Barack Obama Quotes

That's what we're missing. We're missing argument. We're missing debate. We're missing colloquy. We're missing all sorts of things. Instead, we're accepting.

Debate is so much better than denial.

And I think both the left and the right should celebrate people who have different opinions, and disagree with them, and argue with them, and differ with them, but don't just try to shut them up.

In the midst of fighting there is no place for public debate.

You have not converted a man because you have silenced him.

Be calm in arguing; for fierceness makes error a fault, and truth discourtesy.

Discourse has ended in America. It's all just shouting and ranting and demonization. Do you know how the rest of the world laughs at you guys? Have you got any idea? They're just rocking with laughter night and day.

To disagree, one doesn't have to be disagreeable.

A living museum must surely see itself as a locus of argument. A breathing art institution is not a lockup but a moveable feast.

We are a country that does better when we do debate and air our differences.

We can calm down our argument a little so that we can learn what it is that we are actually arguing about.

I think, in any debate, you have to respect the other person's point of view, if you agree or disagree.

If you disagree with me about a position I have taken, or what I've done, tell me, argue with me, debate. Sometimes, right and good are not that clear; at other times, it is only deliberate and respectful debate that leads us to understand what road we should take.

There is no civil discourse left and it is really sad.

In Washington, there is a way to have disagreements and debates, which is so healthy, but a way to be friends at the end of the day, which I believe is the essence of America.

Whenever people speak, you give the opposition the opportunity to use those words as they see fit.

We ought to be able to talk about ideas, we ought to be able to debate ideas because that's how you get to consensus and that's how you move this country forward and that's how you move this state forward. We do a better job of it in Iowa. We do.

I just hope we can find our way back to engaging with one another, arguing strongly with one another, and then going down and having a root beer together or something and - and having a good laugh about it as we work together for the best interests of the next generation of Americans who are going to inherit this country.

Democracy feeds on argument, on the discussion as to the right way forward. This is the reason why respecting the opinion of others belongs to democracy.

Public discourse requires making an argument for a point of view, not having an argument - as in having a fight.

I think we should be very clear on this. You know, this country was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment... It was the idea that people could talk, reason, have dialogue, discuss the issues. It wasn't founded on the idea that someone would get struck by a divine inspiration and know everything right from wrong. I mean, people who founded this country had religion, they had strong beliefs, but they believed in reason, in dialogue, in civil discourse. We can't lose that in this country. We've got to get it back.

I've always wondered if people who block each other from expressing their opinions do so because they have so little confidence in their own. To me, encountering an opposing point of view is a chance to gain a deeper understanding of the issues at stake and develop my own point of view. But the first thing you've got to do is you've got to let people speak and you've got to listen. And that's what the first amendment is all about. That's what really distinguishes this country from others.

I don't mind people trying to pick apart my policies, and that's fine and that's fair game. But, you know, I don't think we're serving our nation well by allowing the discourse to become so uncivil that people use words that they shouldn't be using.

We sometimes talk about democracy as if it’s just about voting, and the stuff that happens in legislatures. But, at its core, liberal democracy is a series of concrete human encounters: persuasion, argument, negotiation, compromise. It’s one viewpoint encountering a bunch of other viewpoints in hopes of finding some positive way forward. For liberal democracy to function, we must be able to understand one another to some degree, to see one another’s viewpoints, to project respect across difference and disagreement.

Progressive culture’s substitution of nastiness for persuasion and argument has robbed America of the incisive commentary of which intelligent progressives would otherwise be capable. Progressives got addicted to the power of cancel culture — their seemingly invincible H-bomb — and when it stopped working they just didn’t know what else to do, because they had forgotten everything they used to do in the time before Twitter.