150 Quo Quotes

Following is our list of quo quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about question the status quo.

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Famous Quo Quotes

I ran for the presidency, despite hopeless odds, to demonstrate the sheer will and refusal to accept the status quo. — Shirley Chisholm

All poets, all writers are political. They either maintain the status quo, or they say, 'Something's wrong, let's change it for the better.' — Sonia Sanchez

All good things to those who wait. - Hannibal

All good things to those who wait. — Hannibal

Now I think that a true liberal will always prioritize individuals over the group, will always prioritize heresy over orthodoxy, will always prioritize the dissenting voice over the status quo. — Maajid Nawaz

One day everything will be well, that is our hope. Everything's fine today, that is our illusion. — Voltaire

Don’t be afraid to think different and challenge the status quo. — Jensen Huang

Education in this country is about how to maintain the status quo and to perpetuate racism. — Jane Elliot

Comfort zones are deadly zones because you lose your true potential of what you can be, you start going with the status quo. — Greg Plitt

The job isn't to catch up to the status quo; the job is to invent the status quo. — Seth Godin

Great leaders are not afraid to challenge the status quo and embrace change. — Michael Abrashoff

Short Quo Quotes

  • Embrace change. Envision what could be, challenge the status quo, and drive creative destruction. — Charles Koch
  • Whoever has an original thing to say, it is sort of a threat to the status quo. — Steve Lacy
  • We exist temporarily through what we take, but we live forever through what we give. — Douglas A. Lawson
  • To rebel or revolt against the status quo is in the very nature of an artist. — Uta Hagen
  • I'm not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it. — Niccolo Machiavelli
  • In spite of warnings, nothing much happens until the status quo becomes more painful than change. — Laurence J. Peter
  • Status quo, you know, that is Latin for the mess we're in. — Ronald Reagan
  • Achieving gender equality is about disrupting the status quo - not negotiating it. — Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka
  • Bureaucracy defends the status quo long past the time when the quo has lost its status. — Laurence J. Peter
  • For people, 'here' signifies not merely a physical space, but also an historical space. — Paulo Freire
Quo quote An artist is someone who uses bravery, insight, creativity and boldness to challenge status-quo.
An artist is someone who uses bravery, insight, creativity and boldness to challenge status-quo.

Leadership Status Quo Quotes

Because management deals mostly with the status quo and leadership deals mostly with change, in the next century we are going to have to try to become much more skilled at creating leaders. — John P. Kotter

If architecture is going to nudge, cajole, and inspire a community to challenge the status quo into making responsible changes, it will take the subversive leadership of academics and practitioners who keep reminding students of the profession’s responsibilities. — Samuel Mockbee

Curiosity about the world and questioning of the status quo to open minds to alternative visions of the future are essential leadership skills. And they can be learned. — Stewart D. Friedman

This is classic Donald Trump. This is the movement, not the party. He has been agitating against the leadership, the Washington establishment, the status quo, people who have held power, people that didn`t take on President Barack Obama to the extent he wanted to or the base wants to. — Bob Ehrlich

We can walk together to change the status quo. — Ken Wyatt

Question The Status Quo Quotes

I try to use my influence and empower my community to always question the status quo – whether it relates to broader policy issues or YouTube gossip. — Ryan Higa

Questioning the status quo can result in banishment, imprisonment, ridicule or being burned at the stake, depending on your era, your locale, and the sacred cows you wish to butcher. — Gene Spafford

The soft-minded man always fears change. He feels security in the status quo, and he has an almost morbid fear of the new. For him, the greatest pain is the pain of a new idea. — Martin Luther King, Jr.

What business entrepreneurs are to the economy, social entrepreneurs are to social change. They are the driven, creative individuals who question the status quo, exploit new opportunities, refuse to give up, and remake the world for the better. — David Bornstein

The greatest pain is the pain of a new idea. — Martin Luther King, Jr.

