Utopian Quotes - Page 3

• It is clear that several countries, in the Balkans for example, need to be considered countries of safe origin. But others like, in my opinion, Eritrea, undoubtedly need to be considered a country of origin with a valid claim to asylum. And with a third group of states, like Nigeria for example, each individual case needs to be evaluated. Then there are also very controversial cases like Afghanistan. In any case, united European action is needed. This argument for Europeanization may sound utopian, but there is no alternative.

  Paolo Gentiloni

  Country, Alternatives, Eritrea

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• It isn't humanly possible for the things radical leftists want to bring about the desired results that they choose. They claim they want a utopian happiness, and they are further and further away from it the more successful they are.

  Rush Limbaugh

  Successful, Want, Claims

  "The Pope: Trump’s Not a Christian". "The Rush Limbaugh Show", www.rushlimbaugh.com. February 18, 2016.

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• Lagos was the ultimate dysfunctional city - but actually, in terms of all the initiatives and ingenuity, it mobilised an incredibly beautiful, almost utopian landscape of independence and agency.

  Rem Koolhaas

  Beautiful, Agency, Cities

  "'Lagos shows how a city can recover from a deep, deep pit': Rem Koolhaas talks to Kunlé Adeyemi". Interview with Chris Michael, www.theguardian.com. February 26, 2016.

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• What we are expecting, after 2012, is a one hundred more times, more harmonious, Utopian world, where things like, time travel, levitation, instant telepathy, instant healing, telekinesis are as common and as everyday, as breathing. And I look forward to that time ...I see a very, very positive future coming.

  David Wilcock

  Healing, Breathing, Everyday

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• All ideas advanced to deal with the Florentine noise problem, the Florentine traffic problem, are Utopian, and nobody believes in them, just as nobody believed in Machiavelli's Prince, a Utopian image of the ideally self-interested despot.

  Mary McCarthy

  Believe, Self, Ideas

  Mary McCarthy (2016). “The Stones of Florence”, p.18, Pickle Partners Publishing

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• In contrast to the asexual chasteness of official communist art , Nazi art is both prurient and idealizing. A utopian aesthetics (physical perfection; identity as a biological given) implies an ideal eroticism: sexuality converted into the magnetism of leaders and the joy of followers. The fascist ideal is to transform sexual energy into a "spiritual" force, for the benefit of the community.

  Susan Sontag

  Spiritual, Art, Perfection

  Susan Sontag (1983). “A Susan Sontag reader”, Vintage

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• If utopian fiction became the new trend, I wouldn't read it.

  Veronica Roth

  Fiction, Trends, Ifs

  "Divergent Author Veronica Roth Imagines Terrible Utopian Fiction" by Sabrina Rojas Weiss, December 2, 2011.

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• You need a prince to make a town in an intellectual sense. Developers want to make money. If they cared about architecture, they'd become architects. I've had so many projects that never came off because they had no sponsor, and not because they were utopian. I just want to build a town that's normal.

  Leon Krier

  Intellectual, Needs, Want

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• These inventors were elevating the formulation of entrepreneurial ideas to the status of a visionary activity. Though forced to justify their efforts in the pragmatic language of venture capital, they were at heart utopian thinkers intent on transforming the world.

  Alain de Botton

  Heart, Ideas, Effort

  "The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work". Book by Alain de Botton, 2009.

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• We live in a world in which the only utopian visions arrive in commercial breaks: magical visions of an impossibly hospitable world, peopled by bright-eyed attractive men, women, children... Where nobody dies... In my worlds people died. And I thought that was honest. I thought I was being honest.

  Neil Gaiman

  Children, Writing, Men

  "Signal to Noise". Book by Neil Gaiman, 1992.

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• True Americanism is practical idealism. Its aims, instead of being materialistic and mechanical, are idealistic to the point of being Utopian. In this way, the U.S. can provide and express ideals that strike a chord in humans everywhere - a declaration of independence on behalf of all the peoples of the world.

  Maurice Saatchi

  Independence, World, Way

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• Only utopian liberals could be surprised that the Nazis were art connoisseurs.

