Quotes about apology
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Phil Brooks photo
Murray Leinster photo
Al Gore photo

“President Bush offered a brief and half-hearted apology to the Arab world — but he should apologize to the American people for abandoning the Geneva Conventions.”

Al Gore (1948) 45th Vice President of the United States

Quotes, NYU Speech (2004)
Context: President Bush offered a brief and half-hearted apology to the Arab world — but he should apologize to the American people for abandoning the Geneva Conventions.
He also owes an apology to the U. S. Army for cavalierly sending them into harm's way while ignoring the best advice of their commanders.
Perhaps most importantly of all, he should apologize to all those men and women throughout our world who have held the ideal of the United States of America as a shining goal, to inspire their hopeful efforts to bring about justice under a rule of law in their own lands.
Of course, the problem with all these legitimate requests is that a sincere apology requires an admission of error, a willingness to accept responsibility and to hold people accountable.
And President Bush is not only unwilling to acknowledge error. He has thus far been unwilling to hold anyone in his administration accountable for the worst strategic and military miscalculations and mistakes in the history of the United States of America.

P. J. O'Rourke photo
Wendell Berry photo

“By this time, the era of cut-and-run economics ought to be finished. Such an economy cannot be rationally defended or even apologized for. The proofs of its immense folly, heartlessness, and destructiveness are everywhere.”

Wendell Berry (1934) author

"Conserving Forest Communities".
Another Turn of the Crank (1996)
Context: By this time, the era of cut-and-run economics ought to be finished. Such an economy cannot be rationally defended or even apologized for. The proofs of its immense folly, heartlessness, and destructiveness are everywhere. Its failure as a way of dealing with the natural world and human society can no longer be sanely denied. That this economic system persists and grows larger and stronger in spite of its evident failure has nothing to do with rationality or, for that matter, with evidence. It persists because, embodied now in multinational corporations, it has discovered a terrifying truth: If you can control a people’s economy, you don’t need to worry about its politics; its politics have become irrelevant. If you control people’s choices as to whether or not they will work, and where they will work, and what they will do, and how well they will do it, and what they will eat and wear, and the genetic makeup of their crops and animals, and what they will do for amusement, then why should you worry about freedom of speech? In a totalitarian economy, any "political liberties" that the people might retain would simply cease to matter. If, as is often the case already, nobody can be elected who is not wealthy, and if nobody can be wealthy without dependence on the corporate economy, then what is your vote worth? The citizen thus becomes an economic subject.

St. Vincent (musician) photo

“You can’t apologize your way into people’s hearts … You have to go full force.”

St. Vincent (musician) (1982) American singer-songwriter

"Friendly, and Just a Bit Creepy: St. Vincent Defies Categories" in The New York Times (7 May 2009) http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/arts/music/07vince.html?_r=1&ref=arts&pagewanted=all
Context: I think anyone who is creative or self-aware in any way, there’s like a humility to it, or I should say a humiliation to it. But there’s also a self-delusion — the provisional ego, as my uncle would call it. The self-delusion is the thing that makes you go, oh you know what, all the music that I’ve ever loved in the world, I want to be a part of that — hey, listen to what I have to say, it’s really important, it’s going to matter.”
You can’t apologize your way into people’s hearts... You have to go full force.

Charles Mingus photo

“It seems so hard for some of us to grow up mentally just enough to realize that there are other persons of flesh and bone, just like us, on this great, big earth. And if they don't ever stand still, move, or "swing," they are as right as we are, even if they are as wrong as hell by our standards. Yes, Miles, I am apologizing for my stupid "Blindfold Test."”

Charles Mingus (1922–1979) American jazz double bassist, composer and bandleader

I can do it gladly because I'm learning a little something. No matter how much they try to say that Brubeck doesn't swing — or whatever else they're stewing or whoever else they're brewing — it's factually unimportant.
Not because Dave made Time magazine — and a dollar — but mainly because Dave honestly thinks he's swinging. He feels a certain pulse and plays a certain pulse which gives him pleasure and a sense of exaltation because he's sincerely doing something the way he, Dave Brubeck, feels like doing it. And as you said in your story, Miles, "if a guy makes you pat your foot, and if you feel it down your back, etc.," then Dave is the swingingest by your own definition, Miles, because at Newport and elsewhere Dave had the whole house patting its feet and even clapping its hands....
An Open Letter To Miles Davis (1955)

Gloria Steinem photo

“I always feel I have to apologize to my friends who are Republicans because they’ve basically lost their party.”

