Quotes about occupation (392 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“And yet I adore him. I think he's quite crazy, and with no place or occupation in life, and far from happy, and philosophically irresponsible – and there is absolutely nobody like him.”

Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) Russian-American novelist, lepidopterist, professor

Source: Ada, or Ardor: A Family Chronicle

Life , Thinking , Happiness

“First, for over seven years the United States has been occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula, plundering its riches, dictating to its rulers, humiliating its people, terrorizing its neighbors, and turning its bases in the Peninsula into a spearhead through which to fight the neighboring Muslim peoples.
If some people have in the past argued about the fact of the occupation, all the people of the Peninsula have now acknowledged it. The best proof of this is the Americans' continuing aggression against the Iraqi people using the Peninsula as a staging post, even though all its rulers are against their territories being used to that end, but they are helpless.
Second, despite the great devastation inflicted on the Iraqi people by the crusader-Zionist alliance, and despite the huge number of those killed, which has exceeded 1 million… despite all this, the Americans are once again trying to repeat the horrific massacres, as though they are not content with the protracted blockade imposed after the ferocious war or the fragmentation and devastation.
So here they come to annihilate what is left of this people and to humiliate their Muslim neighbors.
Third, if the Americans' aims behind these wars are religious and economic, the aim is also to serve the Jews' petty state and divert attention from its occupation of Jerusalem and murder of Muslims there. The best proof of this is their eagerness to destroy Iraq, the strongest neighboring Arab state, and their endeavor to fragment all the states of the region such as Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Sudan into paper statelets and through their disunion and weakness to guarantee Israel's survival and the continuation of the brutal crusade occupation of the Peninsula.”

Osama bin Laden (1957–2011) founder of al-Qaeda

1990s, Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders (1998)

War , People , Past , Fight

“Racism within the military has long been an important tool to justify the destruction and occupation of another country. It has long been used to justify the killing, subjugation and torture of another people. Racism is a vital weapon employed by this government.”

Michael Prysner (1983) American anti-war political activist

"Our Real Enemies"

People , Country

“This may be my last message. From today Bangladesh is independent. I call upon the people of Bangladesh wherever you are and with whatever you have, to resist the occupation army. Our fight will go on till the last soldier of the Pakistan Occupation Army is expelled from the soil of independent Bangladesh. Final victory is ours. Joy Bangla!”

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (1920–1975) Bengali revolutionary, founder ("father") of Bangladesh

The Declaration of Independence on the night of 26th March, 1971. The declaration was made minutes before his arrest by the Pakistan Army. http://www.albd.org/autoalbd/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=111&Itemid=44 http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=93650 http://web.archive.org/web/20110719125113/http://www.albd.org/autoalbd/images/stories/compile/2006/dia/dia_letter.jpg
Quote, Other

People , Victory , Joy , Fight

“If a man, having lashed two hulls together, is crossing a river, and an empty boat happens along and bumps into him, no matter how hot-tempered the man may be, he will not get angry. But if there should be someone in the other boat, then he will shout out to haul this way or veer that. If his first shout is unheeded, he will shout again, and if that is not heard, he will shout a third time, this time with a torrent of curses following. In the first instance, he wasn't angry; now in the second he is. Earlier he faced emptiness, now he faces occupancy. If a man could succeed in making himself empty, and in that way wander through the world, then who could do him harm?”

Zhuangzi (-369–-286 BC) classic Chinese philosopher

World , Way , Time

“Viewed from the standpoint of social science, society is composed of individuals organized in occupational groups, each group fulfilling some function of the society. Taking this fact into account, psychology – the science of human nature and human consciousness – is able to make at least one general assertion as to the form a given society must take if it is to persist as a society. It must be possible for the individual as he works to see that his work is socially necessary; he must be able to see beyond his group to the society.”

Elton Mayo (1880–1949) Australian academic

Source: Democracy and freedom. 1919, p. 37

Nature , Science

“Actually there is little acute hatred of Germany left in this country, and even less, I should expect to find, in the army of occupation. Only the minority of sadists, who must have their "atrocities" from one source or another, take a keen interest in the hunting-down of war criminals and quislings.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"Revenge is Sour", Tribune (9 November 1945)

War , Country

“We are told we are fighting terrorists. The real terrorist was me. And the real terrorism is this occupation.”

Michael Prysner (1983) American anti-war political activist

"Our Real Enemies"

Fight

“I should say that, in addition to my tree-love (it was originally called The Tree), it arose from my own pre-occupation with the Lord of the Rings, the knowledge that it would be finished in great detail or not at all, and the fear (near certainty) that it would be 'not at all'.”

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien book Leaf by Niggle

About "Leaf by Niggle", in a letter to Caroline Everett (24 June 1957)
Context: I should say that, in addition to my tree-love (it was originally called The Tree), it arose from my own pre-occupation with the Lord of the Rings, the knowledge that it would be finished in great detail or not at all, and the fear (near certainty) that it would be 'not at all'. The war had arisen to darken all horizons. But no such analyses are a complete explanation even of a short story...

Love , Fear , Knowledge , Tree

“Do you smoke?

Well, yes, I must admit I smoke.

I'm glad to hear of it. A man should always have an occupation of some kind.”

Oscar Wilde The Importance of Being Earnest

Source: The Importance of Being Earnest

“Anything may happen when womanhood has ceased to be a protected occupation.”

Virginia Woolf book A Room of One's Own

Source: A Room of One's Own

“Reading is my favourite occupation, when I have leisure for it and books to read.”

Anne Brontë book Agnes Grey

Source: Agnes Grey

Books , Reading

“Rincewind tried to force the memory out of his mind, but it was rather enjoying itself there, terrorizing the other occupants and kicking over the furniture.”

Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author

Source: The Color of Magic

Memory

“To give an accurate description of what has never occurred is not merely the proper occupation of the historian, but the inalienable privilege of any man of parts and culture.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Parting

“Book collecting is an obsession, an occupation, a disease, an addiction, a fascination, an absurdity, a fate. It is not a hobby. Those who do it must do it.”

Jeanette Winterson (1959) English writer

Fate , Books , Disease

“Even the asexual has a deviation - his asexuality. It is far more abnormal to have a lack of sexual desire (unless illness or old-age, or another valid reason has caused the wane) than it is to be sexually promiscuous. However, if a Satanist chooses sexual sublimination above overt sexual expression, that is entirely his own affair. In many cases of sexual sublimination (or asexuality), any attempt to emancipate himself sexually would prove devastating to the asexual. Asexuals are invariably sexually sublimated by their jobs or hobbies. All the energy and driving interest which would normally be devoted to sexual activity is channeled into other pastimes or into their chosen occupations. If a person favors other interests over sexual activity, it is his right, and no one is justified in condemning him for it. However, the person should at least recognize the fact that this is a sexual sublimation.”

Anton LaVey book The Satanic Bible

The Satanic Bible (1969)

Age , Personality

“When the soul has arrived at this state all the acts of its spiritual and sensual nature, whether active or passive, and of whatever kind they may be, always occasion an increase of love and delight in God: even the act of prayer and communion with God, which was once carried on by reflections and divers other methods, is now wholly an act of love. So much so is this the case that the soul may always say, whether occupied with temporal or spiritual things, "My sole occupation is love."”

John of the Cross (1542–1591) Spanish mystic and Roman Catholic saint

Happy life! happy state! and happy the soul which has attained to it!
Explanation of Stanza 28 part 8
Spiritual Canticle of The Soul and The Bridegroom, Notes to the Stanzas

Love , Life , God , Soul

“By the time I was twenty, I had lived through a Hungarian Fascist dictatorship, German military occupation, the Nazis' "Final Solution," the siege of Budapest by the Soviet Red Army, a period of chaotic democracy in the years immediately after the war, a variety of repressive Communist regimes, and a popular uprising that was put down at gunpoint... [where] many young people were killed; countless others were interned. Some two hundred thousand Hungarians escaped to the West. I was one of them.”

Andrew S. Grove (1936–2016) Hungarian-born American businessman, engineer, and author

Prologue: Grove summarized his first twenty years of life in Hungary in his memoirs.
New millennium, Swimming Across: a Memoir, 2001

War , People , Democracy , Time

“Rule over the occupied territories would have social repercussions. After a few years there would be no Jewish workers or Jewish farmers. The Arabs would be the working people and the Jews the administrators, inspectors, officials, and police—mainly secret police. A state ruling a hostile population of 1.5 to 2 million foreigners would necessarily become a secret-police state, with all that this implies for education, free speech, and democratic institutions. The corruption characteristic of every colonial regime would also prevail in the state of Israel. The administration would have to suppress Arab insurgency on the one hand and acquire Arab Quislings on the other. There is also good reason to fear that the Israel Defense Force, which has been until now a people's army, would, as a result of being transformed into an army of occupation, degenerate, and its commanders, who will have become military governors, resemble their colleagues in other nations.Out of concern for the Jewish people and its state we have no choice but to withdraw from the territories and their population of one and a half million Arabs.”

Yeshayahu Leibowitz (1903–1994) israeli intellectual

"The Territories" (1968)

Hostility , People , Secret , Education

“What was a reasonable offer? In the first place, there ought to be an amnesty. … The second point in the terms should be a grant of money to rebuild the burned homesteads and restock the devastated farms. … Nothing would do more to accelerate the return of peace and order than to give the people occupation and a chance of living. Then, it should be part of any reasonable offer to the Boers that there should be a speedy restoration of self-governing institutions.”

James Bryce, 1st Viscount Bryce (1838–1922) British academic, jurist, historian and Liberal politician

Speech to the Women's National Liberal Association Conference, Memorial Hall, London (12 June 1901), quoted in The Times (13 June 1901), p. 12.
1900s

Money , People , Peace , Chance

“I know I've reached the stage where other artists would bleach their hair or buy a fancy costume, but, inexcusably, I can only be me, which is a full-time occupation and causes terrible backaches.”

Morrissey (1959) English singer

From "I’ll astonish you", interview by Len Brown, Details (March 1991).
In interviews etc., About himself and his work

Time

“He is immensely fat, and so
Well suits the occupation:
In point of fact, if you must know,
We used to call him years ago,
THE MAYOR AND CORPORATION!”

Lewis Carroll (1832–1898) English writer, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer

Canto 5
Phantasmagoria (1869)

“I am called wise, for my hearers always imagine that I myself possess wisdom which I find wanting in others: but the truth is, O men of Athens, that God only is wise; and in this oracle he means to say that the wisdom of men is little or nothing… as if he said, He, O men, is the wisest, who like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing. And so I go on my way, obedient to the god, and make inquisition into anyone, whether citizen or stranger, who appears to be wise; and if he is not wise, then in vindication of the oracle I show him that he is not wise; and this occupation quite absorbs me, and I have no time to give either to any public matter of interest or to any concern of my own, but I am in utter poverty by reason of my devotion to the god.”

Socrates (-470–-399 BC) classical Greek Athenian philosopher

23a-c
Plato, Apology

Wisdom , Men , God , Truth

“Some Western powers admit that they have killed a large part of Jewish population in Europe and founded the occupied regime in order to put right the wrong they had committed.
With deference to all nations and followers of divine religions, we are asking if this atrocity is true, then why the people of the region should pay for it by occupation of Palestinian lands and unending suppression of Palestinian people, by homelessness of millions of Palestinians, by destruction of their cities and rural areas and agricultural lands.
Why should they pay by fire, bullets and imposition of forces? And why should they pay by tolerating occupation of Islamic lands? Are the consequences of the establishment of this regime less than the Holocaust you are claiming?
If there are doubts regarding the Holocaust, there is really no doubt regarding Palestinian disaster and Holocaust. The Holocaust in Palestine has persisted for more than sixty years.”

