64 Moral Indignation Quotes

Following is our list of moral indignation quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about indignation.

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Famous Moral Indignation Quotes

Moral outrage is the most powerful motivating force in politics. — Morton Blackwell

If you can live amid injustice without anger, you are immoral as well as unjust. — Thomas Aquinas

Humanity is outraged in me and with me. We must not dissimulate nor try to forget this indignation, which is one of the most passionate forms of love. — George Sand

To denounce moralizing out of hand is to pronounce a moral judgment. - H. L. Mencken

To denounce moralizing out of hand is to pronounce a moral judgment. — H. L. Mencken

I've got my indignation but I'm pure in all my thoughts. — Eddie Vedder

I think to scandalize is a right, to be scandalized is a pleasure, and those who refuse to be scandalized are moralists. — Pier Paolo Pasolini

The moral man is he who is opposed to injustice per se, opposed to injustice wherever he finds it; the moral man looks for injustice first of all in himself. — Bayard Rustin

The temptation to moralize is strong; it is emotionally satisfying to have enemies rather than problems, to seek out culprits rather than the flaws in the system. — William Sloane Coffin

Anger is an integrity-producing response to the invasion of your personal boundaries. — Gabrielle Roth

Watch the too indignantly righteous. Before long you will find them committing or condoning the very offence which they have so fiercely censured. — Sri Aurobindo

Indignation is a submission of our thoughts, but not of our desires. — Bertrand Russell

If you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have a moral obligation to do something about it. — John Lewis

Morality is simply the attitude we adopt towards people whom we personally dislike. — Oscar Wilde

universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality. — Arthur Schopenhauer

In argument about moral problems, relativism is the first refuge of the scoundrel. — Roger Scruton

Righteous Indignation Quotes

A puritan is a person who pours righteous indignation into the wrong things. - G. K. Chesterton

A puritan is a person who pours righteous indignation into the wrong things. — G. K. Chesterton

Sometimes people's spiritual ideas become fixed and they use them against those who don't share their beliefs - in effect, becoming fundamentalist. It's very dangerous - the finger of righteous indignation pointing at someone who is identified as bad or wrong. — Pema Chodron

A man's sentiments are generally just and right, while it is second selfish thought which makes him trim and adopt some other view. The best reforms are worked out when sentiment operates, as it does in women, with the indignation of righteousness. — Leland Stanford

Moral indignation quote Maturity is learning to walk away from people and situation that threaten your peace of mind, self r
Maturity is learning to walk away from people and situation that threaten your peace of mind, self respect, values, morals and self worth.

Don't let the sun go down on me. — Elton John

An attitude of permanent indignation signifies great mental poverty. Politics compels it votaries to take that line and you can see their minds growing more impoverished every day, from one burst of righteous indignation to the next. — Paul Valery

I am always suspicious of righteous indignation. Nothing is more cruel than righteous indignation. — Clarence Darrow

Moral indignation quote A clear conscience is the sure sign of a bad memory.
A clear conscience is the sure sign of a bad memory.

I am tired of the superficial smiles that adorn the many ghouls among us. I am tired of the righteous indignation that hides beneath those visages that feign our best interest and deign to think we cannot and will not stand for ourselves. — Corey Taylor

Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo. — H. G. Wells

I was so obsessed and consumed with my grievances that I could not get away from myself and think things out in the light. I was in the grip of that blinding, destructive, terrible thing -- righteous indignation. — Anzia Yezierska

I am righteous and righteously indignant, the Tea Party is righteously indignant, and our goal is to not just save the country, but quite frankly, if America goes, so goes the world, so in our desire to save the country, we are trying to save the world. — Andrew Breitbart

Indignation Quotes

If you have the capacity to tremble with indignation every time that an injustice is committed in the world, then we are comrades. — Che Guevara

If you tremble with indignation at every injustice then you are a comrade of mine. — Ernesto Guevara

If you tremble with indignation at every injustice then you are a comrade of mine. — Che Guevara

Moral indignation quote Respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality.
Respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality.

One's life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation and compassion. — Simone de Beauvoir

Is that vodka?" Margarita asked weakly. The cat jumped up in his seat with indignation. "I beg pardon, my queen," he rasped, "Would I ever allow myself to offer vodka to a lady? This is pure alcohol! — Mikhail Bulgakov

If you can learn to live with indignities in life, you can go far. — Michael J. Massimino

Moral indignation quote Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something.
Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something.

I remember nothing of this, no ambulance rides, nothing. Nothing between switching out the bedside lamp and the sudden indignity of rebirth: the slaps, the brightness, the tubing, the speed, the urgent insistence that I be choked back into breathing life. I have felt so sorry for babies ever since. — Stephen Fry

Where is the indignation about the fact that the US and USSR have thirty thousand pounds of destructive force for every human being in the world? — Norman Cousins

I am the product of the sustained indignation of a branded grandfather, the militant protest of my grandmother, the disciplined resentment of my father and mother, and the power of the mass action of the church. — Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.