Gloria Steinem (1934) American feminist and journalist

The Humanist interview (2012)
Context: This war against women started a long time ago with old Democrats who took over the Republican Party, which was, before that, the very first to support the Equal Rights Amendment. Even when the National Women’s Political Caucus started, there was a whole Republican feminist entity. But beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, right-wing Democrats like Jesse Helms began to leave the Democratic Party and gradually take over the GOP.
So I always feel I have to apologize to my friends who are Republicans because they’ve basically lost their party. Ronald Reagan couldn’t get nominated today because he was supportive of immigrant rights. Barry Goldwater was pro-choice. George H. W. Bush supported Planned Parenthood. No previous Republicans except for George W. Bush would be acceptable to the people who now run the GOP. They are not Republicans. They are the American version of the Taliban. … They’ve taken over one of our two great parties. This causes people to wrongly think that the country is equally divided but if we look at the public opinion polls, it isn’t. So, I can’t think of anything more crucial than real Republicans taking back the GOP.

Alan Watts photo
Frederick Douglass photo

“For this feeling there are many apologies, for there was never yet an error, however flagrant and hurtful, for which some plausible defense could not be framed. Chattel slavery, king craft, priest craft, pious frauds, intolerance, persecution, suicide, assassination, repudiation, and a thousand other errors and crimes have all had their defenses and apologies. Prejudice of race and color has been equally upheld. The two best arguments in the defense are, first, the worthlessness of the class against which it is directed; and, second, that the feeling itself is entirely natural. The way to overcome the first argument is to work for the elevation of those deemed worthless, and thus make them worthy of regard, and they will soon become worthy and not worthless. As to the natural argument, it may be said that nature has many sides. Many things are in a certain sense natural, which are neither wise nor best. It is natural to walk, but shall men therefore refuse to ride? It is natural to ride on horseback, shall men therefore refuse steam and rail?”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

1860s, Our Composite Nationality (1869)
Context: I need not repeat here the multitude of reproachful epithets expressive of the same sentiment among ourselves. All who are not to the manor born have been made to feel the lash and sting of these reproachful names. For this feeling there are many apologies, for there was never yet an error, however flagrant and hurtful, for which some plausible defense could not be framed. Chattel slavery, king craft, priest craft, pious frauds, intolerance, persecution, suicide, assassination, repudiation, and a thousand other errors and crimes have all had their defenses and apologies. Prejudice of race and color has been equally upheld. The two best arguments in the defense are, first, the worthlessness of the class against which it is directed; and, second, that the feeling itself is entirely natural. The way to overcome the first argument is to work for the elevation of those deemed worthless, and thus make them worthy of regard, and they will soon become worthy and not worthless. As to the natural argument, it may be said that nature has many sides. Many things are in a certain sense natural, which are neither wise nor best. It is natural to walk, but shall men therefore refuse to ride? It is natural to ride on horseback, shall men therefore refuse steam and rail? Civilization is itself a constant war upon some forces in nature, shall we therefore abandon civilization and go back to savage life? Nature has two voices, the one high, the other low; one is in sweet accord with reason and justice, and the other apparently at war with both. The more men know of the essential nature of things, and of the true relation of mankind, the freer they are from prejudice of every kind. The child is afraid of the giant form of his own shadow. This is natural, but he will part with his fears when he is older and wiser. So ignorance is full of prejudice, but it will disappear with enlightenment. But I pass on.

Colin Powell photo

“I don't think I have anything to be ashamed of or apologize for with respect to what America has done for the world.”