  Camille Paglia

  Art, Nazi, Connoisseur

  Camille Paglia (1990). “Sexual Personae”, p.45, Yale University Press

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• Books are surviving in this intense, fragmented, hyper-accelerated present, and my sense and hope is that things will slow down again and people will want more time for a contemplative life. There is no way people can keep up this pace. No one is happy. Two or three hours to read should not be an unattainable thing, although I hope we get to that stage without needing a corporate sponsored app to hold our hand. The utopian in me has my fingers crossed that we haven't quite figured out the digital future just yet. After all, the one thing we know about people: they always surprise.

  Junot Diaz

  Book, Contemplative Life, Hands

  "Junot Díaz: a life in books" by Nicholas Wroe, www.theguardian.com. August 31, 2012.

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• Around 1967 I began backing away from dogmatic Leninism, not so much because I thought it was false, I just decided there was nothing utopian about it.

  Henry Flynt

  Backing Away, Dogmatic, Decided

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• Money has always been a particular problem for revolutionaries and anti-capitalists. What will money look like 'after the revolution'? How will it function? Will it exist at all? It's hard to answer the question if you don't know what money actually is. Proposing to eliminate it entirely seems utopian and naive.

  David Graeber

  Looks, Answers, Revolution

  "Note worthy: what is the meaning of money?" by David Graeber, www.theguardian.com. December 16, 2011.

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• Political thought in France is either nostalgic or Utopian.

  Raymond Aron

  Political, France, Nostalgic

  Raymond Aron (2011). “The Opium of the Intellectuals”, p.31, Transaction Publishers

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• Propaganda requires a permanent network of communication so that it can systematically stifle reflection with emotive or utopian slogans. Its pace is usually fast.

  John Berger

  Communication, Reflection, Pace

  "The beginning of history" by John Berger, www.theguardian.com. August 24, 2004.

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• I think of an intellectual as just being bookish, being interested in history books, utopian ideas, that kind of thing.

  Richard Rorty

  Book, Thinking, Ideas

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• Paradise A concept embraced by almost every culture. A land of peace and harmony. Some say it doesn't belong to the earth, that there is no Shangri-la, no utopian wilderness for the living.

  Ellen Hopkins

  Land, Culture, Earth

  Ellen Hopkins (2013). “Perfect”, p.577, Simon and Schuster

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• When the perfect order prevails, the world is like a home shared by all. Leaders are capable and virtuous. Everyone loves and respects their own parents and children as well as the parents and children of others. The old are cared for, adults have jobs, children are nourished and educated. There is a means of support for all those who are disabled or find themselves alone in the world. Everyone has an appropriate role to play in the family and society. Devotion to public duty leaves no place for idleness. Scheming for ill gain is unknown. Sharing displaces selfishness and materialism.

  Confucius

  Inspirational, Motivational, Jobs

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• One can imagine a sane, healthy, cheerful human society based on no more than the principles of common sense, as validated each day by work, play, and living experience. But this remains the most utopian and fantastic of ideals.

  Edward Abbey

  Play, Common Sense, Healthy

  Edward Abbey (2015). “A Voice Crying in the Wilderness”, p.21, RosettaBooks

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• I know it's very idealistic and utopian, but I believe we need to just let everyone not be judged in terms of religion, groups or nations or region.

  Shahrukh Khan

  Believe, Groups, Needs

  "Shah Rukh Khan: 'My job is to make people smile'" by Grace Wong, www.cnn.com. March 1, 2010.

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• I have enjoyed the success my work has brought me. Some might say I haven't really struggled to be successful. I think it is my perspective that is utopian. My state of mind is positive and peaceful. And I dare to dream.

  Vidya Balan

  Dream, Successful, Thinking

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• In this branch of utopian real estate, architecture is no longer the art of designing buildings so much as the brutal skyward extrusion of whatever site the developer has managed to assemble.

  Rem Koolhaas

  Art, Real, Design

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• Socialist thought owes its appeal to the young largely to its visionary character; the very courage to indulge in Utopian thought is in this respect a source of strength for socialism which traditional liberalism sadly lacks. Speculation about general principles provides an opportunity for the play of the imagination of those who are unencumbered by much knowledge of the facts of present-day life. Their ideas suffer from inherent contradictions, and any attempt to put them into practice must produce something utterly different from what they expect.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Philosophy, Character, Opportunity

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