Milos Forman Quotes

Churchill knew instinctively what was wrong with communism - that it repressed liberty; that it replaced individual discretion with state control; that it entailed the curtailment of democracy, and therefore that it was tyrannous.

To trample democracy with one’s feet and to give power to a single man over almost eighty million people is so terrible that one can very probably tremble over the events which will come here.

Even if the country is run by a Mussolini, free speech will find its way.

Totalitarianism, if not fought against, could triumph anywhere.

No society has gone the way of gulags or concentration camps by following the path of Spinoza and Einstein and Jefferson and Thomas Paine

Dictatorship naturally arises out of democracy, and the most aggravated form of tyranny and slavery out of the most extreme liberty.

I lived under the Nazis and under the Communists.

I am a witness to nations and people deprived of their freedom. I was there. I watched that great Iron Curtain drop around nations which formerly had prized their freedom - good people. I was aghast as these were written off by the stroke of a pen.

I fear that, tired of anarchy, you may hope at the end for a return of oppression and that you may welcome the yoke of the first fortunate adventurer who shows up, who, far from consolidating your destiny, will only prolong your servitude

No matter how hard we may try to revive Democracy, to help her once more stand on her legs, to breathe life into her, all efforts will be futile. All hopes for a victory of democracy over fascism are the crassest illusions.

The ultimate failures of dictatorship cost humanity far more than the temporary failures of democracy.

There is a very long history of oppression in the Arab world, particularly in the states he mentions: Iran, Iraq, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, as well as in Sudan and Tunisia. These regimes are not based on democracy and their legitimacy comes from military dictatorships or inherited systems. The basic right of an individual to voice his or her opinion is not granted in any kind of form in the Arab world.

The more a regime claims to be the embodiment of liberty the more tyrannical it is likely to be.

... a step in the direction of tyranny.

There is no such thing as a liberal dictatorship, because a dictator just cannot afford to be liberal.

A global government would almost by definition abusive. As someone who escaped from Communist government, how would I escape from global government.

No truly sophisticated proponent of repression would be stupid enough to shatter the facade of democratic institutions.

There's nothing to fear. I'm not a dictator.

Modern tyrants are terror managers. Do not allow your shock to be turned against your freedom.

In their efforts to discredit human freedom, the Putinites denounce the sins that may occur under the reign of liberty with the same ardor, the same sincerity, and the same purpose that animated their Soviet forebears.

Americans are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism, or communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn from their experience.

I grew up under a dictatorship. I knew what it meant for people to not have the ability to freely express themselves.

Once you get a tyranny, you don't easily get rid of it. Much better to remember about eternal vigilance.

I lived in countries that had no democracy... so I don't find myself in the same luxury as you do. You grew up in freedom, and you can spit on freedom because you don't know what it is not to have freedom.

A democratic despotism is like a theocracy: it assumes its own correctness.