“Calling someone a monster does not make him more guilty; it makes him less so by classing him with beasts and devils”

— Mary McCarthy

"The Hue and Cry," The Writing on the Wall (1970)
Context: Calling someone a monster does not make him more guilty; it makes him less so by classing him with beasts and devils (“a person of inhuman and horrible cruelty or wickedness,” OED, Sense 4). Such an unnatural being is more horrible to contemplate than an Eichmann — that is, aesthetically worse — but morally an Ilse Koch was surely less culpable than Eichmann since she seems to have had no trace of human feeling and therefore was impassable to conscience.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Calling someone a monster does not make him more guilty; it makes him less so by classing him with beasts and devils" by Mary McCarthy?

Mary McCarthy79

American writer 1912–1989

Related quotes

“Patriotism requires less and less of making the eagle scream, but more and more of making him think.”

Aldo Leopold (1887–1948) American writer and scientist

"The Home Builder Conserves" [1928]; Published in The River of the Mother of God and Other Essays by Aldo Leopold, Susan L. Flader and J. Baird Callicott (eds.) 1991, p. 147.
1920s

“What does not kill him, makes him stronger.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Ecce homo

… was ihn nicht umbringt, macht ihn stärker
"Why I Am So Wise", 2
Cf. Twilight of the Idols (1888), "Maxims and Arrows", aphorism 8: What does not destroy me, makes me stronger.
Ecce Homo (1888)

“Take hope from the heart of man and you make him a beast of prey.”

Ouida (1839–1908) British novelist

A Village Commune http://books.google.com/books?id=4rksAAAAYAAJ&q=%22take+hope+from+the+heart+of+man+and+you+make+him+a+beast+of+prey%22&pg=PA206#v=onepage (1881) <br class="br">Cited in: Pratiyogita Darpan https://books.google.nl/books?id=trBMVnMmk6oC&pg=PT47&lpg=PT47&dq=%22Take+hope+from+the+heart+of+man+and+you+make+him+a+beast+of+prey%22&source=bl&ots=CrxbsmwOru&sig=5n_dKLOkkZs7IlJucIBMAy2gG_Y&hl=nl&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiIyumfwJ_LAhWDNpoKHRGjBxoQ6AEIWjAH#v=onepage&q=%22Take%20hope%20from%20the%20heart%20of%20man%20and%20you%20make%20him%20a%20beast%20of%20prey%22&f=false, February 2009

“The broad effects which can be obtained by punishment in man and beast are the increase of fear, the sharpening of the sense of cunning, the mastery of the desires; so it is that punishment tames man, but does not make him "better."”

Friedrich Nietzsche book On the Genealogy of Morality

Essay 2, Section 15
On the Genealogy of Morality (1887)

“One of the first things I did when I came on, I said, “I do not want this Kong to be a quadruped. I want him to stand upright, I want a throwback to the 1933 film where he is a biped, because he is a monster. He’s not just a big silverback gorilla, he’s a movie monster.” So I wanted to stand him upright, I wanted to make him tall, and part of that is because I wanted him to feel like this fusion between a god, a man, and a beast. I wanted to make him big enough that, if any of us stood at this table and we looked up at this thing, towered over us, how big does that thing have to be for the first thing that your brain says is, “That’s a god. I’m looking at a god.””

Jordan Vogt-Roberts (1984) American film director

Interview: Director Jordan Vogt-Roberts on Resurrecting an Icon for KONG: SKULL ISLAND http://dailydead.com/interview-director-jordan-vogt-roberts-on-resurrecting-an-icon-for-kong-skull-island/ (March 9, 2017)

“Unbelief makes a man guilty of the vilest contempt of Christ, and the whole design of redemption by Him.”

John Flavel (1627–1691) English Presbyterian clergyman

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 607.

““Isn’t that a little hard on him? You’re not only making him feel bad about something he didn’t do, you’re making him feel bad about something that didn’t even shracking happen.”
“I believe churches used to call it original sin,” Rutherford agreed, looking crafty. “But what does it matter, if it serves to make him a better man?””

Kage Baker book The Life of the World to Come

Source: The Life of the World to Come (2004), Chapter 5, “Another Meeting” (p. 97)

“The object of the educational system is to make the child feel suitably guilty for the harm that has been done to him.”

Celia Green (1935) British philosopher

Source: The Decline and Fall of Science (1976)

“Since Hedorah was supposed to be a monster created by pollution instead of an animal, I tried to avoid portraying him as an animal. I tried to make him seem spooky and grotesque.”

Kenpachiro Satsuma (1947) Japanese actor

As quoted by David Milner, "Kenpachiro Satsuma Interview I" http://www.davmil.org/www.kaijuconversations.com/satsum.htm, Kaiju Conversations (December 1993)

“To make someone an icon is to make him an abstraction, and abstractions are incapable of vital communication with living people.”

David Foster Wallace (1962–2008) American fiction writer and essayist

Source: Consider the Lobster and Other Essays

“Calling someone a monster does not make him more guilty; it makes him less so by classing him with beasts and devils”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Mary McCarthy79

Related quotes

Related topics