Molly Ivins Quotes

You are welcoming to everyone when you're a liberal. You do not have a small mind.

I think my politics are just inclined to be empathetic and humanistic. I grew up with so many different kinds of people with different politics, different religion, no religion, no politics, education, no education, and I was infatuated with all of them.

The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the minds of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interests alongside its own without bias; the spirit of liberty remembers that not even a sparrow falls to earth unheeded; the spirit of liberty is the spirit of Him who, near two thousand years ago, taught mankind that lesson it has never learned, but has never quite forgotten; that there may be a kingdom where the least shall be heard and considered side by side with the greatest.

Liberals can understand everything, but people who don’t understand them.

Liberals stand for tolerance, magnanimity, community spirit, the defense of the weak against the powerful, love of learning, freedom of belief, art and poetry, city life, the very things that make life worth dying for. Conservatives stand for tax cuts … and use of the tax refund to buy a gun and an attack dog to take with you when you drive your all-terrain vehicle through the barriers of Republicanville.

Guess what this liberal would be all about? This liberal would be about socializing.

You have to look beyond your known limited experience. Politics should be based on compassion.

I love my right-wing friends, my practical friends, my bleeding heart friends - without all of these viewpoints, life would be pretty boring.

Liberals allow right-wingers on their platforms to have a 'civilized discussion,' but there's no reasoning with racists. I don't want them to have a platform that humanizes them. I want to talk down to them and meet them exactly where they are, with absolutely no respect.

We should all be allies to ideas or people or initiatives that we don't necessarily have a real knowledge in.

If we're constantly giving every one of our allies the woke test instead of inviting them to be more woke, we're doomed. You can be the most woke person of all time and be alone.

I am a universalist, passionately devoted to the cause of equality within the human family.

I have friends who are black, white, purple, gay, straight, Martian, yellow, old, and young. I have friends who are animals and a few who I believe to be robots. All of them are people to me. In my mind, it's not about what you look like or what you do; it's about who you are inside.

I'm fairly conservative on social issues, but not extremely conservative and not reactionary.

I will stand strong to defend people even if I don't agree with them.

We need a type of patriotism that recognizes the virtues of those who are opposed to us.

No human trait deserves less tolerance in everyday life, and gets less, than intolerance.

Brattleboro is a very small town, but it's pretty liberal.

I am committed to examining my feelings and will recognize, appreciate and respect the differences among people in our society.

Tolerance is not really a lived virtue; it's more of a cerebral ascent.

My family was very, very receptive to all; all races, religions.

LA can be a very open and accepting creative environment. But it is important, because there is this odd separation here, it is important to make your kids mindful of other people and other people's plight.

I always thought of myself as a moderate liberal, a fighter for peace and justice. I never thought of myself as being all that far out.

I think what's important is to give space to the range of human experience.

I'm very much a humanist. I'm very much pro-choice. I'm very much politically correct.