#fanaticism

As a musician I tell you that if you were to suppress adultery, fanaticism, crime, evil, the supernatural, there would no longer be the means for writing one note. ↗

— Georges Bizet

#crime #evil #fanaticism #i #longer

The fundamentalist seeks to bring down a great deal more than buildings. Such people are against, to offer just a brief list, freedom of speech, a multi-party political system, universal adult suffrage, accountable government, Jews, homosexuals, women's rights, pluralism, secularism, short skits, dancing, beardlessness, evolution theory, sex. There are tyrants, not Muslims. United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has said that we should now define ourselves not only by what we are for but by what we are against. I would reverse that proposition, because in the present instance what we are against is a no brainer. Suicidist assassins ram wide-bodied aircraft into the World Trade Center and Pentagon and kill thousands of people: um, I'm against that. But what are we for? What will we risk our lives to defend? Can we unanimously concur that all the items in the preceding list -- yes, even the short skirts and the dancing -- are worth dying for? The fundamentalist believes that we believe in nothing. In his world-view, he has his absolute certainties, while we are sunk in sybaritic indulgences. To prove him wrong, we must first know that he is wrong. We must agree on what matters: kissing in public places, bacon sandwiches, disagreement, cutting-edge fashion, literature, generosity, water, a more equitable distribution of the world's resources, movies, music, freedom of thought, beauty, love. These will be our weapons. Not by making war but by the unafraid way we choose to live shall we defeat them. How to defeat terrorism? Don't be terrorized. Don't let fear rule your life. Even if you are scared. ↗

— Salman Rushdie

#fanaticism #freedom #fundamentalism #human-rights #terrorism

But The Same Sea is set precisely in this Israel, which never makes it to the news headlines anywhere. It is a novel about everyday people far removed from fundamentalism, fanaticism nationalism, or militancy of any sort. ↗

— Amos Oz

#any #anywhere #everyday #everyday people #fanaticism

I give no shit to what extent they believe in superstitions and fanaticism. But I will fight till death, if their fallacious belief hurts any individual. ↗

— M.F. Moonzajer

#believe #fanaticism #superstitions #death

Patriotism is a kind of religion; it is the egg from which wars are hatched." [My Uncle Sosthenes] ↗

— Guy de Maupassant

#fanaticism #patriotism #religion #wars #religion

The tendency to claim God as an ally for our partisan value and ends is the source of all religious fanaticism. ↗

— Reinhold Niebuhr

#claim #ends #fanaticism #god #our

What is fanaticism today is the fashionable creed tomorrow, and trite as the multiplication table a week after. ↗

— Wendell Phillips

#creed #fanaticism #fashionable #multiplication #table

Fanaticism is overcompensation for doubt. ↗

— Robertson Davies

#fanaticism

From fanaticism to barbarism is only one step. ↗

— Denis Diderot

#fanaticism #only #step

In morals what begins in fear usually ends in wickedness; in religion what begins in fear usually ends in fanaticism. Fear, either as a principle or a motive, is the beginning of all evil. ↗

— Anna Jameson

#begins #either #ends #evil #fanaticism