Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton Quotes
When the people have no other tyrant, their own public opinion becomes one.
1st Baron Lytton of Knebworth
Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton, 1803-1873, Novelist & British Colonial Secretary (Conservative), Ernest Maltravers
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Earl of Roscommon
An excellent example of this occurred in the first decades of the 21st century. At the beginning if the century, the majority of Americans were clearly opposed to the idea of same-sex / gay marriage. By 2008, the population was evenly split, for and against. By 2014 the majority of Americans were clearly in favor of same-sex marriage and it had been legalized in more than a dozen states.
For earlier similar sentiments see Plato and William D'Avenant {312586}.
Eldest son of Robert Walpole
See Otis Singletary for a similar modern view
He was concerned about the possible “tyranny of the majority.”
This was much more the case in 1840 when this quotation was written. Since then, a much higher proportion of American society has become educated, and the cultures that American immigrants have come from had multiplied. Publications abounded and after radio and television there were more attacks on American majority positions. The major change came with radio call in talk shows, similar TV shows and then the Internet provided a painless way to publicly go against majority opinion. By the first decade of the 21st century, movements of majority rejectionists such as the Tea Party and the Occupy Movement were thriving and “futile contests” received much public attention and showed that there were others with the non-majority views who made it socially acceptable to be outside the norms of the majority.
Islamic modernists like Serageldin are many among the educated Muslims but their views are often drowned out by the violence and extremist statements of the fundamentalists.
Conformity--the natural instinct to passively yield to that vague something recognized as authority.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835-1910
Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, PC was an English writer and politician. He served as a Whig member of Parliament from 1831 to 1841 and a Conservative from 1851 to 1866. He was Secretary of State for the Colonies from June 1858 to June 1859, choosing Richard Clement Moody as founder of British Columbia. He declined the Crown of Greece in 1862 after King Otto abdicated. He was created Baron Lytton of Knebworth in 1866. He coined the phrases "the great unwashed", "pursuit of the almighty dollar", "the pen is mightier than the sword", and "dweller on the threshold", and the opening phrase "It was a dark and stormy night." Yet his standing declined and he is little read today. The sardonic Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, held annually since 1982, claims to seek the "opening sentence of the worst of all possible novels".