States are like people. They do not question the awful status quo until some dramatic event overturns the conventional and lax way of thinking. — Victor Davis Hanson

Sometimes people think you’re smart if you question the status quo, if nothing else. — Craig Ferguson

As the generalization goes about the art industry, people can be really challenging and thought-provoking in their thinking and questioning the status quo, and it's really important that the status quo can be questioned and that there are people doing that. — Lily Cole

I'm not a philosopher so why should I provide anyone with the answers? I'm just a musician, I don't have any solutions. All I'm doing is questioning the status quo, with every record I've made, to a certain extend. — Ayshay

As a teenager I was very clear that I wasn't in the church just to toe the line, but I saw there was a capacity within Christianity and the bible not to fall into line but to question the status quo, that's what kept me in the church. I was listening to the sort of music that did that questioning. — Alan Green

Quid Pro Quo Quotes

Once you experience being loved when you are unworthy, being forgiven when you did something wrong, that moves you into non-dual thinking. You move from what I call meritocracy, quid pro quo thinking, to the huge ocean of grace, where you stop counting or calculating. — Richard Rohr

Wilderness designations should not be the result of a quid pro quo. They should rise or fall on their own merits. — Nick Rahall

Twenty-five years ago, Christmas was not the burden that it is now; there was less haggling and weighing, less quid pro quo, less fatigue of body, less weariness of soul; and, most of all, there was less loading up with trash. — Margaret Deland

If the angle you're going at is there's some kind of quid pro quo - there isn't. Business is business, and people are allowed to make money. Looks can be deceiving, because there's no quid pro quo here. — Mike Miller

This is nothing. The last couple of batches of [Hillary Clinton's] emails have revealed exactly nothing. Now, who is pushing this notion that there was a quid pro quo in the State Department? — Thomas Roberts

State Department official accused of offering 'quid pro quo' in [Hillary] Clinton email scandal. — Donald Trump

Acting for me is not that quid pro quo. — Tom Wilkinson

If you're cutting deals with one company or another, eventually, there's going to be a quid pro quo. There's going to be a bribe. There's going to be something. — David Brooks

Both the State Department and the FBI deny any 'quid pro quo' between Hillary Clinton's State Department and the FBI. — Thomas Roberts

Texas has waited too long for a governor who knows that quid pro quo shouldn't be the status quo. It's time for a governor who believes that you don't have to buy a place in Texas' future. — Wendy Davis

Challenge The Status Quo Quotes

I wore black because I liked it. I still do, and wearing it still means something to me. It's still my symbol of rebellion -- against a stagnant status quo, against our hypocritical houses of God, against people whose minds are closed to others' ideas. — Johnny Cash

Challenging the status quo takes commitment, courage, imagination, and, above all, dedication to learning. — Marshall Ganz

One of the great liabilities of history is that all too many people fail to remain awake through great periods of social change. — Martin Luther King, Jr.

Understand first that failure indicates courage. It means you had the bravery to test yourself. The temerity to challenge your status quo. The audacity to step outside your comfort zone. That impulse is both inspiring and empowering. Hold on to it. And congratulate yourself for trying. — Rich Roll

If you do the same thing as others, it will wear you out. Nintendo is not good at competing so we always have to challenge the status quo by making something new, rather than competing in an existing market. — Satoru Iwata

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. — Walter Isaacson

Like the early Christians, we must move into a sometime hostile world armed with the revolutionary gospel of Jesus Christ. With this powerful gospel we shall boldly challenge the status quo. — Martin Luther

When you're doing something for yourself, or your best friend or family, you're not going to cheese out. If you don't love something, you're not going to go the extra mile, work the extra weekend, challenge the status quo as much. — Steve Jobs

When something really bad is going on in a culture, the average guy doesn't see it. He can't. He's average and is surrounded by and immersed in the cant and discourse of the status quo. — George Saunders

I look at every business and ask, How long can this last? How can I identify the status quo and change it? — Sheldon Adelson

Changing The Status Quo Quotes

It will always be a battle a day between those who want maximum change and those who want to maintain the status quo. — Gerry Adams

In fact, people themselves are responsible for making the status quo so resistant to change. We are trapped by our own behavior. — Chris Argyris

The human ego prefers anything, just about anything, to falling, or changing, or dying. The ego is that part of you that loves the status quo – even when it's not working. It attaches to past and present and fears the future. — Richard Rohr

For any student of history, change is the law of life. Any attempt to contain it guarantees an explosion down the road; the more rigid the adherence to the status quo, the more violent the ultimate outcome will be. — Henry A. Kissinger

At the end of the day, nobody can tell you how to tackle failure or how to handle change. The world is very good at encouraging you to go along with the status quo and at basking in your successes. — Viola Davis

