Contentious Quotes

• Long stormy spring-time, wet contentious April, winter chilling the lap of very May; but at length the season of summer does come.

  Thomas Carlyle

  Summer, Nature, Spring

  Thomas Carlyle (2014). “The Selected Works of Thomas Carlyle”, p.73, Lulu.com

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• Give no answer to contentious arguments or irresponsible accusations. Let such things "fly out open windows" until they spend themselves.

  Stephen Covey

  Giving, Answers, Argument

  Stephen R. Covey (1992). “Principle Centered Leadership”, p.124, Simon and Schuster

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• Great wisdom is generous; petty wisdom is contentious. Great speech is impassioned, small speech cantankerous.

  Zhuangzi

  Wisdom, Speech, Petty

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• Becoming a mom made me more contentious about expressing my true taste.

  Edie Brickell

  Mom, Taste, Becoming

  "Edie Brickell ready for 'Picture Perfect' comeback". www.today.com. December 31, 2003.

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• The world of American politics is more contentious than it has ever been in my lifetime.

  Chuck Palahniuk

  World, Lifetime, American Politics

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• The scrum and the tackle are the two really contentious areas of the game. If you get those two aspects right, most rugby matches will work in your favour.

  Alan Lewis

  Games, Two, Favour

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• Dare to contend without being contentious. Preserve the truth without hurting people. Love and be charitable.

  Aiden Wilson Tozer

  Hurt, People, Dare

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• You can't assume if you do something contentious that people will be on your side. The moment violence enters the story, the story changes. Then the question is, "How do you face up to violence?" And then you have to have a no-compromise position. And this is quite simply a lesson we learn in the school playground.

  Salman Rushdie

  School, Your Side, People

  Source: www.teachingbooks.net

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• I mean, I went to a Catholic boys school for a year, but that was to play hockey. Religion class was quite contentious for me.

  Keanu Reeves

  Funny, School, Mean

  "Keanu Heads Down Under With 'Constantine'". Associated Press Interview, www.foxnews.com. February 19, 2005.

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• One of the most fruitless, irritating wastes in the world is arguing-the contentious, endless kind of arguing that is akin to quarreling, and causes feuding in families and among friends, and leaves resentful feeling in homes, in hearts, in businesses and professions, and in all kinds of gatherings in public and private places, and in all relationships of life-and with so little that it ever seems to settle!

  Richard L. Evans

  Home, Heart, Feelings

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• Tolerance obviously requires a non-contentious manner of relating toward one another’s differences. But tolerance does not require abandoning one’s standards or one’s opinions on political or public policy choices. Tolerance is a way of reacting to diversity, not a command to insulate it from examination.

  Dallin H. Oaks

  Differences, Diversity, Choices

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• Faithiest resonated with me in many ways-not only because, like Chris, I am a gay former-Christian atheist who still thinks of my religious neighbors as fellow truth-seekers-but also because I deeply appreciated the book's nuanced approach to contentious issues. This is an important contribution to current debates, one which should be read not only for its valuable content but also for its exemplary tone: warm, engaging, optimistic, and humble.

  John Corvino

  Christian, Religious, Atheist

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• Politics in this country [USA] is always tough. It's always contentious, because this is a big country and a diverse country, and people have strong points of view, and we've got a great diversity of interests.

  Barack Obama

  Country, Strong, Views

  Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

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• When you take comprehensive, then we're dealing with certain issues like full citizenship ... And whatever else we disagree on, I think we would agree on that that's a more toxic and contentious issue, granting full amnesty.

  Herbert Spencer

  Thinking, Issues, Immigration

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• What distinguishes exemplary boards is that they are robust, effective social systems . . .The highest performing companies have extremely contentious boards that regard dissent as an obligation and that treat no subject as undiscussable.

  Jeffrey Sonnenfeld

  Boards, Social, Robust

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• I don't even like playing a contentious role.

  Jim DeMint

  Roles

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• Disturbers are to be rebuked, the low spirited to be encouraged, the infirm to be supported, objectors confuted, the treacherous guarded against, the unskilled taught, the lazy aroused, the contentious restrained, the haughty repressed, the poor relieved, the oppressed liberated, the good approved, the evil borne with, and all are to be loved!

  Saint Augustine

  Evil, Lazy, Taught

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• I gave the graduation speech at my high school. Not because I was valedictorian but because the grade voted for me to do it. And I gave a slightly contentious speech. I was a little critical of the administration. But for a long time it said on Wikipedia that I took my balls out and exposed myself to the crowd.

  Nick Kroll

  School, Long, Speech

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• I think that there are non-physical laws all right: genuine (if not strict) laws written in the language of biology, economics, and so on. But I don't regard that as a contentious issue. Even reductionists about chemistry will think that there are special chemical laws whose formulation makes essential use of chemical terminology.

  David Papineau

  Thinking, Law, Issues

  "Physical". Interview with Richard Marshall, www.3ammagazine.com. April 8, 2013.

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• Uses are always much broader than functions, and usually far less contentious. The word function carries overtones of purpose andpropriety, of concern with why something was developed rather than with how it has actually been found useful. The function of automobiles is to transport people and objects, but they are used for a variety of other purposes--as homes, offices, bedrooms, henhouses, jetties, breakwaters, even offensive weapons.

  Frank Smith

  Home, Office, People

  Frank Smith (2014). “To Think: In Language, Learning and Education”, p.108, Routledge

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• I am not going to wait and have us plunge back into a contentious national debate that has very little chance of succeeding. Let's make the Affordable Care Act work for everybody.

  Hillary Clinton

  Waiting, Succeed, Affordable Care Act

  Hillary Clinton's speech at the Clinton-Sanders Democratic presidential debate in Durham, New Hampshire, hosted by MSNBC, www.nytimes.com. February 4, 2016.

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• You [as an actor] have a responsibility to Jonathan's book and you have a responsibility to talk about a subject that is going to be, whether it's contentious or not, it's going t bring up a huge, emotional response from people. A lot of people will say they are ready or they're not ready.

  Stephen Daldry

  Book, Responsibility, Emotional

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• One of the good things is the relationship between director and editor used to be more contentious. Studios used to leave directors alone more during the post production process and now they're clamoring to get in. So, the director and the editor end up teaming up sort of against the studio to fight what they're doing and you lose the creative tension that you used to have between an editor and a director.

  Michael Sucsy

  Fighting, Editors, Creative

  Source: www.moviesonline.ca

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• Senator [Ben] Sanders and I share some very big progressive goals. I've been fighting for universal healthcare for many years, and we're now on the path to achieving it. I don't want us to start over again. I think that would be a great mistake, to once again plunge our country into a contentious debate about whether we should have and what kind of system we should have for healthcare.

  Hillary Clinton

  Country, Mistake, Fighting

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

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• I think it's unworkable. What are we going to have, people like in contentious divorces suddenly claiming that one or the other of them should go to jail because once he or she spanked the child.

  Sean Hannity

  Children, Divorce, Thinking

  Source: www.foxnews.com

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