Meanness Quotes

“Because they are mean is no reason why I should be. I hate such things, and though I think I've a right to be hurt, I don't intend to show it. (Amy March)”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“Sometimes you never feel meaner than the moment you stop being mean. It's like how turning on a light makes you realize how dark the room had gotten. And the way you usually act, the things you would have normally done, are like these ghosts that everyone can see but pretends not to.”
― Rebecca Stead, When You Reach Me

“If you're insulting people on the internet, you must be ugly on the inside.”
― Phil Lester

“Mean girls go far in high school. Kind women go far in LIFE.”
― Mandy Hale, The Single Woman: Life, Love, and a Dash of Sass

“My mother says that when Mrs. Rowley is mean, which is generally the case, it is really because she is just unhappy, and who could blame her with a husband like that . . . She says this is really the only reason people are ever mean--they have something hurting inside of them, a claw of unhappiness scratching at their hearts, and it hurts them so much that sometimes they have to push it right out of their mouths to scratch someone else, just to give themselves a rest, a moment of relief.”
― Laura Moriarty

“I'd be more willing to accept religion, even if I didn't believe it, if I thought it made people nicer to each other but I don't think it does.”
― Andy Rooney, Sincerely, Andy Rooney

“When the great ship containing the hopes and aspirations of the world, when the great ship freighted with mankind goes down in the night of death, chaos and disaster, I am willing to go down with the ship. I will not be guilty of the ineffable meanness of paddling away in some orthodox canoe. I will go down with the ship, with those who love me, and with those whom I have loved. If there is a God who will damn his children forever, I would rather go to hell than to go to heaven and keep the society of such an infamous tyrant. I make my choice now. I despise that doctrine. It has covered the cheeks of this world with tears. It has polluted the hearts of children, and poisoned the imaginations of men. It has been a constant pain, a perpetual terror to every good man and woman and child. It has filled the good with horror and with fear; but it has had no effect upon the infamous and base. It has wrung the hearts of the tender; it has furrowed the cheeks of the good. This doctrine never should be preached again. What right have you, sir, Mr. clergyman, you, minister of the gospel, to stand at the portals of the tomb, at the vestibule of eternity, and fill the future with horror and with fear? I do not believe this doctrine: neither do you. If you did, you could not sleep one moment. Any man who believes it, and has within his breast a decent, throbbing heart, will go insane. A man who believes that doctrine and does not go insane has the heart of a snake and the conscience of a hyena.”
― Robert G. Ingersoll, The Liberty Of Man, Woman And Child

“When someone would mistreat, misinform, misuse, misguide, mishandle, mislead… or any other "mis"… to others, they’re obviously missing something from their lives.”
― Donald L. Hicks, Look into the stillness

“Poetry destroyed? Genius banished? No! Mediocrity, no: do not let envy prompt you to the thought. No; they not only live, but reign, and redeem: and without their divine influence spread everywhere, you would be in hell--the hell of your own meanness.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Flippancy, the most hopeless form of intellectual vice.”
― George Gissing

“I have made up my mind to say my say. I shall do it kindly, distinctly; but I am going to do it. I know there are thousands of men who substantially agree with me, but who are not in a condition to express their thoughts. They are poor; they are in business; and they know that should they tell their honest thought, persons will refuse to patronize them—to trade with them; they wish to get bread for their little children; they wish to take care of their wives; they wish to have homes and the comforts of life. Every such person is a certificate of the meanness of the community in which he resides. And yet I do not blame these people for not expressing their thought. I say to them: 'Keep your ideas to yourselves; feed and clothe the ones you love; I will do your talking for you. The church can not touch, can not crush, can not starve, cannot stop or stay me; I will express your thoughts.”
― Robert G. Ingersoll, The Liberty Of Man, Woman And Child

“In stating these matters, I speak an open and disinterested language, dictated by no passion but that of humanity. To me, who have not only refused offers, because I thought them improper, but have declined rewards I might with reputation have accepted, it is no wonder that meanness and imposition appear disgustful. Independence is my happiness, and I view things as they are, without regard to place or person; my country is the world, and my religion is to do good.”
― Thomas Paine, Rights of Man

“That was when I learned that kindness could break a heart just as sure as meanness. The difference was the kindness made that broken heart softer. Meanness just made the heart want to be hard.”
― Susie Finkbeiner, A Cup of Dust