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (1956) 6th President of the Islamic Republic of Iran

2006, 2006 International Qods Conference address

People , Religion , Parting

“The life we lead here is as far from ascetic abstinence as from an enervating comfort; simplicity is the rule here, but a simplicity full of variety, a variety of occupations, of activities, tasks, tendencies, natures; each one is free to organise his life as he pleases, the discipline is reduced to a minimum that is indispensable to organize the existence of 110 to 120 people and to avoid the movements which would be detrimental to the achievement of our yogic aim.”

The Mother (1878–1973) spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo

In The Formation Of The Ashram http://www.searchforlight.org/Sriaurobindo_Ashram1.htm, also in VII. The Formation of The Ashram http://www.sriaurobindoashram.com/Content.aspx?ContentURL=/_StaticContent/SriAurobindoAshram/-04%20Centers/India/Pondicherry/Sri%20Aurobindo%20Society/Wilfried/The%20Mother%20-%20A%20Short%20Biography/-010_The%20Formation%20of%20the%20Ashram.htm pp.39-40

Life , People , Nature

“The social stock of knowledge differentiates reality by degrees of familiarity… my knowledge of my own occupation and its world is very rich and specific, while I have only very sketchy knowledge of the occupational worlds of others.”

Peter L. Berger book The Social Construction of Reality

Source: The Social Construction of Reality, 1966, p. 43

World , Knowledge , Reality

“For those who want to talk a lot about World War II, if it's about occupation, then we could also talk about it (Muslim prayers in the streets), because that is occupation of territory. It is an occupation of sections of the territory, of districts in which religious laws apply. It's an occupation. There are of course no tanks, there are no soldiers, but it is nevertheless an occupation and it weighs heavily on local residents.”

Marine Le Pen (1968) French lawyer and politician

At a gathering in Lyon – Marine Le Pen: Muslims in France 'like Nazi occupation', The Telegraph (12 December 2010) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/8197895/Marine-Le-Pen-Muslims-in-France-like-Nazi-occupation.html

War , World , Law

“I don't understand why people would find my views abhorrent. If you ask any Israeli to put himself in a similar situation of occupation and oppression for 36 years - everyone would say they would do the same, including [Israeli Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon. I never heard any similar criticism from those Israelis who are shocked by the killing of women and children in suicide attacks, of an Israeli rocket attack that kills Palestinian civilians.”

Leah Tsemel (1945) Israeli lawyer

"The Israeli who defends suicide bombers," 2003

Women , Children , People , Understanding

“A house may be large or small; as long as the neighboring houses are likewise small, it satisfies all social requirement for a residence. But let there arise next to the little house a palace, and the little house shrinks to a hut. The little house now makes it clear that its inmate has no social position at all to maintain, or but a very insignificant one; and however high it may shoot up in the course of civilization, if the neighboring palace rises in equal or even in greater measure, the occupant of the relatively little house will always find himself more uncomfortable, more dissatisfied, more cramped within his four walls.”

Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist

Wage Labour and Capital (December 1847) http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/ch06.htm, in Marx Engels Selected Works, Volume I, p. 163.

Housing

“Zionist Israel's occupation of Arab Palestine has forced the Arab world to waste billions of precious dollars on armaments, making it impossible for these newly independent Arab nations to concentrate on strengthening the economies of their countries and elevate the living standard of their people.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

Malcolm X on Zionism (1964)

People , World , Country

“The dance around the golden calf of identity is the last and greatest orgy of counterenlightenment. Identity is the magic word of a partially hidden, partially open conservatism that has inscribed personal identity, occupational identity, national identity, political identity, female identity, male identity, class identity, party identity, etc., on its banner.”

Peter Sloterdijk (1947) German philosopher

Source: Kritik der zynischen Vernunft [Critique of Cynical Reason] (1983), pp. 60-61

Dance , Personality

“I have been a soreheaded occupant of a file drawer labeled “Science Fiction” … and I would like out, particularly since so many serious critics regularly mistake the drawer for a urinal.”

Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) American writer

"Science Fiction"; originally published in The New York Times Book Review, 5 September 1965
Wampeters, Foma & Granfalloons (1974)

Science

“My sole occupation is love.
All my occupation now is the practice of the love of God, all the powers of soul and body, memory, understanding, and will, interior and exterior senses, the desires of spirit and of sense, all work in and by love. All I do is done in love; all I suffer, I suffer in the sweetness of love.”

John of the Cross (1542–1591) Spanish mystic and Roman Catholic saint

Explanation of Stanza 28 part 8
Spiritual Canticle of The Soul and The Bridegroom, Notes to the Stanzas

Love , God , Soul , Understanding

“In every province, the chief occupations, in order of importance, are lovemaking, malicious gossip, and talking nonsense.”

Voltaire (1694–1778) French writer, historian, and philosopher

Citas, Candide (1759)

“There is a vague popular belief that lawyers are necessarily dishonest. I say vague, because when we consider to what extent confidence and honors are reposed in and conferred upon lawyers by the people, it appears improbable that their impression of dishonesty is very distinct and vivid. Yet the impression is common, almost universal. Let no young man choosing the law for a calling for a moment yield to the popular belief — resolve to be honest at all events; and if in your own judgment you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be honest without being a lawyer. Choose some other occupation, rather than one in the choosing of which you do, in advance, consent to be a knave.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Fragment, Notes for a Law Lecture (1 July 1850), cited in Abraham Lincoln: Complete Works, Comprising his Speeches, Letters, State Papers, and Miscellaneous Writings, Vol. 2 (1894)
1850s

