Voicing opposition to the McCarran Internal Security Act of 1950
Context: The whole notion of loyalty inquisitions is a national characteristic of the police state, not of democracy. The history of Soviet Russia is a modern example of this ancient practice. I must, in good conscience, protest against any unnecessary suppression of our rights as free men. We must not burn down the house to kill the rats.
Voicing opposition to the McCarran Internal Security Act of 1950
“Hating people is like burning down your own home to get rid of a rat.”
As I See Religion (1932)
Variant: Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat.
The Bijak of Kabir (1983;2002) as translated by Linda Hess and Shukdeo Singh.
Bijak
“I'm not senile," I snapped. "If I burn the house down it will be on purpose.”
Source: The Blind Assassin
“When your house is burning down, you don't worry about the remodeling.”
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, unspecified episode
Christopher
Source: The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore (1963)
“We must be as stealthy as rats in the wainscoting of their society.”
A Stainless Steel Rat is Born (1985)
The Stainless Steel Rat
Context: We must be as stealthy as rats in the wainscoting of their society. It was easier in the old days, of course, and society had more rats when the rules were looser, just as old wooden buildings have more rats than concrete buildings. But there are rats in the building now as well. Now that society is all ferrocrete and stainless steel there are fewer gaps in the joints. It takes a very smart rat indeed to find these openings. Only a stainless steel rat can be at home in this environment.
“Rats!
They fought the dogs and killed the cats”
The Pied Piper of Hamelin, line 10 (1842).
Context: Rats!
They fought the dogs and killed the cats,
And bit the babies in the cradles,
And ate the cheeses out of the vats,
And licked the soup from the cooks' own ladles,
Split open the kegs of salted sprats,
Made nests inside men's Sunday hats,
And even spoiled the women's chats
By drowning their speaking
With shrieking and squeaking
In fifty different sharps and flats.
