I think that if a person doesn't feel cynical then they're out of phase with the 20th century. Being cynical is the only way to deal with modern civilization - you can't just swallow it whole. — Frank Zappa
Cynicism is the only form in which base souls approach honesty. — Friedrich Nietzsche
Cynic: an idealist whose rose-colored glasses have been removed, snapped in two and stomped into the ground, immediately improving his vision — Rick Bayan
What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. — Oscar Wilde
A sceptic finds Dallas absurd. A cynic thinks the public doesn't — Clive James
The opposite of creativity is cynicism — Esa Saarinen
Cynicism is easy. Mimicry is easy. Optimistic contrarians are the rarest breed. — Naval Ravikant
Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist. — George Carlin
I'm not an idealist anymore, I'm a bitter realist. — Soe Hok Gie
Watch what people are cynical about, and one can often discover what they lack. — George S. Patton
I am neither bitter nor cynical but I do wish there was less immaturity in political thinking. — Franklin D. Roosevelt
Perhaps no philosopher is more correct than the cynic. The happiness of the animal, that thorough cynic, is the living proof of cynicism. — Friedrich Nietzsche
Short Cynical Quotes
The demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots. — H. L. Mencken
A President needs political understanding to run the government, but he may be elected without it. — Harry S. Truman
What a liberal really wants is to bring about change that will not in any way endanger his position. — Stokely Carmichael
If you're too open-minded; your brains will fall out. — Lawrence Ferlinghetti
A little Consideration, a little Thought for Others, makes all the difference. — A. A. Milne
If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular? — Dorothy Parker
A cynical, mercenary, demagogic press will produce in time a people as base as itself. — Joseph Pulitzer
People say you become more cynical as you get older. That hasn't been my experience. — Tucker Carlson
This goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory. — William Shakespeare
Doubters do not achieve; skeptics do not contribute; cynics do not create. — Calvin Coolidge
Cynical Image Quotes
Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist.
Dark Cynical Quotes
All romantics meet the same fate some day. Drunk and cynical and boring someone in some dark cafe. — Joni Mitchell
There's a part of me that still hates everything, and my natural view default setting is still very cynical and dark — Alexei Sayle
The cynic is one who never sees a good quality in a man, and never fails to see a bad one. He is the human owl, vigilant in darkness and blind to light, mousing for vermin, and never seeing noble game. — Henry Ward Beecher
I don't think it's ever easy to be funny. I find it easy to amuse myself with a certain sort of cynical dark humor that tends toward the meaner side, like my character in Happy Gilmore. Those kinds of characters come easily to me. — Ben Stiller
And introduce an element of cynicism and darkness into it and just realize that we're all vulnerable. We are humans. There is a finite end to this life and we're all going to face it and a little silliness can help. — Alan Thicke
The dark war consciousness and pride have seized upon the weak, with great cynicisms and glib, soulless intellects, that grind away like robotic gears at what they despise and can never understand. — Bryant H. McGill
Bob Dylan was again an entirely new person - this time old, craggy, cynical, and world-weary, as in "Not Dark Yet". — Bob Dylan
The cynics, they can only speak of the dark, of the obvious, and this is not hard. For all it's supposed sophistication, it's cynicism that's simplistic. In a fallen world, how profound is
to see the cracks? — Ann Voskamp
This is such a cynical world. The way the world is, there's so much going on and so much stress in the world and so much darkness and craziness and imbalance. — Ann Wilson
I really like dark music and darkness in general and cynicism and pessimism and negativity because it allows you to create an even bigger contrast. — Andrew W.K.
Being Cynical Quotes
An Honest politician will not be tolerated by a democracy unless he is very stupid ... because only a very stupid man can honestly share the prejudices of more than half the nation. — Bertrand Russell
Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything that it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more. — Erica Jong
There's nothing more frustrating than seeing cynics sit there and say, 'Well, nobody can make any more money because Microsoft and Intel own everything.' Is the software industry mature, or is it embryonic? I would say it's embryonic. There will be a hundred more Microsofts, not just one. — Michael Saylor
I hear loads of cynics saying that I'll never be able to change anything. They say that junk food marketing and the ready availability of fast food is just too powerful. But I'd say in response, screw you. I know that most people, if they're really honest, are fed up with the same old rubbish — Jamie Oliver
I believe that history is not made by cynics. It is made by realists who are not afraid to dream. Let us be these people. — Tzipi Livni
A happy home is one in which each spouse grants the possibility that the other may be right, though neither believes it — Donald M. Fraser
Whoever we may be, whatever our immediate interest, however much we carry baggage from our past, however much we have been caught by the fashion of cynicism and loss of faith in the capacity of the people, let us err today and say - nothing can stop us now! — Thabo Mbeki
Never be a cynic, even a gentle one. Never help out a sneer, even at the devil. — Vachel Lindsay
To give [the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba] even covert support is on a par with the hypocrisy and cynicism for which the United States is constantly denouncing the Soviet Union in the United Nations and elsewhere. This point will not be lost on the rest of the world, nor on our own consciences. — J. William Fulbright
The truth is, I pretend to be a cynic, but I am really a dreamer who is terrified of wanting something she may never get. — Joanna Hoffman
Cynical Love Quotes
We’re all a little weird. And life is a little weird. And when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall into mutually satisfying weirdness — and call it love — true love. — Robert Fulghum
Strange to say what delight we married people have to see these poor fools decoyed into our condition. — Samuel Pepys
History is neither written nor made without love or hate. — Theodor Mommsen
Love is the fart
Of every heart
It pains the man when 'tis kept close,
And others doth offend, when 'tis let loose. — John Suckling
