Freedom Of Expression Quotes

“If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all.”
― Noam Chomsky

“1. Everyone is entitled to their opinion about the things they read (or watch, or listen to, or taste, or whatever). They’re also entitled to express them online.

2. Sometimes those opinions will be ones you don’t like.

3. Sometimes those opinions won’t be very nice.

4. The people expressing those may be (but are not always) assholes.

5. However, if your solution to this “problem” is to vex, annoy, threaten or harrass them, you are almost certainly a bigger asshole.

6. You may also be twelve.

7. You are not responsible for anyone else’s actions or karma, but you are responsible for your own.

8. So leave them alone and go about your own life."

[Bad Reviews: I Can Handle Them, and So Should You (Blog post, July 17, 2012)]”
― John Scalzi

“Confidence is knowing who you are and not changing it a bit because of someone’s version of reality is not your reality.”
― Shannon L. Alder

“Too many adults wish to 'protect' teenagers when they should be stimulating them to read of life as it is lived.”
― Margaret A. Edwards

“A slut is someone, usually a woman, who’s stepped outside of the very narrow lane that good girls are supposed to stay within. Sluts are loud. We’re messy. We don’t behave. In fact, the original definition of “slut” meant “untidy woman.” But since we live in a world that relies on women to be tidy in all ways, to be quiet and obedient and agreeable and available (but never aggressive), those of us who color outside of the lines get called sluts. And that word is meant to keep us in line.”
― Jaclyn Friedman

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[Blog post, March 10, 2014]”
― K.J. Charles

“Those who make conversations impossible, make escalation inevitable.”
― Stefan Molyneux

“Freedom of speech is unnecessary if the people to whom it is granted do not think for themselves.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty.”
― Henry David Thoreau

“You can't pick and choose which types of freedom you want to defend. You must defend all of it or be against all of it.”
― Scott Howard Phillips

“Freedom of the press is limited to those who own one.”
― A.J. Liebling

“Don’t think it is enough to attend meetings and sit there like a lump…. It is better to address envelopes than to attend foolish meetings. It is better to study than act too quickly; but it is best to be ready to act intelligently when the appropriate opportunity arises… Speak up. Learn to talk clearly and forcefully in public. Speak simply and not too long at a time, without over-emotion, always from sound preparation and knowledge. Be a nuisance where it counts, but don’t be a bore at any time… Do your part to inform and stimulate the public to join your action…. Be depressed, discouraged and disappointed at failure and the disheartening effects of ignorance, greed, corruption and bad politics — but never give up.”
― Marjory Stoneman Douglas

“There has to be a cut-off somewhere between the freedom of expression and a graphically explicit free-for-all.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Brushstrokes of a Gadfly,

“Of all the religions in the world, perhaps the religion of liberty is the only faith capable of purity.”
― Tiffany Madison

“Religion, a mediaeval form of unreason, when combined with modern weaponry becomes a real threat to our freedoms. This religious totalitarianism has caused a deadly mutation in the heart of Islam and we see the tragic consequences in Paris today. I stand with Charlie Hebdo, as we all must, to defend the art of satire, which has always been a force for liberty and against tyranny, dishonesty and stupidity. ‘Respect for religion’ has become a code phrase meaning ‘fear of religion.’ Religions, like all other ideas, deserve criticism, satire, and, yes, our fearless disrespect."

[I Stand With Charlie Hebdo, as We All Must (Wall Street Journal, January 7, 2015)]”
― Salman Rushdie

“It’s not the word that’s important, it’s the right to say any word you want to and to form any sentence you want to, that’s the point and once they start to legally restrict what we can say and what we can’t say then we are on a slippery slope to authoritarianism.”

“We’re talking about racists,” said Karen.

“No one should be allowed to be racist,” said Mark.

“But that’s not down to the Government or the courts,” said Rob desperately, “that should be down to us, we should make it difficult for people to be racist, we should frown upon such language and activity, it should be by peer pressure that we stop people from being abusive and unpleasant, not down to the Government.”

“Why not?” demanded Karen, “they make the laws so it’s down to them to make the punishments.”

