#cynicism

Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don’t learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us. ↗

— Stephen Colbert

#optimism #pessimism #disappointment

As you can see, I have memorized this utterly useless piece of information long enough to pass a test question. I now intend to forget it forever. You’ve taught me nothing except how to cynically manipulate the system. Congratulations. ↗

— Bill Watterson

#taking-tests #useless-information #cynicism

Time is like a river flowing endlessly through the universe. And if you poled your flatboat in that river you might fight your way against the current and travel upstream into the past. Or go with the flow and rush into the future. This was in a less cynical time before toxic waste dumping and pollution filled the waterway of Chronus with the detritus of empty hours wasted minutes years of repetition and time that has been killed. ↗

— Harlan Ellison

#cynicism

This isn't really a convention, This is really an infomercial. And every night we'll have a different infomercial and people view it with a certain level of cynicism. ↗

— Susan Estrich

#certain level #convention #cynicism #different #every

If only media people would stop reaching for the low-hanging fruit, which is cynicism and pessimism, and stopped trying so hard to be hip and cool and have a swagger. ↗

— Emilio Estevez

#cynicism #fruit #hard #hip #media

Politicians.Their first thoughts are always with the loved ones of the British serviceman tragically killed in action. And whether they'll vote New Labour at the next election. There's no need to be cynical, Susan. Why not? You've got me there. ↗

— William Donaldson

#new-labour #love

Home? What is home? Home is where a house is that you come back to when the rainy season is about to begin, to wait until the next dry season comes around. Home is where your woman is, that you come back to in the intervals between a greater love - the only real love - the lust for riches buried in the earth, that are your own if you can find them. Perhaps you do not call it home, even to yourself. Perhaps you call them 'my house,' 'my woman,' What if there was another 'my house,' 'my woman,' before this one? It makes no difference. This woman is enough for now. Perhaps the guns sounded too loud at Anzio or at Omaha Beach, at Guadalcanal or at Okinawa. Perhaps when they stilled again some kind of strength had been blasted from you that other men still have. And then again perhaps it was some kind of weakness that other men still have. What is strength, what is weakness, what is loyalty, what is perfidy? The guns taught only one thing, but they taught it well: of what consequence is life? Of what consequence is a man? And, therefore, of what consequence if he tramples love in one place and goes to find it in the next? The little moment that he has, let him be at peace, far from the guns and all that remind him of them. So the man who once was Bill Taylor has come back to his house, in the dusk, in the mountains, in Anahuac. ("The Moon Of Montezuma") ↗

— Cornell Woolrich

#cynical #cynicism #home #loyalty #noir

I think that all the anger and cynicism comes from suppressing things that we always wanted. ↗

— John Lee Hancock

#anger #comes #cynicism #i #i think

The cure for cynicism is simply to engage honestly. ↗

— Jeremy Paxman

#cynicism #engage #honestly #simply

Gold was not sure of many things, but he was definite about one: for every successful person he knew, he could name at least two others of greater ability, better, and higher intelligence who, by comparison, had failed. ↗

— Joseph Heller

#intelligence