Insidious Quotes

• Partial truths or half-truths are often more insidious than total falsehoods.

  Samuel P. Huntington

  Half, Partial Truth, Falsehood

  Samuel P. Huntington (2004). “Who are We?: The Challenges to America's National Identity”, p.37, Simon and Schuster

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• Fear is an insidious and deadly thing. It can warp judgment, freeze reflexes, breed mistakes. Worse, it's contagious.

  James Stewart

  Fear, Mistake, Judgment

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• Happiness is the most insidious prison of all.

  Alan Moore

  Prison, Vendetta

  "Fictional character: V". "V for Vendetta". Comic book series by Alan Moore, 1982 - 1986.

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• Experience has taught me to believe that, these human beans are the most insidious enemies man, with a tendency to corpulence in advanced life, can possess, though eminently friendly to youth.

  William Banting

  Believe, Men, Enemy

  William Banting (2005). “Letter on Corpulence”, p.46, Cosimo, Inc.

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  I am concerned for the security of our great Nation; not so much because of any threat from without, but because of the insidious forces working from within.

  Douglas MacArthur

  Military, Gun, New World Order

  Douglas MacArthur's speech to the Texas Legislature in Austin (June 13, 1951) as quoted in "General MacArthur Speeches and Reports 1908-1964" edited by Edward T. Imparato (p. 175), June 14, 2000.

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• A human being can survive almost anything, as long as she sees the end in sight!

  Elizabeth Wurtzel

  Depression, Sight, Fog

  Elizabeth Wurtzel (2014). “Prozac Nation: Young and Depressed in America”, p.179, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The television, that insidious beast, that Medusa which freezes a billion people to stone every night, staring fixedly, that Siren which called and sang and promised so much and gave, after all, so little.

  Ray Bradbury

  Night, People, Political

  "The Murderer". Short story by Ray Bradbury, 1953.

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• Only hidden and undetected oratory is really insidious. What reaches the heart without going through the mind is likely to bounce back and put the mind out of business.

  Mortimer Adler

  Heart, Mind, Oratory

  Mortimer J. Adler, Charles Van Doren (2014). “How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading”, p.194, Simon and Schuster

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• We face a hostile ideology global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose and insidious in method.

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Character, Purpose, Faces

  Dwight D. Eisenhower (2006). “The Military-Industrial Complex: With an Introduction by Jesse Smith”, p.24, Basementia Publications

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• Folks, the most insidious part of this whole health care scheme is that all of these vast medical expenditures will become nothing more than government budget items. We individuals will no longer exist. The relationship between a government and citizen will change forever.

  Rush Limbaugh

  Health, Government, Forever

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• Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.

  Louis D. Brandeis

  Freedom, Independent, Men

  Olmstead v. United States (dissenting opinion) (1928)

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• Unfortunately, money in politics is an insidious thing - and a loophole in our campaign finance system was taken advantage of with money going to existing or new 527 groups with the sole purpose of influencing the election.

  Olympia Snowe

  Taken, Groups, Campaigns

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• The plague of racism is insidious, entering into our minds as smoothly and quietly and invisibly as floating airborne microbes enter into our bodies to find lifelong purchase in our bloodstreams.

  Maya Angelou

  Justice, Diversity, Racism

  Maya Angelou (2011). “Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now”, p.57, Bantam

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• And action is the only remedy to indifference, the most insidious danger of all.

  Elie Wiesel

  Action, Indifference, Danger

  Elie Wiesel (2012). “Night”, p.143, Macmillan

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• Freedom's enemies are waste, lethargy, indifference, immorality, and the insidious attitude of something for nothing.

  William Arthur Ward

  Attitude, Enemy, Waste

  William Arthur Ward (1968). “Thoughts of a Christian Optimist: The Words of William Arthur Ward”

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• The surest and most insidious enemy of freedom is not dictatorship, but complacency.

  Natalie Angier

  Enemy, Complacency, Dictatorship

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• Conversation has a kind of charm about it, an insuating and insidious something that elicits secrets from us just like love or liquor.

  Seneca the Younger

  Love, Learning, Knowledge

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• The problem is that white people see racism as conscious hate, when racism is bigger than that. Racism is a complex system of social and political levers and pulleys set up generations ago to continue working on the behalf of whites at other people's expense, whether whites know/like it or not. Racism is an insidious cultural disease. It is so insidious that it doesn't care if you are a white person who likes Black people; it's still going to find a way to infect how you deal with people who don't look like you.

  Scott Woods

  Hate, White, People

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• The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.

  Louis D. Brandeis

  Peace, Freedom, War

  Olmstead v. United States (dissenting opinion) (1928)

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• Love is the best, most insidious, most effective instrument of social repression.

  Rainer Werner Fassbinder

  Love Is, Social, Instruments

  Rainer Werner Fassbinder (1986). “The Marriage of Maria Braun”, p.202, Rutgers University Press

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• Experience teaches us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent.

  Louis D. Brandeis

  Law Courts, Government, Libertarian Party

  Olmstead v. United States (dissenting opinion) (1928)

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• The worst, most insidious effect of censorship is that, in the end, it can deaden the imagination of the people. Where there is no debate, it is hard to go on remembering, every day, that there is a suppressed side to every argument.

  Salman Rushdie

  Death, People, Imagination

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• Indifference to evil is more insidious than evil itself. It is a silent justification affording evil acceptability in society.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Evil, Indifference, Silent

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• I'm concerned about the insidious influence of the media's bad messages that undermine the lessons parents try to instill in their sons and daughters.

  John Ratzenberger

  Mother, Daughter, Son

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• There're many ways, my dear, to victimize people. The most insidious way is to persuade them that they're victims.

  Tom Robbins

  People, Way, Still Life With Woodpecker

  Tom Robbins (2010). “Half Asleep In Frog Pyjamas”, p.306, Random House

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