depends upon its being inflated by social prestige; it is a social privilege.
Simone Weil— p. 64 (Human Personality (1943))
Representing the people of Oregon's Second District is an honor and a privilege. Covering more than 70,000 square miles in twenty counties throughout eastern, southern and central Oregon, our district is breathtaking and diverse.
— Greg Walden, Welcome Message, United States House of Representatives, page, United States Congressman Greg Walden.
Human rights are not a privilege conferred by government. They are every human being’s entitlement by virtue of his humanity. The right to life does not depend, and must not be contingent, on the pleasure of anyone else, not even a parent or sovereign... you must weep that your own government, at present, seems blind to this truth.
— Mother Teresa, in her amicus brief filed before the U.S. Supreme Court in the cases of Loce v. New Jersey and Krail et al. v. New Jersey in February 1994.
Today I see more clearly than yesterday that back of the problem of race and color, lies a greater problem which both obscures and implements it: and that isthefact that so many civilized persons are willing to live in comfort even if the price of this is poverty, ignorance and disease of the majority of their fellowmen; that to maintain this privilege men have waged war until today war tends to become universal and continuous, and the excuse for this war continues largely to be color and race.
W(illiam) E(dward) B(urghardt) Du Bois— Preface to reprint of The Souls of Black Folk (1969).
It is the province of knowledge to speak, and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen.
Oliver Wendell Holmes— 1872 The Poet at the Breakfast Table, ch.10.
'I almost wish I were not a painter,' observed my companion.'Why so? one would think at such a time you would most exult in your privilege of being able to imitate the various brilliant and delightful touches of nature.'No; for instead of delivering myself up to the full enjoyment of them as others do, I am always troubling my head about how I could produce the same effect upon canvas; and as that can never be done, it is more vanity and vexation of spirit.'
anne brontë— Helen to Gilbert (Ch. IX : A Snake in the Grass)
As long as we look to legislation to cure poverty or to abolish special privilege we are going to see poverty spread and special privilege grow.
Henry Ford— My Life and Work by Henry Ford (autobiography)
Christ has lifted woman to a new place in the world. And just in proportion as Christianity has sway, will she rise to a higher dignity in human life. What she has now, and what she shall have, of privilege and true honor, she owes to that gospel which took those qualities peculiarly and which had been counted weak and unworthy, and gave them a Divine glory in Christ.
herrick johnson— P. 618. (Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895))
It's a privilege and it's an honour and Olivia and I are certainly looking forward to visiting this beautiful, historic building and being able to stay there during the session when we're here in Ottawa.
jack layton— Jack Layton skittish about moving into Stornoway June 15, 2011
They, the conservatives, are the real outsides, they tell us, gazing with disgust upon the ludicrous manners of the high and mighty. Or, they tell us, they are rough-and-ready proles, laughing along with us at the efforts of our social "betters" to reform and improve us. That they are often, in fact, people of privilege doing their utmost to boost the fortunes of a political party that is the traditional tool of the privileged is a contradiction that does not trouble them.
thomas frank— Ibid. (p. 116)
The privilege of opening the first trial in history for crimes against the peace of the world imposes a grave responsibility. The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their being repeated. That four great nations, flushed with victory and stung with injury stay the hand of vengeance and voluntarily submit their captive enemies to the judgment of the law is one of the most significant tributes that Power has ever paid to Reason.
robert h. jackson— Opening Address to the International Military Tribunal at the Nuremberg Trials (November 10, 1945).
Sentir mon Cœur is a privilege only granted to the exceptional man the one who has the ability to find words that exactly (or, to himself, convincingly) express his feelings. … The value of words help to define the feeling itself. … The common failure is to allow habitual words and phrases, flowing spontaneously from the memory, to determine and deform the feelings.
herbert read— p. 16 (The Cult of Sincerity (1969))
Liberty is not merely a privilege to be conferred; it is a habit to be acquired.
david lloyd george— David Lloyd George, Speech in the House of Commons, (10 May 1928)
It is the privilege of a trader in a free country, in all matters not contrary to law, to regulate his own mode of carrying it on according to his own discretion and choice.
— Alderson, B., Hilton v. Eckersley (1856), 6 Ellis &B. 74.
Like environmentalists, politicians generally privilege flora and fauna over folks. (NIMBYs excepted. Senator Edward Kennedy is a not-in-my-backyard environmentalist: he opposes wind farms in Nantucket Sound, offshore from his Hyannis Port compound.)
— "In Defense of the Fence,"WorldNetDaily.com, April 4, 2008.
I have these two sayings, “Champions adjust” and “Pressure is a privilege”. Tennis teaches you about those things. When you're playing a tennis match, you can't say, “Stop, I want to do another take”, or “Can I play that over?” That's the way sports are.
— Billy Jean King, Daily Express, 29th October 2008.