People , Law , Confidence , Universe

“Your favourite virtue … Simplicity
Your favourite virtue in man … Strength
Your favourite virtue in woman … Weakness
Your chief characteristic … Singleness of purpose
Your idea of happiness … To fight
Your idea of misery … Submission
The vice you excuse most … Gullibility
The vice you detest most … Servility
Your aversion … Martin Tupper
Favourite occupation … Book-worming
Favourite poet … Shakespeare, Aeschylus, Goethe
Favourite prose-writer … Diderot
Favourite hero … Spartacus, Kepler
Favourite heroine … Gretchen [Heroine of Goethe's Faust]
Favourite flower … Daphne
Favourite colour … Red
Favourite name … Laura, Jenny
Favourite dish … Fish
Favourite maxim … Nihil humani a me alienum puto [Nothing human is alien to me, Terence]
Favourite motto … De omnibus dubitandum”

Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist

Everything must be doubted
Marx's replies to a set of questions given to him by his daughters Jenny and Laura in 1865 http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1865/04/01.htm

Books , Flowers , Idea , Fish

“Because if we had gone to Baghdad we would have been all alone. There wouldn't have been anybody else with us. It would have been a U. S. occupation of Iraq. None of the Arab forces that were willing to fight with us in Kuwait were willing to invade Iraq. Once you got to Iraq and took it over and took down Saddam Hussein's government, then what are you going to put in its place? That's a very volatile part of the world. And if you take down the central government in Iraq, you could easily end up seeing pieces of Iraq fly off. Part of it the Syrians would like to have, the west. Part of eastern Iraq the Iranians would like to claim. Fought over for eight years. In the north, you've got the Kurds. And if the Kurds spin loose and join with Kurds in Turkey, then you threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey. It's a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq. The other thing is casualties. Everyone was impressed with the fact that we were able to do our job with as few casualties as we had, but for the 146 Americans killed in action and for the families it wasn't a cheap war. And the question for the president in terms of whether or not we went on to Baghdad and took additional casualties in an effort to get Saddam Hussein was, how many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth? And our judgment was not very many, and I think we got it right.”

Dick Cheney (1941) American politician and businessman

Cheney, on not pushing on to Baghdad during the first Gulf War; C-SPAN 4-15-94 Interview on CNN http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0708/13/sitroom.03.html
1990s

War , World , Family , Question

“John McCain once opposed these tax cuts — he rightly called them unfair and fiscally irresponsible. But now he has done an about face and wants to make them permanent, just like he wants a permanent occupation in Iraq. No matter what the costs, no matter what the consequences, John McCain seems determined to carry out a third Bush term…”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

"Bush-McCain policies have... ballooned the national debt." (20 March 2008) http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/03/20/789664.aspx
2008

“The occupation made it very clear to me that there was something wrong, and I started to ask myself all kinds of questions and came to the conclusion that Zionism is negative and bad, and that we are oppressing the Palestinians.”

Leah Tsemel (1945) Israeli lawyer

"The Israeli who defends suicide bombers," 2003

Question

“A man may call himself a Christian—but the measure of his Christianity is the occupation of his mind and heart with the truth as it is in Jesus.”

Alexander Maclaren (1826–1910) British minister

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 376.

Truth , Heart

“The German soldiers, that is, the workers and peasants, will in the majority of cases have far more sympathy for the vanquished peoples than for their own ruling caste. The necessity to act at every step in the capacity of 'pacifiers' and oppressors will swiftly disintegrate the armies of occupation, infecting them with a revolutionary spirit.”

Leon Trotsky (1879–1940) Marxist revolutionary from Russia

Manuscript from 1940, as translated in Writings of Leon Trotsky‎ edited by George Breitman

People

“A prophet or an achiever must never mind an occasional absurdity; it is an occupational risk.”

Oswald Mosley book My Life

My Life, ch.12.

“We stand together because we believe that upholding peace and security is the responsibility of every nation. The days of empire and spheres of influence are over. Bigger nations must not be allowed to bully the small, or impose their will at the barrel of a gun or with masked men taking over buildings. And the stroke of a pen can never legitimize the theft of a neighbor’s land. So we will not accept Russia’s occupation of Crimea or its violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty. Our free nations will stand united so that further Russian provocations will only mean more isolation and costs for Russia. Because after investing so much blood and treasure to bring Europe together, how can we allow the dark tactics of the 20th century to define this new century?”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2014, 25th Anniversary of Polish Freedom Day Speech (June 2014)

Men , Peace

“I knew that if I was captured by the Germans I would be shot at once, since I have always been counted as an enemy of Germany because of my play, Le Bourgmestre de Stillemonde, which dealt with the conditions in Belgium during the German Occupation of 1918.”

Maurice Maeterlinck (1862–1949) Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist

As quoted in "Maeterlinck, Impoverished Exile, Arrives With Wife From France" http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F00613F7395A11728DDDAA0994DF405B8088F1D3&scp=1&sq=%22if+I+was+captured+by+the+Germans+I+would%22&st=p in The New York Times (13 July 1940)

“But just because I am a critic of Israeli policy — and in particular the occupation, simply because it is untenable, it creates a border that cannot be defended — that does not mean I believe the U.S. has brought this terrorism on itself because it supports Israel. I believe bin Laden and his supporters are using this as a pretext. If we were to change our support for Israel overnight, we would not stop these attacks.
I don't think this is what it's really about.”

Susan Sontag (1933–2004) American writer and filmmaker, professor, and activist

Salon interview (2001)
Context: But just because I am a critic of Israeli policy — and in particular the occupation, simply because it is untenable, it creates a border that cannot be defended — that does not mean I believe the U. S. has brought this terrorism on itself because it supports Israel. I believe bin Laden and his supporters are using this as a pretext. If we were to change our support for Israel overnight, we would not stop these attacks.
I don't think this is what it's really about. I think it truly is a jihad, I think there is such a thing. There are many levels to Islamic rage. But what we're dealing with here is a view of the U. S. as a secular, sinful society that must be humbled, and this has nothing to do with any particular aspect of American policy. In my view, there can be no compromise with such a vision. And, no, I don't think we have brought this upon ourselves, which is of course a view that has been attributed to me.