“It’s not about punishment,” pressed Rob, “it’s about morality and social conscience, it’s about standing up for what’s right versus moral laziness, it’s about courage versus cowardice.”
― Arun D. Ellis, Daydream Believers

“Look, I don't see why bad artists - I mean artists who are obviously incompetent... - why they should be presented hypocritically as good artists just because they're supposed to be advancing the frontiers of freedom of expression or... ...demonstrating that there should be no limit on subject matter.”
― Anthony Burgess, Earthly Powers

“Man must be able to think freely and he must be able to express his thoughts freely! He who is against this is not only fascist and primitive but at the same time is a very great coward also! Only the brave and the honourable men are never afraid of freedom of thought and freedom of expression of ideas! Just like the cockroaches do not like the light, evil minds also do not like the freedom of thoughts!”
― Mehmet Murat ildan

“Many of us persons of the tinted persuasion care about human rights and artistic freedom too.”
― Salman Rushdie

“Lose your freedom, and become a slave by borrowing.”
― Oscar Auliq-Ice

“Aber was nennen Sie ruhig sein? Die Hände in den Schoss legen? Leiden, was man nicht sollte? Dulden, was man nicht dürfte?”
― Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Emilia Galotti

“We live in a time I did not think I would see in my lifetime, a time when freedom—and in particular freedom of expression, without which the world of books could not exist—is everywhere under attack from reactionary, authoritarian, populist, demagogic, narcissistic, careless voices; when places of education and libraries are subject to hostility and censorship; and when extremist religion and bigoted ideologies have begun to intrude in areas of life in which they do not belong. And there are also progressive voices being raised in favor of a new kind of bien-pensant censorship, one which appears virtuous, and which many people have begun to see as a virtue. So freedom is under pressure from the left as well as the right, the young as well as the old. This is something new, and made more complicated by our new tool of communication, the Internet, on which well-designed pages of malevolent lies sit side by side with the truth, and it is difficult for many people to tell which is which; and our social media, where the idea of freedom is every day abused to permit, very often, a kind of online mob rule, which the billionaire owners of these platforms seem increasingly willing to encourage—and to profit by.
What do we do about free speech when it is so widely abused? We should still do, with renewed vigor, what we have always needed to do: to answer bad speech with better speech, to counter false narratives with better narratives, to answer hate with love, and to believe that the truth can still succeed even in an age of lies. We must defend it fiercely and define it as broadly as possible, so, yes, we should of course defend speech that offends us; otherwise we are not defending free expression at all. Let a thousand and one voices speak in a thousand and one different ways.
To quote Cavafy, “the barbarians are coming today,” and what I do know is that the answer to philistinism is art, the answer to barbarianism is civilization, and in any war it may be that artists of all sorts—filmmakers, actors, singers, and, yes, those who practice the ancient art of the book—can still, together, turn the barbarians away from the gates.”
― Salman Rushdie

“I didn't know what freedom was until I escaped from the communist regime. Now that I smell the sound of freedom, I know how my freedom is being treated. This is why I refuse to be loyal to a political party, because no political party is loyal to you! I lived to see it. I vote for my freedom, not for a political party!”
― Zybejta (Beta) Metani'Marashi

“Las palabras se combaten con palabras, no con acciones censoras.”
― Rallo Juan Ramón

“There are days when I find myself bawling in the parking lot right before work because I feel like I'm wasting my life working for someone else's dream instead of my own.”
― Helen Edwards, Nothing Sexier Than Freedom

“To question whether you have freedom,
is the beginning of freedom.
To question why you have freedom,
is the beginning of civilization.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Iman Insaniyat, Mazhab Muhabbat: Pani, Agua, Water, It's All One

“Religious persecution has tendency to crush the soul and literally break the heart piece by piece.”
― Qamar Rafiq

“Want to read me, let me write.”
― P.S. Jagadeesh Kumar

“We are free to be, with consequences, which makes us either criminals or slaves.”
― Deanna L. Lawlis

“We are free to be, with consequences of which, if we choose freedom, makes us either criminals or slaves.”
― Deanna L. Lawlis