Savitri Devi Quotes

The press today is an army with carefully organized weapons, the journalists its officers, the readers its soldiers. But, as in every army, the soldier obeys blindly, and the war aims and operating plans change without his knowledge. The reader neither knows nor is supposed to know the purposes for which he is used and the role he is to play. There is no more appalling caricature of freedom of thought. Formerly no one was allowed to think freely; now it is permitted, but no one is capable of it any more. Now people want to think only what they are supposed to want to think, and this they consider freedom.

I will not attack your doctrines nor your creeds if they accord liberty to me. If they hold thought to be dangerous - if they aver that doubt is a crime, then I attack them one and all, because they enslave the minds of men.

It is surely time for men to think for themselves, and to throw off the authority of names so artificially magnified.

I'm plotting revolution against this lie that the majority has a monopoly of the truth. What are these truths that always bring the majority rallying round? Truths so elderly they are practically senile. And when a truth is as old as that, gentlemen, you can hardly tell it from a lie.

Flags are bits of colored cloth that governments use first to shrink-wrap people’s brains and then as ceremonial shrouds to bury the dead. When independent-thinking people (and here I do not include the corporate media) begin to rally under flags, when writers, painters, musicians, film makers suspend their judgment and blindly yoke their art to the service of the “Nation,” it’s time for all of us to sit up and worry.

Reasonable argument is impossible when authority becomes the arbiter.

I often quote Hitler, who said words to the effect of, "Rulers are fortunate that the people do not think." Politicians know this. Even when the public seems to be upset, the politicians know if they can put on a brave face and ride it out, they generally will.

Let must or if be damned with whomever's afraid down with ought with because with every brain which thinks it thinks, nor dares to feel.

Freedom of speech is useless without freedom of thought.

If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to interrogate those who tell us that something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then, we are up for grabs for the next charlatan (political or religious) who comes rambling along.

Always question the authority.

Unquestioning obedience is for slaves, the uneducated and the pathetic.

In mathematics we do not appeal to authority, but rather you are responsible for what you believe.

You shouldn’t blindly accept a leader’s advice. You’ve got to question leaders on occasion.

Free discussion requires an atmosphere unembarrassed by any suggestion of authority or even respect.

When an old and distinguished person speaks to you, listen to him carefully and with respect — but do not believe him. Never put your trust into anything but your own intellect. Your elder, no matter whether he has gray hair or has lost his hair, no matter whether he is a Nobel laureate — may be wrong. The world progresses, year by year, century by century, as the members of the younger generation find out what was wrong among the things that their elders said. So you must always be skeptical — always think for yourself.

I've read too many books to believe what I am told.

What you need is sustained outrage...there's far too much unthinking respect given to authority.

Think for yourself. Know what you're doing. Question authority.

If we can't think for ourselves, if we're unwilling to question authority, then we're just putty in the hands of those in power.

Who shall dispute what the Reviewers say? Their word's sufficient; and to ask a reason, In such a state as theirs, is downright treason.

I think: the powers like to talk about "freedom" in order to wash the population's brains.

The current flows fast and furious. It issues in a spate of words from the loudspeakers and the politicians. Every day they tell us that we are a free people fighting to defend freedom. That is the current that has whirled the young airman up into the sky and keeps him circulating there among the clouds. Down here, with a roof to cover us and a gasmask handy, it is our business to puncture gasbags and discover the seeds of truth.

Intelligence is dangerous. Intelligence means you will start thinking on your own; you will start looking around on your own. You will not believe in the scriptures; you will believe only in your own experience.

The average man's opinions are much less foolish than they would be if he thought for himself.