Support , Thinking , Change

“There can be no doubt that children should be taught those useful things which are really necessary, but not all things, for occupations are divided into liberal and illiberal; and to young children should be imparted only such kinds of knowledge as will be useful to them without vulgarizing them.”

Aristotle book Politics

Book VIII 1337b.5 http://books.google.com/books?id=ZrDWAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA245&dq=%22absorb+and+degrade+the+mind%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=c6NaUbatEYWp4AOWp4CoBA&ved=0CHYQ6AEwDA#v=onepage&q=%22absorb%20and%20degrade%20the%20mind%22&f=false, 1885 edition
Politics
Context: There can be no doubt that children should be taught those useful things which are really necessary, but not all things, for occupations are divided into liberal and illiberal; and to young children should be imparted only such kinds of knowledge as will be useful to them without vulgarizing them. And any occupation, art, or science which makes the body, or soul, or mind of the freeman less fit for the practice or exercise of virtue is vulgar; wherefore we call those arts vulgar which tend to deform the body, and likewise all paid employments, for they absorb and degrade the mind. There are also some liberal arts quite proper for a freeman to acquire, but only in a certain degree, and if he attend to them too closely, in order to attain perfection in them, the same evil effects will follow.

Children , Knowledge

“The occupation with things of the mind has by now itself become “practical,” a business with strict division of labor, departments and restricted entry. The man of independent means who chooses it out of repugnance for the ignominy of earning money will not be disposed to acknowledge the fact. For this he is punished. He … is ranked in the competitive hierarchy as a dilettante no matter how well he knows his subject, and must, if he wants to make a career, show himself even more resolutely blinkered than the most inveterate specialist. The urge to suspend the division of labor which, within certain limits, his economic situation enables him to satisfy, is thought particularly disreputable: it betrays a disinclination to sanction the operations imposed by society, and domineering competence permits no such idiosyncrasies. The departmentalization of mind is a means of abolishing mind where it is not exercised ex officio, under contract. It performs this task all the more reliably since anyone who repudiates this division of labor—if only by taking pleasure in his work—makes himself vulnerable by its standards, in ways inseparable from elements of his superiority.”

Theodor W. Adorno book Minima Moralia

E. Jephcott, trans. (1974), § 1
Minima Moralia (1951)
Context: The son of well-to-do parents who … engages in a so-called intellectual profession, as an artist or a scholar, will have a particularly difficult time with those bearing the distasteful title of colleagues. It is not merely that his independence is envied, the seriousness of his intentions mistrusted, that he is suspected of being a secret envoy of the established powers. … The real resistance lies elsewhere. The occupation with things of the mind has by now itself become “practical,” a business with strict division of labor, departments and restricted entry. The man of independent means who chooses it out of repugnance for the ignominy of earning money will not be disposed to acknowledge the fact. For this he is punished. He … is ranked in the competitive hierarchy as a dilettante no matter how well he knows his subject, and must, if he wants to make a career, show himself even more resolutely blinkered than the most inveterate specialist. The urge to suspend the division of labor which, within certain limits, his economic situation enables him to satisfy, is thought particularly disreputable: it betrays a disinclination to sanction the operations imposed by society, and domineering competence permits no such idiosyncrasies. The departmentalization of mind is a means of abolishing mind where it is not exercised ex officio, under contract. It performs this task all the more reliably since anyone who repudiates this division of labor—if only by taking pleasure in his work—makes himself vulnerable by its standards, in ways inseparable from elements of his superiority. Thus is order ensured: some have to play the game because they cannot otherwise live, and those who could live otherwise are kept out because they do not want to play the game.

Money , Pleasure , Way , Exercises

“The occupation and destruction of peoples is paved with a political strategy, developed by a culture of society, and embodied by doctrines, systems and economic theories.”

Yasser Elshantaf (1983) Palestinian Entrepreneur

People

“Thus they toil on in trouble and danger all the days of their life, with little opportunity for enjoying, being ever engaged in getting: their only idea of a holiday is to do what the occasion demands, and to them laborious occupation is less of a misfortune than the peace of a quiet life. To describe their character in a word, one might truly say that they were born into the world to take no rest themselves and to give none to others.”

Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War

Book I, Chapter III
History of the Peloponnesian War, Book I

Peace , Holiday , World , Idea

“We must recognize that it is a cardinal sin against democracy to support a man for public office because he belongs to a given creed or to oppose him because he belongs to a given creed. It is just as evil as to draw the line between class and class, between occupation and occupation in political life. No man who tries to draw either line is a good American. True Americanism demands that we judge each man on his conduct, that we so judge him in private life and that we so judge him in public life.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

1910s, Address to the Knights of Columbus (1915)

Democracy , Drawing , Support , Life

“The bourgeoisie has stripped of its halo every occupation hitherto honoured and looked up to with reverent awe. It has converted the physician, the lawyer, the priest, the poet, the man of science, into its paid wage labourers.”

Karl Marx book The Communist Manifesto

Section 1, paragraph 14.
The Communist Manifesto (1848)

Science

“It would be better if they [rulers] compelled the Jews to work for their living, as they do in parts of Italy, than that, living without occupation, they can grow rich only by usury”

Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican scholastic philosopher of the Roman Catholic Church

solis usuris ditentur
Source: On the Governance of the Jews (c. 1263–1265) art. 2

Parting

“Without opium, plans, marriages and journeys appear to me just as foolish as if someone falling out of a window were to hope to make friends with the occupants of the room before which he passes.”

Jean Cocteau (1889–1963) French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, boxing manager and filmmaker

Source: Opium: The Diary of His Cure

Marriage , Hope , Appearance

“Writing is supposed to be difficult, agonizing, a dreadful exercise, a terrible occupation.”