Colin Powell (1937) Former U.S. Secretary of State and retired four-star general

2000s
Context: There is nothing in American experience or in American political life or in our culture that suggests we want to use hard power. But what we have found over the decades is that unless you do have hard power — and here I think you're referring to military power — then sometimes you are faced with situations that you can't deal with.
I mean, it was not soft power that freed Europe. It was hard power. And what followed immediately after hard power? Did the United States ask for dominion over a single nation in Europe? No. Soft power came in the Marshall Plan. Soft power came with American GIs who put their weapons down once the war was over and helped all those nations rebuild. We did the same thing in Japan.
So our record of living our values and letting our values be an inspiration to others I think is clear. And I don't think I have anything to be ashamed of or apologize for with respect to what America has done for the world.
We have gone forth from our shores repeatedly over the last hundred years and we've done this as recently as the last year in Afghanistan and put wonderful young men and women at risk, many of whom have lost their lives, and we have asked for nothing except enough ground to bury them in, and otherwise we have returned home to seek our own, you know, to seek our own lives in peace, to live our own lives in peace. But there comes a time when soft power or talking with evil will not work where, unfortunately, hard power is the only thing that works.

Response to a question by George Carey (a former Archbishop of Canterbury), after the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland (26 January 2003), as to whether the US had given due consideration to the use of "soft power" vs "hard power" against the regime of Saddam Hussein; this has sometimes been portrayed as an accusation by an Archbishop of Canterbury that the United States was engaged in "empire building", in which Powell's response has been paraphrased:

Wisława Szymborska photo

“My apologies to the felled tree for the table's four legs.
My apologies to great questions for small answers.”

Wisława Szymborska (1923–2012) Polish writer

"Under One Small Star"
Poems New and Collected (1998), Could Have (1972)

“As I am not a member of any community, no society can answer for my irregular conduct; neither do I wish to apologize to the world for my procedure; as I believe the Lord is my Shepherd, and Bishop of my soul.”

Dorothy Ripley (1767–1832) missionary

Preface (18 July 1819), p. 4
The Bank of Faith and Works United (1819)
Context: As I am not a member of any community, no society can answer for my irregular conduct; neither do I wish to apologize to the world for my procedure; as I believe the Lord is my Shepherd, and Bishop of my soul.
Duty to my Maker, excites me to faithfulness, knowing that life is the time to work for God; that I may be counted worthy to reign with the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, in "the city of the Living God, the Heavenly Jerusalem."

Thomas Merton photo

“I simply like Chuang Tzu because he is what he is and I feel no need to justify this liking to myself or to anyone else. He is far too great to need any apologies from me.”

Thomas Merton (1915–1968) Priest and author

"A Note To The Reader".
The Way of Chuang-Tzŭ (1965)
Context: I simply like Chuang Tzu because he is what he is and I feel no need to justify this liking to myself or to anyone else. He is far too great to need any apologies from me. … His philosophical temper is, I believe, profoundly original and sane. It can of course be misunderstood. But it is basically simple and direct. It seeks, as does all the greatest philosoph­ical thought, to go immediately to the heart of things.
Chuang Tzu is not concerned with words and formulas about reality, but with the direct existential grasp of reality in itself. Such a grasp is necessarily obscure and does not lend itself to abstract analysis. It can be presented in a parable, a fable, or a funny story about a conversation between two philosophers.

Grover Cleveland photo

“Amid the din of party strife the people's choice was made, but its attendant circumstances have demonstrated anew the strength and safety of a government by the people. In each succeeding year it more clearly appears that our democratic principle needs no apology, and that in its fearless and faithful application is to be found the surest guaranty of good government.”

Grover Cleveland (1837–1908) 22nd and 24th president of the United States

First Inaugural Address (4 March 1885).
Context: Amid the din of party strife the people's choice was made, but its attendant circumstances have demonstrated anew the strength and safety of a government by the people. In each succeeding year it more clearly appears that our democratic principle needs no apology, and that in its fearless and faithful application is to be found the surest guaranty of good government.
But the best results in the operation of a government wherein every citizen has a share largely depend upon a proper limitation of purely partisan zeal and effort and a correct appreciation of the time when the heat of the partisan should be merged in the patriotism of the citizen.

