Inspirational Quotes 56

I found I could make people laugh

It’s a myth that the funny kid in class doesn’t get bullied. I got bullied just like everybody else. I hate the community of ridicule that exists now. I still don’t watch shows where people are embarrassed for other people’s entertainment. It’s just a kind of bullying to me. (Simon Pegg, Guardian 2014-01-04)

The greatest insight into groups of people is how they treat their children. (Nelson Mandela)

Adult complicity in children's bullying of other children - the apparent belief that it was normal, OK, a necessary evil. (Monadic Forks ‏@domfox 12 Dec 2013)

In February this year, the report of a joint inspection on young sex offenders found that, in many cases, there had been an earlier display of sexually harmful behaviour which had been overlooked, minimised or dismissed by parents, teachers and social workers. (womensviewsonnews.org/2013)

Your berserk insistence on turning up without warning… or ringing them when they’re eating, or just generally trying to pretend that you’re all still students, even though you graduated 15 years ago and they’ve got important jobs and marriages and children that you do your best to ignore. (Guardian 2014-01-04 warns against NY resolutions to spend more time with friends.)

Nineteenth-century young people were compulsive joiners. Political movements, literary societies, religious organizations, dancing clubs… proliferated. The men and women who joined cared about the stated cause, but also craved the community these groups created. (NYT)

My troubles are only scratches on the great periphery of cosmology. (Kenneth Williams, 1963)

I feel like "throw everything into the sea, start a new life" wouldn't be a lasting solution, but it's very tempting. (Truett Ogden ‏@Truett 26 Oct 2013)

90% of problems can be solved with money. (Writer on thegloss.com.)

The idea that once women were economically independent traditional marriage would change utterly or fall by the wayside was popular with some late-19th-century feminists. (Swimming in the Steno Pool, Lynn Peril)

“The office is not a democracy!” Letter to the New York Times magazine, 1981 (Swimming in the Steno Pool, Lynn Peril Odd that the US was so proud of being the first democracy – but the office was not a democracy, and the family as set up by the Founding Fathers was a dictatorship.)

Now it was her job to fight the stereotype by becoming assertive (“without being aggressive”, certainly an exercise in mixed messaging if ever there was one). (Swimming in the Steno Pool, Lynn Peril)

Smart men and women in finance and corporate law always grow rich, or at least well-to-do. Incredibly smart men and women in short-story writing and anthropology or acting rarely do. (Ben Stein)

A lot of the time, these people see anything less than total agreement as an angry militant mob. They're not used to being stood up to. (‏@FeministAspie)

[The Cumbernauld] plan called for “a single multi-purpose town centre surrounded by high-density neighbourhoods.  The neighbourhoods would not have their own retail centres, but would instead be connected to the main centre by pedestrian footpaths.  Residents would be able to walk safely to and from the centre without ever coming across a car: a giant motorway system catered for those who wanted to drive through the town or to the centre.” What they created has been described by some as “A soulless concrete carbuncle surrounded by roundabouts.” (manchesterhistory.net)

More here, and links to the rest.