Censor Quotes

Literature should not be suppressed merely because it offends the moral code of the censor. (William O. Douglas)
The worst thing you can do is censor yourself as the pencil hits the paper. You must not edit until you get it all on paper. If you can put everything down, stream-of-consciousness, you'll do yourself a service. View quote
Stephen Sondheim
A censor is an expert in cutting remarks. A censor is a man who knows more than he thinks you ought to. View quote
Laurence J. Peter
Any test that turns on what is offensive to the community's standards is too loose, too capricious, too destructive of freedom of expression to be squared with the First Amendment. Under that test, juries can censor, suppress, and punish what they don't like, provided the matter relates to "sexual impurity" or has a tendency "to excite lustful thoughts". This is community censorship in one of its worst forms. It creates a regime where in the battle between the literati and the Philistines, the Philistines are certain to win. View quote
William O. Douglas
Rather than trying to put an end to Eminem or some other rapper, politicians should think about why they're rapping. It's easier to try to censor some kid who's swearing about poverty than it is to stop the poverty. View quote
Willie Nelson
Can we trust transnational internet groups like Wikipedia, which are self-regulating and unaccountable, to determine or censor information for the public, to decide what are the facts in nearly all fields of life and learning? View quote
David Frawley
But, o, photography! as no art is, Faithful and disappointing! That records Dull days as dull, and hold-it smiles as frauds, And will not censor blemishes, Like washing-lines, and Hall's-Distemper boards. View quote
Philip Larkin
The Superego, in censoring the unconscious and in implanting conscience, also censors the censor. View quote
Herbert Marcuse
I just don't get it. The pigeon was already dead, we found it in the road. And no other censor has objected. What is the problem with you, English? You killed millions of Indians and Africans, and yet you go nuts about the circumstances of the death of a single Serbian pigeon. I am touched you hold the lives of Serbian birds so dear, but you are crazy. I will never understand how your minds work. View quote
Emir Kusturica
I think the enemy is self-censorship. In a free society the biggest danger is that you're afraid to the point where you censor yourself. View quote
Tim Robbins
Reading develops cognitive skills. It trains our minds to think critically and to question what you are told. This is why dictators censor or ban books. It's why it was illegal to teach slaves to read. It's why girls in developing countries have acid thrown in their faces when they walk to school. (Karin Slaughter)
Censor the body and you censor breath and speech at the same time. Write yourself. Your body must be heard. View quote
Helene Cixous
Pontius Pilate was the first great censor and Jesus Christ the first great victim of censorship. View quote
Ben Lindsey
They cant censor the gleam in my eye. View quote
Charles Laughton
The Church doesn't censor. It tries to guide its faithful through catechism. View quote
Claudio Hummes
It's incredible that they censor films. It's sad. View quote
Dario Argento
In Italy the censor is very old and there are many judges and psychiatrists who analyse you. View quote
Dario Argento
The stated mission at the time was simply to use the influence of the entertainment industry to do an accurate portrayal of drug and alcohol abuse. We all admit that we're not trying to censor anybody. View quote
Gerald McRaney
Difference of opinion is advantageous in religion. The several sects perform the office of a Censor - over each other. View quote
Thomas Jefferson
When one does a thing, it appears good, otherwise one would not write it. Only later comes reflection, and one discards or accepts the thing. Time is the best censor, and patience a most excellent teacher. View quote
Frédéric Chopin
It is our attitude toward free thought and free expression that will determine our fate. There must be no limit on the range of temperate discussion, no limits on thought. No subject must be taboo. No censor must preside at our assemblies. We need all the ingenuity we possess to avert the holocaust. (William O. Douglas)
If you censor yourself, if you cannot articulate your needs, if you cannot articulate your priorities, then whatever you do, putting a little cross in a ballot box, etc, does not represent your view. It is an act of desperation. View quote
Alfred de Zayas
I began with the premise that, deep down, everybody wants to censor something. Human beings, no matter how committed to the principles of free speech, have deep-seated distrust of the open marketplace of ideas, especially when they themselves-or the groups to which they belong-are ‘victims' of the excesses of free speech. View quote
Alan Dershowitz
Postumus was clever: he guessed that this would make Cato angry enough to forget himself. And Cato rose to the bait, shouting out with a string of old-fashioned curses that in the days of his ancestor, whose memory this stammering imp was insulting, woe betide any child who failed in reverence to his elders; for they dealt out discipline with a heavy hand in those days. Whereas in these degenerate times the leading men of Rome gave any ignorant oafish lout (this was for Postumus) or any feeble-minded decrepit-limbed little whippersnapper (this was for me) full permission- Postumus interrupted with a warning smile: "So I was right. The degenerate Augustus insults the great Censor by employing you in his degenerate family. I suppose you have told the Lady Livia just how you feel about things?" View quote
Robert Graves
The vast number of titles which are published each year-all of them are to the good, even if some of them may annoy or even repel us for a time. For none of us would trade freedom of expression and of ideas for the narrowness of the public censor. America is a free market for people who have something to say, and need not fear to say it. View quote
Hubert Humphrey