Randy Pausch photo
Richard Wright photo
Elizabeth Warren photo

“I am not a person of color; I am not a citizen of a tribe; and I have apologized for confusion I’ve caused on tribal citizenship, tribal sovereignty, and for any harm that I’ve caused.”

Elizabeth Warren (1949) 28th United States Senator from Massachusetts

Quoted in Warren Faces Ancestry Question At Town Hall: ‘I Shouldn’t Have Done It. I Am Not A Person Of Color’ https://www.dailywire.com/news/warren-faces-ancestry-question-at-town-hall-i-shouldnt-have-done-it-i-am-not-a-person-of-color (December 8, 2019)
2019

Donald J. Trump photo
Chris Martin photo
J. Howard Moore photo

“Well may we be dazed by the horrific metamorphosis. Dark days are upon us. The pendulum of civilization trembles, as if to swing back to the inglorious twilight of the past. Imperialistic tendencies are laying their damning clutches on the unsuspecting form of the republic. Fearful questions confront us. Whether we are to be compelled henceforth to read with downcast gaze the matchless axioms of Jefferson and to mumble in confusion the heroic history of our dead—whether the Fourth of July is to be henceforth a day of embarrassment and shame instead of, as hitherto, an occasion for spontaneous and boundless pride—whether Yorktown and Monmouth are to become events which, instead of inspiring a continent to eulogy and song, shall provoke no higher eloquence than that which gutturals from the limping lips of apology—whether the political wisdom of the founders of the republic, gleaned in terrible hours, by anxious eyes, from the travail of ages past, shall be swept away by the heartless levity of upstart statesmen—whether, in short, we shall turn our backs inexorably upon the past—a past glorious achievement and unrivaled in precept—and become the wretched exemplars of a policy, ruinous to ourselves and to our children, repulsive to every truly civilized mind and destructive of the fairest hopes of humanity—these.”

J. Howard Moore (1862–1916)

are questions that assail with relentless emphasis the consciences of a great people.
"America's Apostasy", Chicago Chronicle, 6 Mar. 1899

Ralph Waldo Emerson photo
Cyril Ramaphosa photo

“In Zimbabwe, I was booed by the whole stadium. I had to apologise to the people of Zimbabwe for the attacks. I do not want to call it xenophobic attacks. South Africans do not hate people of other nations. … We had to offer an apology on behalf of the people of South Africa. We are loved in the continent. We are a sought after country. … I had to apologise because those attacks were a national shame, …”

Cyril Ramaphosa (1952) 5th President of South Africa

On 15 September 2019, as guest of honour at the Grace Bible Church in Pimville, Soweto, following his return to South Africa from the funeral of Robert Mugabe, as quoted by Baldwin Ndaba in Ramaphosa says xenophobic attacks 'a national shame' https://www.msn.com/en-za/news/national/ramaphosa-says-xenophobic-attacks-a-national-shame/ar-AAHjLX2?ocid=spartanntp, Weekend Argus (15 September 2019)

Elizabeth Warren photo
Elizabeth Warren photo
Jack White photo

“Is this some kind of fucking radio promotion? What the fuck is this? Let me just say that if whatever said radio station tries to blacklist us for my comments about their balloons, I would like them to know I want a written apology tomorrow for interrupting my song.”

Jack White (1975) American musician and record producer

AT The Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California after some balloons bearing a radio station's logo floated on stage.
Chonin, Neva (2005). "White Stripes huge but not bloated" http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/08/15/DDGTAE7B261.DTL&type=music SFGate.com (accessed June 19, 2007)
2010

Richard Sherman (American football) photo
J. Howard Moore photo

“[This work] would be inexcusable to suppose it to be exhaustive. It is not even defensive. It is a projectile, and projectiles do not apologize.
It intends to be followed.”

J. Howard Moore (1862–1916)

"Preface"
Why I Am a Vegetarian: An Address Delivered before the Chicago Vegetarian Society (1895)

Priti Patel photo

“While my actions were meant with the best of intentions, my actions also fell below the standards of transparency and openness that I have promoted and advocated. I offer a fulsome apology to you and to the government for what has happened and offer my resignation.”