We know - intellectually - that confronting an issue is the only way to resolve it. But any resolution will disrupt the status quo. Given the choice between conflict and change on the one hand, and inertia on the other, the ostrich position can seem very attractive. — Margaret Heffernan

The mind is reluctant to embrace deep change, and will play devious games to maintain the status quo. — Kristin Linklater

There's one thing worse than change and that's the status quo. — John Le Carre

Want to change the world? Upset the status quo? This takes more than run-of-the-mill relationships. You need to make people dream the same dream that you do. — Guy Kawasaki

Today, our very survival depends on our ability to stay awake, to adjust to new ideas, to remain vigilant and to face the challenge of change. — Martin Luther King, Jr.

Status Quo Quotes

Even the greatest idea can become meaningless in the rush to judgement. To gauge an idea as feasible we must cut our ties to the status quo and find the balance between constructive criticism and judgment. Within that balance we will uncover crucial input for making our ideas a reality. — Shigeo Shingo

Any woman who chooses to behave like a full human being should be warned that the armies of the status quo will treat her as something of a dirty joke. That's their natural and first weapon. She will need her sisterhood. — Gloria Steinem

The key to success is to always be looking for ways to improve and never be satisfied with the status quo. — Glen Bell

The music of the soul is also the music of salesmanship. Exchange value, not truth value counts. On it centers the rationality of the status quo, and all alien rationality is bent to It. — Herbert Marcuse

The concept of progress must be grounded in the idea of catastrophe. That things are 'status quo' is the catastrophe — Walter Benjamin

Rap comes from the humble beginnings of rebelling against the status quo. Now, rappers have become the status quo themselves. You can't rebel against the Queen and then become the Queen yourself. I attribute much of the blame to testosterone-male dominance and patriarchy. — Chuck D

Politics is pervasive. Everything is political and the choice to be "apolitical" is usually just an endorsement of the status quo and the unexamined life. — Rebecca Solnit

It was simply this: silence is not a neutral position, whatever your intentions. Silence automatically supports the status quo. When you are a presence that lacks a voice, you create an empty space that another voice - a dominating voice that knows no boundaries - is only too happy to fill. — Justine Musk

The best thing I can think of would be to create a union between something as beautiful and powerful and wonderful as Hollywood films and a criticism of the status quo. That's my dream, to make such a German film. — Rainer W. Fassbinder

The best thing I can think of would be to create a union between something as beautiful and powerful and wonderful as Hollywood films and a criticism of the status quo. That's my dream, to make such a German film. — Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Challenging Status Quo Quotes

Any business today that embraces the status quo as an operating principle is going to be on a death march. — Howard Schultz

If you want to thrive in today's economy, you must challenge the status quo and get the financial education necessary to succeed. — Robert Kiyosaki

The most dangerous ideas are not those that challenge the status quo. The most dangerous ideas are those so embedded in the status quo, so wrapped in a cloud of inevitability, that we forget they are ideas at all. — Jacob M. Appel

Stuff your eyes with wonder. — Ray Bradbury

Comedy is to force us to observe ourselves in ways that are humorous and yet, at the end of the day, that cause us enough discomfort with the status quo to make a change. — Michael Eric Dyson

Politics isn't just a game of clashing parties and competing interests. The right reason is to challenge the status quo, to serve the common good, and to leave this nation better than we found it. — Sarah Palin

Your art is what you do when no one can tell you exactly how to do it. Your art is the act of taking personal responsibility, challenging the status quo, and changing people. — Seth

Theory and practice are not only interwoven with one’s culture but with the responsibility of shaping the environment, of breaking up social complacency, and challenging the power of the status quo. — Samuel Mockbee

Politics isn't just a game of clashing parties and competing interests. — Sarah Palin

The status quo is never news, only challenges to it. — Malorie Blackman

Challenging The Status Quo Quotes

Activism that challenges the status quo, that attacks deeply rooted problems, is not for the faint of heart. — Malcolm Gladwell

It's uncomfortable to challenge the status quo. — Seth Godin

People I look to: again, Hank Aaron, man you challenged the status quo and the records of the game. Monumental feats in an era where people didn't like that. — Dave Winfield

You want continual improvement? Then I challenge every employee in an organization to discard the status quo and ask themselves everyday, How can I improve my job?, then find a way to make it happen. — John Novak

