"Did you ever hear anyone say; ""That work had better be banned because I might read it and it might be very damaging to me?"" ~Joseph Henry Jackson"


"Assassination is the extreme form of censorship. ~George Bernard Shaw; ""The Rejected Statement; Part I;"" The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet; 1911"


Wherever they burn books they will also; in the end; burn human beings. ~Heinrich Heine; Almansor; 1823


To reject the word is to reject the human search. ~Max Lerner; 1953; on book purging


"The populist authoritarianism that is the downside of political correctness means that anyone; sometimes it seems like everyone; can proclaim their grief and have it acknowledged. The victim culture; every sufferer grasping for their own Holocaust; ensures that anyone who feels offended can call for moderation; for dilution; and in the end; as is all too often the case; for censorship. And censorship; that by-product of fear - stemming as it does not from some positive agenda; but from the desire to escape our own terrors and superstitions by imposing them on others - must surely be resisted. ~Jonathon Green; ""Did You Say 'Offensive?';"" as posted on wordwizard.com "


The dirtiest book of all is the expurgated book. ~Walt Whitman


If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise; we don't believe in it at all. ~Noam Chomsky


God forbid that any book should be banned. The practice is as indefensible as infanticide. ~Rebecca West


Censorship reflects society's lack of confidence in itself. It is a hallmark of an authoritarian regime. ~Potter Stewart


A free press can be good or bad; but; most certainly; without freedom a press will never be anything but bad. ~Albert Camus


What progress we are making. In the Middle Ages they would have burned me. Now they are content with burning my books. ~Sigmund Freud; 1933


To limit the press is to insult a nation; to prohibit reading of certain books is to declare the inhabitants to be either fools or slaves. ~Claude-Adrien Helv?tius


The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is; that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion; still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right; they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth:? if wrong; they lose; what is almost as great a benefit; the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth; produced by its collision with error. ~John Stuart Mill; On Liberty; 1859


"Take away the right to say ""fuck"" and you take away the right to say ""fuck the government.""? ~Lenny Bruce"


If all mankind minus one were of one opinion; mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he; if he had the power; would be justified in silencing mankind. ~John Stuart Mill; On Liberty; 1859


"Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one. ~Abbott Joseph Liebling; ""Do You Belong in Journalism?"" New Yorker; 4 May 1960"


Censorship offends me. ~Author Unknown


We have a natural right to make use of our pens as of our tongue; at our peril; risk and hazard. ~Voltaire; Dictionnaire Philosophique; 1764


To choose a good book; look in an inquisitor?s prohibited list. ~John Aikin


The paper burns; but the words fly away. ~Akiba ben Joseph


Obscenity is not a quality inherent in a book or picture; but is solely and exclusively a contribution of the reading mind; and hence cannot be defined in terms of the qualities of a book or picture. ~Theodore Schroeder


I disapprove of what you say; but I will defend to the death your right to say it. ~Voltaire


Every human being has a right to hear what other wise human beings have spoken to him. It is one of the Rights of Men; a very cruel injustice if you deny it to a man!? ~Thomas Carlyle


Censorship feeds the dirty mind more than the four-letter word itself. ~Dick Cavett


We can never be sure that the opinion we are endeavoring to stifle is a false opinion; and if we were sure; stifling it would be an evil still. ~John Stuart Mill; On Liberty; 1859


Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so; too. ~Voltaire


The only valid censorship of ideas is the right of people not to listen. ~Tommy Smothers


Nature knows no indecencies; man invents them. ~Mark Twain; Notebook; 1935


I believe in censorship. I made a fortune out of it. ~Mae West


Every burned book enlightens the world. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson


Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history; the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. ~Alfred Whitney Griswold; New York Times; 24 February 1959





You can cage the singer but not the song. ~Harry Belafonte; in International Herald Tribune; 3 October 1988


We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts; foreign ideas; alien philosophies; and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people. ~John F. Kennedy


The test of democracy is freedom of criticism. ~David Ben-Gurion


The fact is that censorship always defeats its own purpose; for it creates; in the end; the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion. ~Henry Steele Commager


If you don't have this freedom of the press; then all these little fellows are weaseling around and doing their monkey business and they never get caught. ~Harold R. Medina


I am thankful for all the complaining I hear about our government because it means we have freedom of speech. ~Nancie J. Carmody