Richard Dawkins Quotes

It is a privileged school with beautiful buildings in a beautiful setting. But the only justification for privilege is that it should help people develop themselves to the full. We are elitist, but not exclusive. And I'm not in ashamed in the least of being elitist. All that means is aiming at the highest standards you can achieve.

And if we don't have a test, what we may end up doing is going back to what this country has done before. We could use social class and we still do, but in the 50s, it was, do you have the right last name and are your parents in privileged positions?

Those who are able to climb up the ladder will find ways to pull it up after them, or selectively lower it down to allow their friends, allies, and kin to scramble up. In other words: 'Who says meritocracy says oligarchy.'

A meritocracy increases inequality --- by its very nature, it has to.

However energetically society in general may strive to make all the citizens equal and alike, the personal pride of each individual will always make him try to escape from the common level, and he will form some inequality somewhere to his own profit.

The surface of American society is covered with a layer of democratic paint, but from time to time one can see the old aristocratic colors breaking through.

America is a meritocracy.

I believe that Britain is becoming more class-conscious, and I quake at the very idea of Old Etonians ruling the world again.

America thinks of itself as a meritocracy, so people have more respect for success and more contempt for failure.

Language does not make one an elite.

I'm aware of the fact that a lot of talented people out there will never get this chance.

'Plutocracy.' It has a perfect nuance: chilly, inaccessible, icy-rich.

Mitt Romney subscribes to the cynical logic that says the American dream belongs to some of us but not all of us.

Anyone could be in the orchestra, or sports team, or arts club at my school. It was precisely the kind of inclusivity that now meets with a sort of scorn and derision as a prizes-for-all culture that generates only mediocrity. There's something so insulting about the idea that including lots of people means mediocrity.

There are only two classes - first class and no class.

Our democracy may have an aristocracy of talent, as Jefferson said – which is fine – but we don’t want everyone else to be left out. Something like that seems to be happening, though.

There is also an artificial aristocracy founded on wealth and birth, without either virtue or talents;... The artificial aristocracy is a mischievous ingredient in government, and provision should be made to prevent its ascendancy.

In this country there is no rank but rank mutton.

I think the debate around nepotism is futile because I am an outsider and I know that there is no compensation of talent.

Class and the snobbery it provokes still matter far too much in Britain, but we are a far more mobile society than we used to be.

Outside of the family, education is the greatest determinant of social mobility.

Class still matters in Britain today.

I don't campaign for the end of the aristocracy or the upper classes; I don't really want to destroy anything at all. I just want more plurality.

You can't not have feelings about country clubs, whichever side you're on.

And I am interested in the fact that class is very much a factor in America, even though it's not supposed to be.