These are bagpipes. I understand the inventor of the bagpipes was inspired when he saw a man carrying an indignant, asthmatic pig under his arm. Unfortunately, the man-made sound never equalled the purity of the sound achieved by the pig. — Alfred Hitchcock

People Writing About Moral Indignation

Name Quotes Likes
Read quotes by Morton Blackwell

Morton Blackwell
quotes on leadership, education and slavery

29 52
Read quotes by Thomas Aquinas

Thomas Aquinas
quotes on faith, god and love

316 4431
Read quotes by George Sand

George Sand
quotes on chopin, love

175 1309
Read quotes by H. L. Mencken

H. L. Mencken
quotes on government, elections and death

913 7279
Read quotes by Eddie Vedder

Eddie Vedder
quotes on life, love

178 1076
Read quotes by Pier Paolo Pasolini

Pier Paolo Pasolini
quotes on love, life and death

22 711

More Moral Indignation Quotes

No, I make no pretension to patriotism. So long as my voice can be heard on this or the other side of the Atlantic, I will hold up America to the lightning scorn of moral indignation. In doing this, I shall feel myself discharging the duty of a true patriot; for he is a lover of his country who rebukes and does not excuse its sins. — Frederick Douglass

The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior 'righteous indignation' — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats. — Aldous Huxley

Moral indignation in most cases is, 2% moral, 48% indignation, and 50% envy. — Vittorio De Sica

Moral indignation quote Bad company ruins good morals.
Bad company ruins good morals.

Envy has always hidden behind moral indignation. — Doris Lessing

Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo. — H. G. [Herbert George] Wells

Moral indignation quote The purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and d
The purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and die, but to enjoy yourself and live.

Moral contempt is a far greater indignity and insult than any kind of crime. — Friedrich Nietzsche

In its sentimental mode, compassion is an exercise in moral indignation, in feeling good rather than doing good ... In its unsentimental mode, compassion seeks above all to do good. — Gertrude Himmelfarb

Moral indignation is a technique used to endow the idiot with dignity. — Marshall McLuhan

There is perhaps no phenomenon which contains so much destructive feeling as moral indignation, which permits envy or hate to be acted out under the guise of virtue. — Erich Fromm

It has been said that the historian is the avenger, and that standing as a judge between the parties and rivalries and causes of bygone generations he can lift up the fallen and beat down the proud, and by his exposures and his verdicts, his satire and his moral indignation, can punish unrighteousness, avenge the injured or reward the innocent. — Herbert Butterfield

The Statist veils his pursuits in moral indignation, intoning in high dudgeon the injustices and inequities of liberty and life itself, for which only he can provide justice and bring a righteous resolution. — Mark Levin

Anger can be a bitterness that devours your soul while righteous indignation is morally driven, it's ethically driven. — Cornel West

What I admire most in any man is a serene spirit, a steady freedom from moral indignation, and all-embracing tolerance--in brief,what is commonly called sportsmanship. — H. L. Mencken

Camp is a solvent of morality. It neutralizes moral indignation, sponsors playfulness. — Susan Sontag

The awakenings of remorse, virtuous shame and indignation, the glow of moral approbation if they do not lead to action, grow less and less vivid every time they occur, till at length the mind grows absolutely callous. — Anna Letitia Barbauld

Moral indignation is one of the most harmful forces in the modern world, the more so as it can always be diverted to sinister uses by those who control propaganda. — Bertrand Russell

From Britain's point of view the 1939 war had been a liberal war which had been entered into in a condition of moral indignation without the resources to fight it, that it had been providential good fortune which had placed the burden of fighting on the Russians and the Americans. — Maurice Cowling

Ah! How neatly tied, in these people, is the umbilical cord of morality! Since they left their mothers they have never sinned, have they? They are apostles, they are the descendants of priests; one can only wonder from what source they draw their indignation, and above all how much they have pocketed to do this, and in any case what it has done for them. — Antonin Artaud

They look for a victim to chivy, and howl him down, and finally lynch him in a sheer storm of sexual frenzy which they honestly imagine to be moral indignation, patriotic passion or some equally allowable emotion, it may be an innocent Negro, a Jew like Leo Frank, a harmless half-witted German; a Christ-like idealist of the type of Debs, an enthusiastic reformer like Emma Goldman. — Aleister Crowley

Only let the North exert as much moral influence over the South, as the South has exerted demoralizing influence over the North, and slavery would die amid the flame of Christian remonstrance, and faithful rebuke, and holy indignation. — Angelina Grimke

It's all a play. Hiroshima and Nagasaki happen, there are hundreds of thousands of dead, and the curtain comes down, and that's the end of that. Then Korea happens. Vietnam happens, all that happened in Latin America happens. And every now and then, this curtain comes down and history begins anew. New moralities and new indignations are manufactured...in a disappeared history. — Arundhati Roy

In a fashion similar to the leftist occupiers on Wall Street, their antics would be the target of rabid moral indignation on the front pages of the New York times and Washington Post and on the lead stories of every cable news show. — Jamie Glazov

Such is the breathtaking speciesism of our Christian-inspired attitudes, the abortion of a single human zygote can arouse more moral solicitude and righteous indignation than the vivasection of any number of intelligent adult chimpanzees! The only reason we can be comfortable with such a double standard is that the intermediates between humans and chimps are all dead. — Richard Dawkins

moral indignation is a pleasure, often the only pleasure, in many lives. It's also one of the few pleasures people feel obliged to force on other people. — Barbara Holland

I've met so many people, often the scum of the earth, and found them, you know, quite decent. I am an uncomfortable stranger to moral indignation. — W. Somerset Maugham

The object of a comedy is not to correct morals or ridicule the vices of society; no, a comedy should depict the discrepancies between life and purpose, should be the fruit of bitter indignation aroused by the degradation of human dignity, should be sarcasm, and not an epigram, convulsive laughter and not an amused grin, should be written with bile and not diluted salt, in a word, it should embrace life in its highest significance. — Vissarion Belinsky

I can spare a dime, brother, but in these morally inflationary times, a dime goes a lot farther if it's demanding work rather than adding to the indignity of relief. — Phil Ochs

The vehemence of my moral indignation surprised me. Was I beginning to have standards and principles, and, oh dear, scruples? What were they, and what would I do with them, and how much were they going to get in my way? — Elaine Dundy

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