Priti Patel (1972) British politician

Said in her resignation letter to Theresa May in November 2017 after she had unauthorised meetings with Israeli officials while Secretary of State for International Development. Priti Patel quits cabinet over Israel meetings row https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41923007 (8 November 2017)
2017

Wendell Berry photo

“By this time, the era of cut-and-run economics ought to be finished. Such an economy cannot be rationally defended or even apologized for. The proofs of its immense folly, heartlessness, and destructiveness are everywhere. Its failure as a way of dealing with the natural world and human society can no longer be sanely denied. That this economic system persists and grows larger and stronger in spite of its evident failure has nothing to do with rationality or, for that matter, with evidence. It persists because, embodied now in multinational corporations, it has discovered a terrifying truth: If you can control a people’s economy, you don’t need to worry about its politics; its politics have become irrelevant. If you control people’s choices as to whether or not they will work, and where they will work, and what they will do, and how well they will do it, and what they will eat and wear, and the genetic makeup of their crops and animals, and what they will do for amusement, then why should you worry about freedom of speech? In a totalitarian economy, any "political liberties" that the people might retain would simply cease to matter. If, as is often the case already, nobody can be elected who is not wealthy, and if nobody can be wealthy without dependence on the corporate economy, then what is your vote worth? The citizen thus becomes an economic subject.”

Wendell Berry (1934) author

"Conserving Forest Communities"
Another Turn of the Crank (1996)

Fernando Chui photo

“In facing this disaster, we admit we have not done enough, there is space for improvement. Here I represent the Macau government in expressing our apologies to the residents.”

Fernando Chui (1957) Chief Executive of Macau (2009-2019)

Fernando Chui (2017) cited in " Macau leader Fernando Chui apologises to residents over Typhoon Hato havoc https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/battered-macau-and-hong-kong-clean-up-after-typhoon-hato-pounds-region-leaving-trail" on The Straits Times, 24 August 2017

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury photo

“It was time to put a stop to the growing idea that England ought to pay tribute to India as a kind of apology for having conquered her: & you have done it effectively.”

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) British politician

Source: Letter to Benjamin Disraeli (16 July 1875), quoted in Marvin Swartz, Politics of British Foreign Policy in the Era of Disraeli and Gladstone (1985), p. 17

“I apologize.”

“you aren’t sorry and don’t apologize.”
The Dragon Queen

Angela Merkel photo

“If we must now have to apologize for showing a friendly face in times of crisis, then this is not my country.”

Angela Merkel (1954) Chancellor of Germany

Merkel during a press conference on September 15, 2015 "Dan ist das nicht mein Land https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9BSD7anl6s,, September 15, 2015.
Original: (de) Wenn wir uns jetzt noch entschuldigen müssen dafür, dass wir in Notsituationen ein freundliches Gesicht zeigen, dann ist das nicht mein Land.

“It could have happened to anybody. People are always saying, 'He didn't apologize.' I don't think I did anything wrong that I need to apologize for. It was a clean hit.”

Jack Tatum (1948–2010) All-American college football player, professional football player, defensive back, safety, College Footbal…

about the Darryl Stingley hit.
Final Confessions of NFL Assassin Jack Tatum by Jack Tatum with Bill Kushner (1996)

Jessamyn Stanley photo
Prevale photo

“Apologizing by acknowledging your mistakes breaks down all forms of pride, often the root cause of the interruption of many friendly, sentimental and professional relationships.”

Prevale (1983) Italian DJ and producer

Original: Scusarsi riconoscendo i propri errori abbatte ogni forma di orgoglio, spesso causa principale dell'interruzione di molte relazioni amichevoli, sentimentali e professionali.
Source: prevale.net

Prevale photo

“Disrespect can forever break relationships of trust that even the most sincere apology could not recreate.”

Prevale (1983) Italian DJ and producer

Original: La mancanza di rispetto può interrompere per sempre rapporti di fiducia che neanche le scuse più sincere potrebbero ricreare.
Source: prevale.net