Ray Bradbury book Zen in the Art of Writing

Source: Zen in the Art of Writing

Exercises

“Being a child at home alone in the summer is a high-risk occupation. If you call your mother at work thirteen times an hour, she can hurt you.”

Erma Bombeck (1927–1996) When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent le…

Home , Time , Summer , Hurt

“… sitting and waiting is one of the most miserable occupations known to man - not that it usually is known to men; women do it much more often.”

Diana Gabaldon book Dragonfly in Amber

Source: Dragonfly in Amber

Women , Men , Waiting

“The secret of being miserable is to have leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not. The cure for it is occupation”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

1910s, A Treatise on Parents and Children (1910)
Context: The secret of being miserable is to have leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not. The cure for it is occupation, because occupation means pre-occupation; and the pre-occupied person is neither happy nor unhappy, but simply alive and active, which is pleasanter than any happiness until you are tired of it.

Secret , Happiness

“Winter is not a season, it's an occupation.”

Sinclair Lewis (1885–1951) American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright

Winter , Season

“Knowledge about life is one thing; effective occupation of a place in life, with its dynamic currents passing through your being, is another.”

William James book The Varieties of Religious Experience

Source: The Varieties of Religious Experience

Life , Knowledge

“What would Prince Charming have for occupation if he had not to awaken the Sleeping beauty?”

Simone de Beauvoir book The Second Sex

Source: The Second Sex

Beauty , Sleep

“You can't have occupation and human rights.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

“A human being must have occupation, if he or she is not to become a nuisance to the world.”

Dorothy L. Sayers (1893–1957) English crime writer, playwright, essayist and Christian writer

Essays, Are Women Human? (1938)

World

“Coaxing drunken Shadowhunters into making fools of themselves was a favorite occupation among the Downworlders, and this performance had been a tremendous success.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

Source: The Midnight Heir

Fools , Success

“It's true that writing is a solitary occupation, but you would be surprised at how much companionship a group of imaginary characters can offer once you get to know them.”

Anne Tyler (1941) American novelist

“Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true, and you will bring these into your experience proportionately to their occupancy of your thoughts.”

Mary Baker Eddy book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures

Source: Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures

“It is an occupational hazard that anyone who has spent her life learning how to lie eventually becomes bad at telling the truth.”

Ally Carter book Heist Society

Source: Heist Society

Life , Truth , Lie , Learning

“He liked fishing and seemed to take pride in being able to like such a stupid occupation.”

Leo Tolstoy book Anna Karenina

Source: Anna Karenina

Stupidity , Fish

“Life without absorbing occupation is hell — joy consists in forgetting life.”

Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher fue el escritor del jarron azul

The Note Book of Elbert Hubbard (1927)

Life , Hell , Joy , Forgetting

“The occupation of Iraq is completely self-perpetuating: The worse things get the more we are obliged to stay. And the longer we stay the worse things get. Wonderful, no? Being trapped in Iraq, moreover, has clearly prevented us from tackling Iran with any traction. One argument commonly made for staying in Iraq makes no sense to me at all. It's McCain's "if we leave, they will follow us home." But if we stay, they can follow us home as well. And by staying, we have clearly created more of them to follow us. The second argument that fails to convince is that by leaving, we give al Qaeda a propaganda coup. Yes, we would, and it would be intellectually dishonest to deny that. Any argument for withdrawal needs to take that into account. But by staying and losing, we also give al Qaeda a propaganda coup. And by constantly giving al Qaeda an anti-imperial narrative, we also prevent Muslims and Arabs from recognizing them for what they are: not anti-imperial liberators but theo-fascists.
It's becoming clearer and clearer to me that if we want to win this long war, we have to leave Iraq. Sooner rather than later.”

Andrew Sullivan (1963) Journalist, writer, blogger

"Iraq and Gaza, Ctd" http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/06/iraq_and_gaza_c.html, The Daily Dish (14 June 2007)

War , Home , Sense

“The European discovery rather than Aboriginal occupation constitutes Australia's pre-history. Australia - its economy, society and polity - is a construction of European civilisation. Australia did not exist when traditional Aborigines occupied the continent. Aborigines have been participants in Australian history, but that story begins with all the others in 1788.”

John Hirst (1942–2016) Australian historian

Sense and Nonsense in Australian History (2005)

History

“From the beginning while we were engaged in these issues, I said in interviews with those who came from abroad, even in Najaf or Paris or among my personal words, I have always said that clerics have an occupation which is more important than these executive jobs, and should Islam become victorious, clerics would dedicate themselves to their own occupation. But as we went on with the revolution, we found out that if we tell all clerics to go after their mosques, this country would fall into the throat of America and Soviet Union. We experienced and saw, those who took the lead but were not clerics, even though some of them were religious people, our revolutionary path was not according to their taste, therefore… we temporarily deviate from our original word until this country could be administered by those other than clerics, then clerics will go back to their preach and their own position and they will leave executive matters to others who work for Islam.”

Ruhollah Khomeini (1902–1989) Religious leader, politician

Imam's Sahife. vol. 16, p. 349,350. (21 June 1982)
Foreign policy

People , Victory , Personality , Country

“In primitive society, where uniformity of occupation is the rule, and the distribution of the community into various classes of workers has hardly begun, every man is more or less his own magician; he practices charms and incantations for his own good and the injury of his enemies.”

James Frazer book The Golden Bough

Source: The Golden Bough (1890), Chapter 5, The Magical Control of the Weather.

Communication

“The labor should include rest breaks so that the worker has time to recover from fatigue. Now one of the very first requirements for a man who is fit to handle pig iron as a regular occupation is that he shall be so stupid and so phlegmatic that he more nearly resembles in his mental make-up the ox than any other type. The man who is mentally alert and intelligent is for this very reason entirely unsuited to what would, for him, be the grinding monotony of work of this character. Therefore the workman who is best suited to handling pig iron is unable to understand the real science of doing this class of work.”

Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856–1915) American mechanical engineer and tennis player

Source: Principles of Scientific Management, 1911, p. 59.

Stupidity , Intelligence , Understanding , Science

“We firmly believe that the withdrawal of occupation forces from Iraq will result in a speedy resolution to most of the problems that country is currently struggling with.”

Gholam-Hossein Elham (1959) Iranian politician

No change in Iran's US policy, Press TV, 2007-07-22, 2007-07-23 http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=17143&sectionid=351020101,

Problem , Country

“Women are never supposed to have any occupation of sufficient importance not to be interrupted, except "suckling their fools "; and women themselves have accepted this, have written books to support it, and have trained themselves so as to consider whatever they do as not of such value to the world or to others, but that they can throw it up at the first "claim of social life." They have accustomed themselves to consider intellectual occupation as a merely selfish amusement, which it is their " duty " to give up for every trifler more selfish than themselves.”

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910) English social reformer and statistician, and the founder of modern nursing

Cassandra (1860)

Life , Women , Books , World

“It is the occupation of a Christian to glorify God.”

Donald Miller (1971) American writer

Prayer and the Art of Volkswagen Maintenance (2000, Harvest House Publishers)

God

“War is a mass phenomenon. To penetrate the basic causes of war, we must discern the factors which have made millions of people abandon their habitual modes of life, their occupations, and their moral concepts to participate in murder and destruction. We should therefore put greater stress upon the simple conscious and. subconscious impulses which rule the behavior of the masses.”

Eugene M. Kulischer (1881–1956) American sociologist

Source: Europe on the Move: War and Population Changes, 1917-1947, 1948, p. 3

Life , War , People , Behavior

“Optimism is an occupational hazard of programming: feedback is the treatment.”

Kent Beck (1961) software engineer

Source: Extreme Programming Explained (2000), p. 31

Optimism

“This planet is haunted by us; the other occupants just evade boredom by filling our skies and seas with monsters.”

John A. Keel book The Mothman Prophecies

The Mothman Prophecies (1976)

Sea

“The fraction of Americans working in occupations concerned primarily with information has increased from 20 to nearly 50 percent of the work force.”

Edward O. Wilson book On Human Nature

On Human Nature (1978), Ch.4 Emergence

“Jahangir, when a prince, at one time intended demolishing some of the Hindu temples at Banaras but desisted there from on Man Singh's intervention. In his reign conversions to Islam were encouraged, conversions back from Islam to Hinduism were punished. When he visited Kangra, he celebrated the Muslim occupation of the fort by desecrating its famous temple. At Pushkar he broke the image of Varaha and a bull was sacrificed to signify the victory of Islam over idolatry.”

Jahangir (1569–1627) 4th Mughal Emperor

Lal, K. S. (1999). Theory and practice of Muslim state in India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan. Chapter 2

Time , Victory

“The Arab world has seen elections before. However, virtually all of them were artificial affairs, their outcomes never in doubt. They were in the end celebrations of one version or another of autocracy, never a repudiation of them. That kind of state-management is not what has just taken place in Iraq. Millions of people actually made choices, and placed claims on those who will lead them in the future. To act upon one's own world like this, and on such a scale, is what politics in the purest sense is all about. It is why we all, once upon a time, became activists. And it is infectious. The taste of freedom is a hard memory to rub out. No wonder the political and intellectual elites of the Arab world are so worried, and no wonder they were so hostile to everything that happened in Iraq since the overthrow of the Saddam regime. They had longed for failure. They trotted out the tired old formulas of anti-Americanism to impart legitimacy to the so-called Iraqi "resistance to American occupation." But the people of Iraq have put an end to all that. En masse, ordinary people took to the streets in the second great Iraqi revolt against the politics of barbarism exemplified by Abu Musab al Zarqawi's immortal words: "We have declared a bitter war against the principle of democracy and all those who seek to enact it."”

Kanan Makiya (1949) American orientalist

"The Shiite Obligation", Wall Street Journal (February 7, 2005)

Hostility , War , People , World

“With respect to animal diet, let it be considered, that taking away the lives of animals, in order to convert them into food, does great violence to the principles of benevolence and compassion. This appears from the frequent hard-heartedness and cruelty found amongst those persons whose occupations engage them in destroying animal life, as well as from the uneasiness which others feel in beholding the butchery of animals.”

David Hartley (philosopher) book Observations on Man

Observations on Man (1749; 6th edition, 1834), Part II, Chapter III, Section II.

Life , Food , Feeling , Appearance

“It is a country (Israel) in which a clear majority of the population, battered by wars and terrorism and heartbreak and frustration, still wants to see negotiations leading to a Palestinian state alongside Israel, and an end to occupation.”

Bradley Burston israeli journalist

What Does 'Death to Israel' Mean to You? (2011)

War , Country

“The most foreign fighters in Iraq are wearing British and American uniforms. The level of self-delusion is bordering frankly on the racist. The vast majority of the people of Iraq are against the occupation of Iraq by the American and British forces.”

George Galloway (1954) British politician, broadcaster, and writer

David Usborne, " Hitchens vs Galloway: The big debate http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article312968.ece", The Independent, September 16, 2005

During a debate with Christopher Hitchens, September 14, 2005

People

“They've worked out elaborate charts classifying all intellectual occupations and interests, with the methods and materials and tools, and especially the goals—the aims, the ideals, the moral purposes—that are suited to each of them. Really tremendous! Why, a musician or an engineer, for example, could look at his chart and tell accurately whether he was progressing fast enough, at his age, and if not, just what his trouble was, and the remedy.”

Sinclair Lewis book Arrowsmith

Arrowsmith (1925), Ch. 40

Age

“The longwall method [can be] regarded as a technological system expressive of the prevailing outlook of mass-production engineering and as a social structure consisting of the occupational roles that have been institutionalized in its use.”

