Quotes About Individualism

When it comes to religion, the USA is now land of the freelancers" or "a greenhouse for spiritual sprouts."15

the ineradicable prejudice that every action intended to serve the profit interest must be anti-social by this fact alone."27

The man assumes the role of the loner, the thinker and the searching spirit who calls the privileged and the powerful to task. The power of one was the courage to remain separate, th think through the truth and not be beguiled by convention or the plausible arguments of those who expect to maintain power, whatever the cost.

Modern women ... they don't sew your pockets ... forget that.

Ah! - dice il romantico, e indossa l'abito di un sistema estraneo di valori: - Ah! Ora sono dei vostri e non sono più solo. Ah! - dice l'esteta, e indossa lo stesso abito: - io resto solo, ma questo è un bell'abito! - l'esteta nella sfera del romanticismo rappresenta il principio del male.

His friend and fellow writer, Ralph Waldo Emerson, agreed, but thought it futile to protest. When Emerson visited Thoreau in jail and asked, "What are you doing in there?" it was reported that Thoreau replied, "What are you doing out there?

Emma Goldman.

But our trip was different. It was a classic affirmation of everything right and true and decent in the national character. It was a gross, physical salute to the fantastic possibilities of life in this country-but only for those with true grit. And we were chock full of that.

Hunter S. Thompson

There's a lot of things wrong with this country, but one of the few things still right with it is that a man can steer clear of the organized bullshit if he really wants to. It's a goddamned luxury, and if I were you, I'd take advantage of it while you can.

Old elephants limp off to the hills to die; old Americans go out to the highway and drive themselves to death with huge cars.

The only way to prepare for a trip like this, I felt, was to dress up like human peacocks and get crazy, then screech off across the desert and cover the story.

Can I get to the bottle of Old Crow and mix it up with the remains of these ice fragments...a cool drink for the freak? Give the gentleman something cool, dear, can't you see he's wired his brain to the water pump and his ears to the generator...

The only thing we're concerned about is what's right for us. We got our own definition of "right.

Don't you have a religion? Dorolow asked Horza. Yes, he replied, not taking his eyes away from the screen on the wall above the end of the main mess-room table. My survival. So... your religion dies with you. How sad, Dorolow said, looking back from Horza to the screen. The Changer let the remark pass.

Changers] were a threat to identity, a challenge to the individualism even of those they were never likely to impersonate. It had nothing to do with souls or physical or spiritual possession; it was, as the Idirans well understood, the behavouristic copying of another which revolted. Individuality, the thing which most humans held more precious than anything else about themselves, was somehow cheapened by the ease with which a Changer could ignore it as a limitation and use it as a disguise.

I prefer to regard myself as one who has the ability and the mental and nervous equipment to make his own laws and act according to them rather than accept the laws that suit the lowest common denominator of the people.

I am allergic to almost every form of international agency, conference or committee.

It was exhilarating, at least at first, to live in a city of narcissists.

Young people these days don't trust anything at all. They want to be free.

Suppose that 'Unsolved Mysteries' called you with news of a long-lost identical twin. Would that suddenly make you less of a person, less of an individual? It is hard to see how. So, why would a clone be different? Your clone would be raised in a different era by different people - like the lost identical twin, only younger than you.

In many ways, the young are more religiously minded than the older generations. I think it's the flip side of an age of individualism. Youngsters are not afraid to tell you what they think, to express their faith and be quite exuberant about it.

The American culture is pursue your own happiness, follow your dreams. The Chinese side is sacrifice everything for your family; it's all about the group. Those conflicting ideas were always a battle in my head.

That person has to be accountable for himself. I think that's what we have to do in society today is to be accountable for yourself. I think we have the tendency to always want to live someone else's life.