Cynical Quotes - Page 13

• I'm a realist all the way. I'm too cynical to be an optimist. But I've lived too much of a charmed life so far to ever be a pessimist.

  Anthony Jeselnik

  Too Much, Way, Realist

  "Comedian Anthony Jeselnik: 'He's The Best!' - Everybody". Interview with David Dean, www.serialoptimist.com. November 29, 2010.

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• Africa is never the same to anyone who leaves it and returns again. It is not a land of change, but it is a land of moods and its moods are numberless. It is not fickle, but because it has mothered not only men, but races, and cradles not only cities, but civilizations - and seen them die, and seen new ones born again - Africa can be dispassionate, indifferent, warm, or cynical, replete with the weariness of too much wisdom.

  Beryl Markham

  Men, Race, Land

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• People tend to become cynical about even the most appalling crisis if it seems to be dragging on, failing to come to term.

  Susan Sontag

  People, Failing, Impatience

  Antonin Artaud, Susan Sontag (1976). “Antonin Artaud, Selected Writings”, p.17, Univ of California Press

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• we know that our world is corrupt and diseased but we're tired of being cynical and feeling helpless. What the hell, tilt at a windmill.

  Cynthia Heimel

  Tired, Our World, Feelings

  Cynthia Heimel (2004). “Get Your Tongue Out of My Mouth, I'm Kissing You Good-bye”

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• I don't think there's any intrinsic difference between a lover and a husband. ... If I were cynical, I would say that a woman should have both a good husband and a lover. But I'm not cynical so I'll just say that a woman should have a lover who's a good husband and a husband who's a good lover, perhaps both.

  Francoise Sagan

  Husband, Good Love, Thinking

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• No one is more romantic than a cynic. I do think that you don't become cynical or 'unsentimental' unless there's a core of romanticism or sentiment that's had a few chips nicked into it.

  Nora Ephron

  Thinking, Romance, Chips

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• ... some veil between childhood and the present is necessary. If the veil is withdrawn, the artistic imagination sickens and dies, the prophet looks in the mirror with a disillusioned and cynical sneer, the scientist goes fishing.

  Margaret Mead

  Mirrors, Fishing, Imagination

  Margaret Mead (1975). “Male and female: a study of the sexes in a changing world”, William Morrow & Co

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• Of late, attempts have been made in the USA - at a high level and in a rather cynical form - to play the "Chinese card" against the USSR. This is a shortsighted and dangerous policy.

  Leonid Brezhnev

  Play, Usa, Chinese

  "Peace, Détente, and Soviet-American Relations: A Collection of Public Statements". Book by Leonid Brezhnev, p. 222, 1979.

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• This notion that's peddled by the religious right - that they are oppressed is not true. Sometimes it's a cynical ploy to move their agenda ahead. The classic example being that somehow secularists are trying to eliminate Christmas, which strikes me as some kind of manufactured controversy.

  Barack Obama

  Religious, Moving, Trying

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• I have committed myself to joy. I have come to realize that those who make space for joy, those who prefer nothing to joy, those who desire the utter reality, will most assuredly have it. We must not be afraid to announce it to refugees, slum dwellers, saddened prisoners, angry prophets. Now and then we must even announce it to ourselves. In this prison of now, in this cynical and sophisticated age, someone must believe in joy.

  Richard Rohr

  Believe, Reality, Space

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• We can be negative and cynical or we can be charged and hot wored to find a way through it, over it, around it under it.

  Laura Schlessinger

  Attitude, Negative, Hot

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• As well as making friends with yourself, fundamentally one should be cynical and critical. This doesn't mean that you should punish yourself, but you just attack the areas of ego's indulgence. At the same time, you continue the friendship with yourself.

  Chogyam Trungpa

  Mean, Ego, Making Friends

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• I never think I feel cynical in general. Cynical is reality with an alternate spelling. I feel there's a gigantic amount of injustice and overt crime every day in the world, from emotional crimes to international crimes, and it often carries rewards.

  Woody Allen

  Reality, Emotional, Thinking

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• No man in his heart is quite so cynical as a well-bred woman.

  W. Somerset Maugham

  Heart, Men, Cynicism

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• I don't think it's ever easy to be funny. I find it easy to amuse myself with a certain sort of cynical dark humor that tends toward the meaner side, like my character in Happy Gilmore. Those kinds of characters come easily to me.

  Ben Stiller

  Character, Dark, Thinking

  Source: www.interviewmagazine.com

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• I'm going to work with Dan Clowes. After Charlie Kaufman, it's hard to fill up the gap. It's hard to find somebody who... A lot of writers, I can clearly see the desire of succeeding before the desire of expressing themselves. Sometimes people get upset when you want to be different. You were talking about "whimsical," which is a nice word. But sometimes they use the word "quirky" in the pejorative sense. I get frustrated, because they feel like I'm doing whatever I want, and there is no ground, and I don't really care. They feel it's cynical. But I don't think I have any cynicism in me.

  Michel Gondry

  Nice, Thinking, People

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• I will never be cynical again about people.

  Dick Ebersol

  People

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• EMILY's List has worked a lot with swing women voters over the years, and one thing we've learned is that they are very cynical about politics and politicians. They very much want help with the challenges facing them and their families, and they feel like most politicians don't understand or want to lift a finger to help them out.

  Ellen Malcolm

  Swings, Years, Challenges

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• You know, the cynicism that is in the politics, it is not for my soul. It makes me - out of me, an extremely bitter, cynical person that I hate to see in the mirror, really.

  Marjane Satrapi

  Hate, Mirrors, Soul

  "Marjane Satrapi: 'A Real Love Story Has To Finish Bad'". Interview with Scott Simon, www.krvs.org. August 18, 2012.

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• Fulfillment of desire taken to extremes doesn't necessarily make us happy. It tends to make us rather cynical.

  Frederick Lenz

  Inspirational, Taken, Buddhism

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• I think that one of the things that is happening in the so-called "clash of civilizations" is that the confidence that was once obvious in the Western Judeo-Christian tradition has been weakened tremendously. There's a feeling that there's a cynical, corporate layer that's really driving it - one that's ready to compromise - and that the real confident energy around the world is coming from Islam, that the believers take their own faith at face value and with great confidence and in far greater numbers.

  James Toback

  Real, Thinking, Feelings

  Source: www.interviewmagazine.com

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• I think the word 'earnest' kind of has a negative connotation on some level. I think one of the things that's happened is that being cynical is somehow conflated with being sophisticated. I think that's problematic, to say the least.

  Josh Radnor

  Thinking, Negative, Levels

  "Josh Radnor & Elizabeth Olsen Are Okay With Being Earnest In ‘Liberal Arts’". Interview with Christopher Rosen, www.huffingtonpost.com. September 12, 2012.

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• I would say most comedians have a very cynical worldview of the way the world can work. It's almost like if you didn't, you couldn't be a comedian.

  Colin Quinn

  Comedian, World, Way

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• Obama's position on marriage is brazenly cynical.

  David Limbaugh

  Position

  "Unpresidential Plummet". Interview with Kathryn Jean Lopez, www.nationalreview.com. September 2, 2010.

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• It's a fact that children with cancer have higher cure rates than adults with cancer, and I wonder if the reason is their natural, unthinking bravery... Adults know too much about failure; they're more cynical and resigned and fearful.

  Lance Armstrong

  Children, Cancer, Bravery

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