Imperatives Quotes - Page 6

After the first establishment of identity there comes the imperative need to lose this new-found sense of separateness and to belong to something larger and more powerful than the weak, lonely self. The sense of moral isolation is intolerable to us.

Carson McCullers

Lonely, Powerful, Self

Carson McCullers (1975). “The mortgaged heart”, Penguin Books Ltd

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The necessary consequence of man's right to life is his right to self-defense. In a civilized society, force may be used only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use. All the reasons which make the initiation of physical force an evil, make the retaliatory use of physical force a moral imperative. If some "pacifist" society renounced the retaliatory use of force, it would be left helplessly at the mercy of the first thug who decided to be immoral. Such a society would achieve the opposite of its intention: instead of abolishing evil, it would encourage and reward it.

Ayn Rand

Thug, Men, Self

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The security of Israel is a moral imperative for all free peoples.

Henry A. Kissinger

Israel, Moral, Security

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I believe that what we get out of life is what we've set ourselves up to get, so there's no such thing as an inconsequential decision. Our destinies are the culmination of all the choices we've made along the way, which is why it's imperative to listen hard to your inner voice when it speaks up. Don't let anyone else's noise drown it out.

Megan McCafferty

Life, Believe, Destiny

Megan McCafferty (2010). “The Complete Jessica Darling Series: Sloppy Firsts, Second Helpings, Charmed Thirds, Fourth Comings, Perfect Fifths”, p.811, Crown

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When quick results are imperative, the manipulation of the masses through symbols may be the only quick way of having a critical thing done.

John Grierson

Done, May, Way

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I believe we should reframe our response to climate change as an imperative for growth rather than merely being a way of being green or meeting environmental commitments.

William Hague

Believe, Commitment, Growth

"William Hague tells ministers to help green industries boost economy" by Juliette Jowit, www.theguardian.com. May 15, 2012.

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But it is imperative, for our own survival, that we avoiid one another, and what more successful means of avoidance are there than words? Language will keep us safe from human onslaught, will express for us our regret at being unable to supply groceries or love or peace.

Janet Frame

Regret, Mean, Successful

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I find the scientific mind horrendous. All those brains and not a moral imperative between them.

Lucille Kallen

Science, Brain, Mind

Lucille Kallen (1987). “C.B. Greenfield: A Little Madness”

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Both love of mankind, and respect for their rights are duties; the former however is only a conditional, the latter an unconditional, purely imperative duty, which he must be perfectly certain not to have transgressed who would give himself up to the secret emotions arising from benevolence.

Immanuel Kant

Rights, Giving, Secret

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In a world where millions of human beings live in extreme poverty, die of malnutrition and lack medical care, where pandemics continue to kill, it is imperative to pursue good faith disarmament negotiations and to shift budgets away from weapons production, war-mongering, surveillance of private persons and devote available resources to address global challenges including humanitarian relief, environmental protection, climate change mitigation and adaptation, prevention of pandemics, and the development of a green economy.

Alfred-Maurice de Zayas

War, Challenges, Environmental

"UN Expert Urges States to Cut Military Spending and Invest More in Human Development". www.ohchr.org. April 14, 2014.

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Americans ought to be the best-traveled, most cosmopolitan people on earth, not only because experience of the world is desirable in its own right, but because as a people acquires a great concentration of power, worldliness becomes a moral imperative.

Shana Alexander

Travel, People, World

Shana Alexander (1970). “The feminine eye”, McCall Pub. Co

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To act without rapacity, to use knowledge with wisdom, to respect interdependence, to operate without hubris and greed are not simply moral imperatives. They are an accurate scientific description of the means of survival.

Barbara Ward, Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth

Mean, Greed, Survival

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the solution to racism lies in our ability to see its ubiquity but not to concede its inevitability. It lies in the collective and institutional power to make change, at least as much as with the individual will to change. It also lies in the absolute moral imperative to break the childish, deadly circularity of centuries of blindness to the shimmering brilliance of our common, ordinary humanity.

