Quotes About Ethics

I would be stupid not to be on my own side. But I'm a human being, too. And I'm on the side of human beings, rather than on the side of crocodiles.

All of the characters in my films, they share one commonality. It doesn't matter whether they are good or bad, it doesn't matter whether they are smart or stupid, these characters all take responsibility for their own behavior. I'm much the same.

Every journalist who is not too stupid or too full of himself to notice what is going on knows that what he does is morally indefensible.

Having an affair with an intern is just an incredibly stupid thing to do.

You have to believe in God before you can say there are things that man was not meant to know. I don't think there's anything man wasn't meant to know. There are just some stupid things that people shouldn't do.

George Bush is not stupid. He's evil. OK? There's a huge difference between stupid and evil.

Most of the real bad guys in the world are people like you and me; they're not stupid, and you can't smell their horns.

Stupidity always accompanies evil. Or evil, stupidity.

Humanitarianism is the expression of stupidity and cowardice.

Self-plagiarism is style.

I'm not conniving - that has a pejorative context. I'm not sitting in back rooms making deals. That's not my style.

I mean there are many, many people in all sorts of different countries who don't have a great life, who are subject to injustice. Are we obliged to take all of them who come here? I think the answer is 'Not necessarily.'

One might rationally argue that individual human beings should be free choose what moral behavior they approve of, and which they don't, subject to the constraints of the law.

As a journalist, I'm not supposed to be the subject, but as an author, I'm fair game - another ingredient in the media soup.

There are some subjects that can only be tackled in fiction.

It's the nature of journalism to need to be close to your subjects. And either you're able to be tough on them, which a lot of us are, or you get in bed with them, and some people do.

Maintaining the dignity of my subjects has grown to be, over the years, an imperative in my work, both in the taking of the pictures and in their presentation.

I think that if journalists, reporters who spend a lot of time on a story, are honest with themselves, we all have feelings about our subjects - I mean, unless you're a robot.

Pharma companies don't have a direct relationship with consumers, so they're always subjects.

As a documentary filmmaker, I try to be sensitive to my subjects.

I read the collected works of former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee and made a list of everything the old Baptist preacher had ever condemned as immoral or untoward. The subjects of his condemnation ranged from college-age women going braless to dogs wearing clothes to Beyonce.

The journalist cannot create his subjects any more than the analyst can create his patients.

Straight-news pieces are supposed to be just that: straight news. They are not supposed to be biased, and a longtime practice for ensuring this is to ask all subjects of a story for their comment.

The sublimity of wisdom is to do those things living, which are to be desired when dying.