Eric Trist (1909–1993) British scientist

Source: "Some Social and Psychological Consequences of the Long Wall Method of Coal-Getting", 1951, p. 5

“Unless the Arab states give Israel formal recognition, within secure, recognised and mutually agreed boundaries, as a permanent feature of the geography and politics of the Middle East. But if Israel is to obtain this recognition, she must, in a settlement, put an end to the territorial occupation which she has maintained since the war of 1967; the nine members of the European Community have declared that this is an essential element in a settlement. On behalf of the British Government I underline that need today.”

Anthony Crosland (1918–1977) British politician

Speech to the UN General Assembly (5 October 1976).

War , Communication

“Train any population rationally, and they will be rational. Furnish honest and useful employments to those so trained, and such employments they will greatly prefer to dishonest or injurious occupations. It is beyond all calculation the interest of every government to provide that training and that employment; and to provide both is easily practicable.”

Robert Owen (1771–1858) Welsh social reformer

A New View of Society (1813-1816)

Training

“In this unexpected scenario, the UFO occupants -- despite their obvious technological superiority -- are desperate for both human genetic material and the ability to feel human emotions -- particularly maternal emotions. Unlikely though it may seem, it is possible that the very survival of these extraterrestrials depends upon their success in absorbing chemical and psychological properties received from human abductees.”

Budd Hopkins (1931–2011) American UFO researcher, painter and sculptor

Source: Intruders: The Incredible Visitations at Copley Woods (1987), p. 190

Feeling , Success , Maternity , Dependency

“The real reason for his attitude lay deeper. Essentially, Gloucester and the barons of his party were opposed to peace because they felt war to be their occupation. Behind them were the poorer knights and squires and archers of England, who, unconcerned with rights or wrongs, were “inclined to war such as had been their livelihood.””

Barbara W. Tuchman book A Distant Mirror

Source: A Distant Mirror (1978), p. 490

War , Peace

“So long as the figures 'now superseded' and the academic projections based upon them held sway, it was possible for politicians to shrug their shoulders. With so much of immediate and indisputable importance on their hands, why should they attend to what was forecast for the end of the century, when most of them would be not only out of office but dead and gone? … It was not for them to heed the cries of anguish from those of their own people who already saw their towns being changed, their native places turned into foreign lands, and themselves displaced as if by a systematic colonisation. For these the much vaunted compassion of the parties and politicians was not available: the parties and the politicians preferred to be busy making speeches on race relations; and if any of their number dared to tell them the truth, even less than the whole truth, about what was happening and what would happen here in England, they denounced them as racialist and turned them out of doors. They could feel safe; for they said in their hearts: 'If trouble comes, it will not be in our time; let the next generation see to it!' … The explosive which will blow us asunder is there and the fuse is burning, but the fuse is shorter than had been supposed. The transformation which I referred to earlier as being without even a remote parallel in our history, the occupation of the hearts of this metropolis and of towns and cities across England by a coloured population amounting to millions, this before long will be past denying. It is possible that the people of this country will, with good or ill grace, accept what they did not ask for, did not want and were not told of. My own judgment— it is a judgment which the politician has a duty to form to the best of his ability— I have not feared to give: it is— to use words I used two years and a half ago— that 'the people of England will not endure it'.”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

Speech to the Carshalton and Banstead Young Conservatives at Carshalton Hall (15 February 1971), from Still to Decide (Eliot Right Way Books, 1972), pp. 202-203.
1970s

People , Truth , Fear , Feeling

“If I used to ask myself, over a coffin, "what good did it do the occupant to be born?" I now put the same question about anyone alive.”

Emil M. Cioran book The Trouble With Being Born

The Trouble With Being Born (1973)

Question

“Man in the electronic age has no possible environment except the globe and no possible occupation except information-gathering.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

1990s and beyond, "The Agenbite of Outwit" (1998)

Age

“You know, the whole American culture is going down the drain, you can't turn on a television set and see anything, or walk in the street and not find garbage, or neighborhoods that were formerly beautiful now have McDonald's in them, and it's all a part of an enormous degeneration of culture in the United States. People that exist in that culture are forced to make moral decisions all the time about their lives, their occupations, their love-lives, and they make decisions that are commensurate with what's happening to them in this culture, and it's too bad that that's happening because that's what Manhattan is about, that New York used to be such a great city, so wonderful, and it has to fight every day for its survival against the encroachment of all this terrible ugliness that is gradually overcoming all the big cities in America.
This ugliness comes from a culture that has no spiritual center, a culture that has money and education, but no sense of being at peace with the world, no sense of purpose in life. They don't know what they're doing, or why they're here. They have no religious center, they have no philosophical center, and so they act, they do what's expedient at the moment. They have no long view of society. They only have the view of quick money, and kill the pain of the moment, and so instead of dealing with the real problems that exist, that are complicated, they sweep them under the rug by turning on the television set, or taking cocaine, or doing many things that enable them to escape confrontation with the unpleasant realities of the world.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

[Allen, Woody, France Roche, Woody Allen, ou L'Anhedoniste; le Plus Drole du Monde, New York, 1979, France 2, 05 January 2013]
Others

Love , Life , Money , Pain

“I do not believe that art must develop on national lines, but I am convinced that there never was and never will be an international art. There is and was French, German, Italian, and Flemish art. But I deny those specific definitions so fashionable with adepts of fascism which make of every country an hermetic cell from which all foreign artists are excluded. [shortly after the end of the German occupation]”

Ossip Zadkine (1890–1967) French sculptor

quote, New York, early 1944; as cited in: Artists on Art – from the 14th – 20th centuries, ed. Robert Goldwater and Marco Treves; Pantheon Books, 1972, London, p. 430
1940 - 1960

Art , Fashion , Country