Love is everything it's cracked up to be. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. — Erica Jong
HYPOTHESES: Evil is boring. Cynicism is idiotic. Fear is a bad habit. Despair is lazy. Joy is fascinating. Love is an act of heroic genius. Pleasure is our birthright. Receptivity is a superpower. — Rob Brezsny
As Dostoevski said: 'Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared with love in dreams. — Dorothy Day
You're killing yourself with cynicism. Your idols got taken away from you one by one and now you have nothing to give your love to. — Philip K. Dick
Watching you walk out of my life does not make me bitter or cynical about love. But rather makes me realize that if I wanted so much to be with the wrong person, how beautiful it will be when the right person comes along. — Nicholas Sparks
Political Cynicism Quotes
In the end, that's what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or a politics of hope? — Barack Obama
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected. — Gilbert K. Chesterton
It will never be possible for any length of time for any group of the American people, either by reason of wealth or learning or inheritance or economic power, to retain any mandate, any permanent authority to arrogate to itself the political control of American public life. — Franklin D. Roosevelt
I've been a politician and so I'm sometimes cynical about what politicians won't do. When I hear a politician say something that makes no sense whatsoever, I think there's one of two things there: There's money or the promise of money. — Allan Boesak
When people treat corruption as a routine part of the process, you have something far worse than wrongdoing or moral failing. You have a political cancer that breeds cynicism about democratic government and infects all of society. — Edward Brooke
Treason doth never prosper. What's the reason? Why, when it prospers, none dare call it treason. — John Harington
Without the truth of the people, politics degenerates into mere spectacle and democracy declines, leaving demagoguery and cynicism to fill the void. — Jerry Brown
What this generation was bred to at television's knees was not wisdom, but cynicism. — Pauline Kael
The commonwealth of Athens is become a forest of beasts. — William Shakespeare
I reject the cynical view that politics is a dirty business. — Richard M. Nixon
No Cynic Quotes
Have compassion for everyone you meet, even if they don't want it. What seems conceit, bad manners, or cynicism is a sign of things no ears have heard, no eyes have seen. You do not know what wars are going on down there where the spirit meets the bone. — Miller Williams
If the great Government of the United States were a private corporation no bank would take its name on a piece of paper, because it has cynically repudiated the words engraved upon its bonds. — Garet Garrett
Never, ever, let anyone tell you what you can and can't do. Prove the cynics wrong. Pity them for they have no imagination. The sky's the limit. Your sky. Your limit. Now. Let's dance. — Tom Hiddleston
When all is said and done, no literature can outdo the cynicism of real life; you won't intoxicate with one glass someone who has already drunk up a whole barrel. — Anton Chekhov
A myth is a religion in which no one any longer believes. — James Kern Feibleman
The worst government is often the most moral. One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane. But when fanatics are on top there is no limit to oppression. — H. L. Mencken
No guest is so welcome in a friend's house that he will not become a nuisance after three days. — Plautus
There is no comparing the brutality and cynicism of today's pop culture with that of forty years ago: from High Noon to Robocop is a long descent. — Charles Krauthammer
There are no letters in the mailbox
And there are no grapes upon the vine
And there are no chocolates in your boxes anymore
And there are no diamonds in the mine — Leonard Cohen
Modern cynics and skeptics... see no harm in paying those to whom they entrust the minds of their children a smaller wage than is paid to those to whom they entrust the care of their plumbing. — John F. Kennedy
Cynicism Quotes
Things of the spirit are what count: brotherhood – in a day when there is too much hatred at home and abroad; cheerfulness – in a day when the pessimists have the floor and cynics are popular; service – in a day when millions are interested in getting or grasping, rather than giving — E. Urner Goodman
Life is not an easy matter... You cannot live through it without falling into frustration and cynicism unless you have before you a great idea which raises you above personal misery, above weakness, above all kinds of perfidy and baseness. — Leon Trotsky
We are at heart so profoundly anarchistic that the only form of state we can imagine living in is Utopian; and so cynical that the only Utopia we can believe in is authoritarian. — Lionel Trilling
Men of integrity, by their very existence, rekindle the belief that as a people we can live above the level of moral squalor. We need that belief; a cynical community is a corrupt community. — John W. Gardner
Civility is not a tactic or a sentiment. It is the determined choice of trust over cynicism, of community over chaos. — George W. Bush
Scientists have discovered that the small, brave act of cooperating with another person, of choosing trust over cynicism, generosity over selfishness, makes the brain light up with quiet joy. — Natalie Angier
When the leaders speak of peace
The common folk know
That war is coming
When the leaders curse war
The mobilization order is already written out. Every day, to earn my daily bread
I go to the market where lies are bought
Hopefully
I take up my place among the sellers.
— Bertolt Brecht
If democracy is ever to be threatened, it will not be by revolutionary groups burning government offices and occupying the broadcasting and newspaper offices of the world. It will come from disenchantment, cynicism and despair caused by the realisation that the New World Order means we are all to be managed and not represented. — Tony Benn
People notice peacemakers because they dress funny. We know how the people who make war dress - in uniforms and medals, or in computers and clipboards, or in absoluteness, severity, greed, and cynicism. But the peacemaker is dressed in righteousness, justice, and faithfulness - dressed for the work that is to be done. — Walter Brueggemann
Be a light, not a judge, be a model not a critic. Little by little, your circle of influence will explode and you will avoid the emotional metastasizing cancers of complaining, criticizing, competing, comparing and cynicism, all which reflect victimization, all of which are the opposite of being proactive. — Stephen Covey
In Conclusion
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