I love challenging the status quo. — Sara Ramirez

Some say that I should settle down, go slower and not push so hard, so quickly for such transformational change. To them, I say that you misunderstand the size of the problems we face, the strength of the status quo and the urgency of the people's desire for change. — Eliot Spitzer

Most of the press is in league with government, or with the status quo. — Harold Pinter

Embrace change as an opportunity to learn, to improve, to make a difference in others' lives as well as in your own. Have the courage to challenge the status quo. Remember that preparation and ambition in combination with opportunity equals success. And have fun! — Rosabeth Moss Kanter

I would say first of all, anyone who wants to challenge the status quo always gets that response. Ninety percent of the time, that's just bull. That's just the way in which people choose to prop up their own privilege or their own particular position. So mostly I shrug it off. — Malcolm Gladwell

The youth should come together to challenge the status quo. They must not give up. — Wole Soyinka

Maintaining The Status Quo Quotes

It's not a matter of maintaining the status quo. We have to create a dynamic state, oriented towards expansion. — David Ben-Gurion

Philanthropy is involved with basic innovations that transform society, not simply maintaining the status quo or filling basic social needs that were formerly the province of the public sector. — David Rockefeller

NGOs have a complicated space in neoliberal politics. They are supposed to mop up the anger. Even when they are doing good work, they are supposed to maintain the status quo. They are the missionaries of the corporate world. — Arundhati Roy

There are... two kinds of people: those who are changing and those who are setting themselves up to be victims of change. As the world continues to march on around us, if I am only maintaining the status quo - if I'm not growing - then I'm falling behind. — Jim Clemmer

Rwanda was considered a second-class operation; because it was a small country, we had been able to maintain a kind of status quo. They were negotiating, they'd accepted the new peace project, so we were under the impression that everything would be solved easily. — Boutros Boutros-Ghali

One of the things I benefited from when I started this business was that I didn't know anything. I was just instinct with no preconceived notions. This enabled me to learn and change quickly without having to worry about maintaining any kind of status quo, like some of my bigger competitors. — Michael Dell

Military intervention to maintain the global status quo will become a constant feature of international relations, whether this is justified in terms of fighting drugs, fighting terrorism, containing 'rogue states', opposing 'Islamic fundamentalism', or containing China. — Walden Bello

Insistence on having a sexual orientation in sex is about defending the status quo, maintaining sex differences and the sexual hierarchy; whereas resistance to sexual orientation, regimentation is more about where we need to be going. — John Stoltenberg

Education in this country is about how to maintain the status quo and to perpetuate racism. — Jane Elliott

The Sixties was a perfect storm of disaffection with political leaders trying to pass off the same old platitudes to maintain the status quo and an unexpected courageousness in the masses of youth. Nothing on this scale had ever happened before in U.S. history and it hasn't happened since. — Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

People Writing About Quo

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Read quotes by Shirley Chisholm

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Read quotes by Maajid Nawaz

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More Quo Quotes

The manager administers; the leader innovates. The manager has a short-range view; the leader has a long-range perspective. The manager asks how and when; the leader asks what and why. The manager has his eye on the bottom line; the leader has his eye on the horizon. The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it. — Warren Bennis

Leaders are fascinated by future. You are a leader if and only if, you are restless for change, impatient for progress and deeply dissatisfied with status quo. Because in your head, you can see a better future. The friction between 'what is' and 'what could be' burns you, stirs you up, propels you. This is leadership. — Marcus Buckingham

In religion, it is not the sycophants or those who cling most faithfully to the status quo who are ultimately praised. It is the insurgents. — Rollo May

Margaret Thatcher has shown that there is power and dignity to be won by defying the status quo and the majority rather than by adapting to them. If the British left, which she froze into immobility like Medusa, could bring itself to learn from this, then we might not have to look upon her like again. — Christopher Hitchens

As long as mankind is made up of independent individuals with free will, there cannot be any social status quo. Men will develop new urges, and these will give rise to new problems, which will require ever new solutions. Human life implies adventure, and there is no adventure without struggles and dangers. — Rene Dubos

There is a clear difference between sexist parody and parody of sexism. Sexist parody encourages the players to mock and trivialize gender issues while parody of sexism disrupts the status quo and undermines regressive gender conventions. — Anita Sarkeesian

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