#arrogance

To write a poem you must have a streak of arrogance-- not in real life I hope. In real life try to be nice. It will save you a hell of a lot of trouble and give you more time to write. ↗

— Richard Hugo

#artists #poet #poetry #poets #writer

The wide world was changing, and she wanted a different place in it. Not just wanted, but felt she deserved. If the world didn't owe her a living, as her mother repeatedly warned her, it owed her a break. She had a strong sense that a better, more exciting, more rewarding life than that which had been the lot of her parents and grandparents was hers by right. In this she was guilty of nothing more serious than the arrogance of youth, from which every generation suffers and by which it distinguishes itself from the preceding one. ↗

— James Robertson

#arrogance #aspirations #entitlement #perception #youth

He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career. ↗

— George Bernard Shaw

#ignorance #politicians #politics #career

Without humor, we’d all be what we’re laughing at. Without arrogance, we’d be humiliated to admit we already are. ↗

— Bauvard

#funny #humor #funny

Class is an aura of confidence that is being sure without being cocky. Class has nothing to do with money. Class never runs scared. It is self-discipline and self-knowledge. It's the sure-footedness that comes with having proved you can meet life. ↗

— Ann Landers

#character #class #cockiness #discipline #money

The arrogance and brutality of empire are not repealed when they temporarily get deployed in a just cause. ↗

— Michael Kazin

#arrogance #brutality #imperialism #united-states #war

I once got lost in a dark woods with no supplies. Struggling to deal with nature, beasts and storms, that was time when I lost my arrogance as human. ↗

— Toba Beta

#bullshit #human #nature

Patriotism ... is a superstition artificially created and maintained through a network of lies and falsehoods; a superstition that robs man of his self-respect and dignity, and increases his arrogance and conceit. ↗

— Emma Goldman

#emma-goldman #patriotism #superstition #respect

I have been called arrogant myself in my time, and hope to earn the title again, but to claim that I am privy to the secrets of the universe and its creator — that's beyond my conceit. I therefore have no choice but to find something suspect even in the humblest believer. Even the most humane and compassionate of the monotheisms and polytheisms are complicit in this quiet and irrational authoritarianism: they proclaim us, in Fulke Greville's unforgettable line, "Created sick — Commanded to be well." And there are totalitarian insinuations to back this up if its appeal should fail. Christians, for example, declare me redeemed by a human sacrifice that occurred thousands of years before I was born. I didn't ask for it, and would willingly have foregone it, but there it is: I'm claimed and saved whether I wish it or not. And if I refuse the unsolicited gift? Well, there are still some vague mutterings about an eternity of torment for my ingratitude. That is somewhat worse than a Big Brother state, because there could be no hope of its eventually passing away. ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#authoritarianism #religion #religion

People who worship only themselves get a slick, polished look -- like monuments. Too bad they had to go so soon. ↗

— Vanna Bonta

#celebrity #hubris #quote #self-importance #vanity