“We do not engage in idle or intentional gossip which undermines someone else's integrity or which spreads the seeds of fear by talking unthinkingly about illness, disasters, and all the other fears which run rampant in the world.”
― Donna Goddard, The Love of Devotion

“The Guardian's headline is 'How Going Green May Make You Mean.' We're inclined to think the chain of causation runs the other way—that people who are jerks to begin with gravitate toward verdant sanctimony.”
― James Taranto

“The more capable people are of inflicting pain, the deeper, more buried they are in illusion and fear.”
― Sonia Choquette, The Psychic Pathway: A Workbook for Reawakening the Voice of Your Soul

“Я мальчик, господин Биркенштакк... На мужчин я насмотрелся в эти дни, ну их к чёрту. Они и предать могут, и убить беззащитного. Слава Хранителям, я ещё ни в чём таком не замешан. И нечего меня сравнивать с мужчинами... Тоже мне похвала...
(Галиен Тукк - советнику Биркенштакку)”
― Vladislav Krapivin, Выстрел с монитора. Гуси-гуси, га-га-га...

“Bonding over hatred
Becoming a mean girl
Won’t help you to win
It’s just another stupid sin”
― Aida Mandic, A Maniac Did

“Но это был не просто мальчик, а злой мальчик. Даже подловатый. Запанибрата держался с пожилыми матросами, а молодым, случалось, тыкал украдкой кулаком в зубы... Но в то же время - не трус.
(О втором лейтенанте монитора Хариусе)”
― Vladislav Krapivin, Выстрел с монитора. Гуси-гуси, га-га-га...

“No one ever did anything mean to anyone else yet save for their good, and so it will be until the end of this frail planet.

"The Staircase”
― Hugh Walpole, All Souls' Night

“Extremism is marked by a closed mind and a meanness of spirit - unwilling to listen, unwilling to reason, unwilling to compromise, unwilling to forgive, and in the end, unwilling to learn and unwilling to grow.”
― Laurence Overmire, The One Idea That Saves The World: A Message of Hope in a Time of Crisis

“And while envy was a mortal sin, it grew rampant in everyone’s soul; it was but a dandelion, a weed that was unstoppable here and one learned to live with. It was a character flaw far less dire than the sort of mean streak that led a man to stab a fork into his wife’s hand.”
― Chris Bohjalian, Hour of the Witch

“Well chosen words create pain that lasts longer than a flogging.”
― L.E. Modesitt Jr., Imager

“Love is so powerful that some people pretend to be smart, someone they are not, kind, reasonable, and/or interested in things they really hate … for a very long time, until the relationship or marriage ends, or seems to be about to end.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“Jacks eyes took on the same disturbing, godforsaken look from the coach.

'It wasn't that long ago that I saw you in my church, willing to promise me almost anything to make the pain stop. Was that a lie? Or have you already forgotten the way heartbreak rips apart the soul piece by piece, how it turns you in to a masochist, making you long for the thing that just eviscerated you until there's nothing left of you to be destroyed?'

His cold fingers dug in to her cheek.

She squared her shoulders and pulled away. 'Are you still talking about my heartbreak, or about yours?'

Jacks laughed and gave her a smile so sharp it could have sliced a diamond. 'You're getting better at the meanness, Little Fox. But you have to have a working heart for it to break. I do not.”
― Stephanie Garber, Once Upon a Broken Heart

“There is an undercurrent of intentional meanness in the police.”
― Steven Magee

“Material means that hide man's meanness fail to reflect his moral richness.”
― B.S. Murthy

“Any person's meanness of character and silliness of mind can be ugly and also seen in every activity and performance of that person, who suffers from a moral illness regardless of whether well-educated or not.”
― Ehsan Sehgal

“The Dark Cloud
Is the criticism you face because you don’t want to kiss ass
Is the rage you experience when people are treated like they are a “lower social class”
Is the animated facet of your nature that has a certain keenness
Is the policy you have of not tolerating unnecessary meanness”
― Aida Mandic, The Dark Cloud

“Mi fermai, fissando lo schermo incredulo. Un euro valeva più o meno settecento colones. Con i miei “miseri” seimila euro sul conto, avevo la bellezza di 4.3 milioni di colones costaricensi. Scoppiai a ridere e presi a girare in tondo sullo stretto marciapiede, le mani tra i capelli. Sembravo uno che ha appena vinto la lotteria: in Costa Rica ero, a tutti gli effetti, un milionario.”
― Gianluca Gotto, La Pura Vida