What's called "liberal" in the intelectual culture means highly conformist to power, but mildly critical.

Students who acquire large debts putting themselves through school are unlikely to think about changing society. When you trap people in a system of debt, they can't afford the time to think.

The general population doesn't know what's happening, and it doesn't even know that it doesn't know.

That's the standard technique of privatization: defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital.

Jingoism, racism, fear, religious fundamentalism: these are the ways of appealing to people if you're trying to organize a mass base of support for policies that are really intended to crush them.

There's a good reason why nobody studies history, it just teaches you too much.

The world is a very puzzling place. If you're not willing to be puzzled, you just become a replica of someone else's mind.

Democratic societies can't force people. Therefore they have to control what they think.

Nobody should have any illusions. The United States has essentially a one-party system and the ruling party is the business party.

If you want to control a population... give them a God to worship.

A language is not just words. It's a culture, a tradition, a unification of a community, a whole history that creates what a community is. It's all embodied in a language.

Vicary had decided he wanted to contribute. He wanted to do something instead of watching the world through his well-guarded window.

Freedom is being allowed to think your own thoughts and live your own life.

There was no need to analyze the feelings that the people caught in the commission of the amorous act, held for each other, for it was literally written in their hands.

Taking joy in life is a woman's best cosmetic.

Some of the smartest people I know are metal fans.

Are you genuine? Or just an actor? A representative? Or what it is that is represented?-In the end, you might merely be someone mimicking an actor ... Second question of conscience.

As he demonstrated with 'Juno' and 'Up in the Air,' Reitman has an uncanny knack among contemporary directors for tapping into the zeitgeist in dramatically satisfying ways.

Know that you are always safe. And also know that it's possible to move from the old to the new, easily and peacefully.

Truly, thoughts are things, and their scope of operation is the world itself.

Meditation is not growth of the ego, it is death of the ego.