False Altruism Quotes

Most people who offer their help do it to make themselves feel better, not us. To be honest, I don't blame them. It's superstition: If you give assistance to the family in need... if you throw salt over your shoulder... if you don't step on the cracks, then maybe you'll be immune. Maybe you'll be able to convince yourself that this could never happen to you.

The rich world likes and wishes to believe that someone, somewhere, is doing something for the Third World. For this reason, it does not inquire too closely into the motives or practices of anyone who fulfills, however vicariously, this mandate.

We are never so generous as when giving advice.

The most popular form of altruism is giving to others the advice you cannot use yourself.

It's always disappointing to come across phony do-gooders. And it's easy to scoff at celebrities working in war zones.

The biggest pests are the people who use altruism as an alibi. What they passionately wish is to make themselves important.

It is easy to be conspicuously 'compassionate' if others are being forced to pay the cost.

Charity is false, futile, and poisonous when offered as a substitute for justice.

We are so happy to advise others that occasionally we even do it in their interest.

She's generous to a fault - if it's her own.

I have sometimes thought that there is no being so venomous, so bloodthirsty as a professed philanthropist.

It is easy to be lenient at other people's expense, and call it generosity of mind.

Those who show pity and are always ready to help during times of trouble are seldom the same ones who rejoice in our joy: when others are happy they have nothing to do, they become superfluous and lose their feeling of superiority, and so they easily show their displeasure.

Remember, imperialism is always presented as humanitarian: the white man's burden, the cross going round the world, the poor benighted natives, the sun never sets. . . So you have to be very careful about humanitarianism.

The terrible immoralities are the cunning ones hiding behind masks of morality, such as exploiting people while pretending to help them.

There are philanthropists who, incapable of managing their own little affairs, take upon themselves those of the whole world; but as their creditors always outnumber their disciples, they owe humanity more than she will ever owe them.

What seems to be generosity is often no more than disguised ambition, which overlooks a small interest in order to secure a great one.

What is meant by charity? Charity is not fundamental. It is really helping on the misery of the world, not eradicating it. One looks for name and fame and covers his efforts to obtain them with the enamel of charity and good works. He is working for himself under the pretext of working for others. Every so-called charity is an encouragement of the very evil it claims to operate against.

There is perhaps no sort of self more subject to dangerous egotism than that which deludes itself with the notion that it is not a self at all, but something else. It is well to beware of persons who believe that the cause, the mission, the philanthropy, the hero, or whatever it may be that they strive for, is outside of themselves, so that they feel a certain irresponsibility, and are likely to do things which they would recognize as wrong if done in behalf of an acknowledged self.

If tempted by something that feels 'altruistic,' examine your motives and root out that self-deception. Then, if you still want to do it, wallow in it!

Beware of sentimental alliances where the consciousness of good deeds is the only compensation for noble sacrifices.