Evading Responsibility Quotes

Are you running away from something?

I'm just as guilty for not doing anything as I am for doing things. Not with case (the 1994 sexual abuse conviction), but just my life. I was so scared of this responsibility that I was running away from it. But I see now that whether I show up for work or not, the evil forces are going to be at me. They're going to come 100 percent.

It is hard to overstate how over time the idea of being at fault for one’s actions has been explicitly diminished as a personal and legal norm, such that many people today have no recognition of being at fault for anything.

Why can't the Indonesians have an Islamic theocracy if they want? Why can't the Pakistanis have a military dictatorship? Why can't the Serbs run their own country the way they prefer? What is the appeal in making sure that people whose minds have been wasted by Alzheimer's Disease vote? Well, let's not beat around the bush: the appeal of mass democracy lies in the fact that in essentially every country in the world today, the number of persons unable to think for themselves is substantially larger than the number able to make independent decisions. Those unable to think for themselves have their thinking done for them by the people who control the mass media. Which is to say, democracy is the preferred system because it gives the political power to those who own or control the mass media and at the same time allows them to remain behind the scenes and evade responsibility for the way in which they use that power.

When you abandon making choices, you enter the vast world of excuses.

Escape into the dream. Escape, a key thing charged against these drugs, that they are for escapists. I think the people who make this charge hardly dare dream to what degree they are escapist.

When the Department does respond to telegrams it is invariably to recommend evasion of issues that cannot be evaded.

Don’t tell me your name. It’s likely to awaken my conscience, and that’s the last thing we want.

Ruby, I lied before. I would have run. —CG

I who am not a specially brave man have had to sustain the sinking courage of these professional fighters in critical times. When it was proposed to station [Gen. Henry W.] Halleck here in general command, he insisted, to use his own language, on the appointment of a general-in-chief who should be held responsible for results. We appointed him and all went well enough until [John] Pope's death, when he broke down—nerve and pluck all gone—and has ever since evaded all possible responsibility—little more since then than a first-rate clerk.

If you keep asking me questions, I will continue to find excuses.

It should be borne in mind that the target is always trying to shift responsibility to get out of being the target. There is a constant squirming and moving and strategy . . . on the part of the designated target. The forces for change must keep this in mind and pin that target down securely. If an organization permits responsibility to be diffused and distributed in a number of areas, attack becomes impossible.

To tell a lie in cowardice, to tell a lie for gain, or to avoid deserved punishment--are all the blackest of black lies.

O'Reilly continues to hide behind his microphone.

Men's common guise is always to lay the burden on some other back.

The best way to avoid responsibility is to say, 'I've got responsibilities.