Patricia J. Williams

Lying, Ubiquity, Racism

Patricia J. Williams (2016). “Seeing a Color-Blind Future: The Paradox of Race”, p.68, Macmillan

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To what or whom does Lizzie Harris direct the imperative title of her startling first book, Stop Wanting? To the reader, the narrator, to desire itself, or to lack? This is a work of complexly, ambiguously layered narratives and identities. The opening poem asserts I want to say what happened / but am suspicious of stories. These lines become an ars poetica for the whole of this painful and exceptional collection in which the unspeakable is stubbornly confronted by a searing eloquence. This is a commanding debut.

Lynn Emanuel

Book, Desire, Identity

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It's tougher for me. But I don't think that's imperative to me starting a new movement, or revive an old movement, to help people.

Lance Armstrong

Thinking, People, Movement

Interview with Dan Roan, www.bbc.com. January 26, 2015.

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Men who scorn the idea of submission to the divine Will and are outraged by the notion of a God who requires submission are among the first to demand total submission to the process in which we are involved and seem to attach a kind of moral imperative to willing participation in it. Any other attitude, so they say, is reactionary or escapist or anti-social. Perhaps, after all, they have found a divinity to worship; and, if they have, the only charitable comment must be: God help them!

Charles le Gai Eaton

Attitude, Men, Ideas

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It's not imperative that I graduate in four years, and it's not imperative that I get all A's.

Kellie Martin

Years, Four, Graduates

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Before you begin working your way into the system, it is imperative that you are ready to be judged. You are only new once. ... You are only ready when you can orchestrate the next move after you have the industry's attention.

K Callan

Moving, Next Move, Hollywood

K. Callan (2000). “Directing Your Directing Career”

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The desire for magic cannot be eradicated. Even the most supposedly rational people attempt to practice magic in love and war. We simultaneously possess the most primitive of brain stems and the most sophisticated of cortices. The imperatives of each coexist uneasily.

Erica Jong

War, Practice, People

Erica Jong (2007). “What Do Women Want?: Essays by Erica Jong”, p.40, Penguin

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In Holland I have seen well-meaning, principled people blinded by multiculturalism, overwhelmed by the imperative to be sensitive and respectful of immigrant culture, while ignoring criminal abuse of women and girls.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Girl, People, Abuse

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How dominating is appetite, how enveloping immediate experience! Even the philosophically minded among us capitulate, ultimately, to the narrowest sense of personal need. Political time moves at a snail's pace because it is only with nearly insurmountable difficulty that moral discomfort takes root in the best of people, forcing an imperative out of a complaint; so viscerally repugnant is it for a critical mass to find the prevailing system unbearable, much less prepare to take up arms against it.

Vivian Gornick

Moving, Roots, People

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What are man and woman if not members of two very different and warring tribes Yet decade after decade, century after century, they attempt in marriage to reconcile and forge a union. Why I don't know. Biological imperative Divine law Or just a desire to connect to that mysterious other In any case, it's always struck me as a hopeful thing.

Andrew Schneider

Men, Law, Two

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It is not enough to simply listen to student voice. Educators have an ethical imperative to do something with students, and that is why meaningful student involvement is vital to school improvement.

Adam Fletcher

Meaningful, School, Voice

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Vague promises of savings from cutting waste, enhancing prevention and wellness, installing electronic medical records and improving quality are merely ‘lipstick’ cost control, more for show and public relations than for true change... Savings will require changing how doctors think about their patients: Doctors take the Hippocratic Oath too seriously, “as an imperative to do everything for the patient regardless of the cost or effects on others.

Ezekiel Emanuel

Cutting, Thinking, Doctors

"Deadly Doctors" by Betsy McCaughey, nypost.com. July 24, 2009.

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Nothing in our time is more interesting than the erstwhile capitalist corporation and the erstwhile Communist firm should, under the imperatives of organization, come together as oligarchies of their own members.

John Kenneth Galbraith

Organization, Interesting, Together

John Kenneth Galbraith (1971). “The new industrial state”, Houghton Mifflin

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