John Searle Quotes

Leftist ideas are a part of the very atmosphere which American youth breathes.

A liberal is a person who kept an open mind … a person who did not always look backward but would look forward to new possible solutions.

Too many on the Left are earnest about nothing at all, sadly. They've been rendered spineless by snarkiness - not least on Twitter.

I'm comfortable on the progressive side. But I'm still more pitched at fighting the Right than I am about building a progressive platform for the future. It's fair to say that that conversation doesn't interest me as much.

I never liked the status quo. Once I went to college, I got very involved in student activism.

My parents were admirers of President Roosevelt and the New Deal. Their parents and most of our relatives and neighbors were Republicans, so they were self-conscious in their liberalism and took it as emblematic of their ability to think for themselves.

I am an academic, and I have always made it clear that my ultimate home is in the realm of ideas.

If you give me enough questions honestly answered, I can get you to the hollow core of any liberal position.

The culture of rigorous questioning and open discourse at the University of Chicago has opened minds to ideas that have changed the world.

At university, my generation were ready to fight, but we didn't really have anything to fight for.

People are not afraid to be activists, to be vocal. And I think back to my years in college, and that wasn't the case.

I need to get a tiny bit more 'woke.'

I am no Rushdie. The only people who think of silencing me are my students, on days when my lectures are more opaque than usual.

I got into politics when I was 12, back when George H. W. Bush was running against Michael Dukakis. We did a mock election in my social studies class, and I remember how so much of what was thought of as liberal made sense to me.

When I was a UA student, I was given the ultimate runaround when my student group wanted to bring author and activist David Horowitz to speak on campus.

I look at books as being a form of activism. Sometimes they'll show us a side of the world that we might not have known about.

Sociology is really in trouble as a field. I can tell you, because I've known young people who have wanted to go into it, and they have been uniformly advised, if you are a free thinker, stay away from sociology.

Conservatives recognize that college campuses and their frames of reality have an outsized impact on the culture, training the next generation of leaders.

I decided to make a lifetime commitment against social injustices, against inequalities, and that is why I am profoundly from the Left.

I had to read Plato and Kant, and at times I was overwhelmed. But I have always been fearless, and so was Hannah Arendt. She wasn't afraid to speak out when she knew her opinions would not be popular because she believed in the public discourse above all.

A university is supposed to be a place where all ideas are discussed.

As an academic, I value the free exchange of ideas.

I'm liking my role as left-wing is my preferred position.

As a community organizer who holds a degree in history, I understand the fascination with history. However, there is a tendency for many of us to get engrossed in the recounting of our history, which often amounts to purely intellectual activity without material action.

Sometimes it feels as if I major in activism and minor in university.