QuoteProject
I distrust the incommunicable; it is the source of all violence
Jean-Paul Sartre
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote suggests that a lack of communication and understanding can lead to conflict and violence.

Jean-Paul Sartre's quote reflects the existentialist belief that individuals are shaped by their interactions and communication with others. He proposes that when people fail to express themselves or understand one another, it fosters misunderstanding and distrust, which can escalate into violence. Essentially, open communication is crucial for peace and harmony among individuals, and its absence can result in destructive outcomes.

Themes

CommunicationViolenceDistrustUnderstandingExistentialism

In practice

Example use cases

In a debate about social issues, one might use this quote to emphasize the importance of dialogue in preventing conflict.

More from Jean-Paul Sartre

If a victory is told in detail, one can no longer distinguish it from a defeat.
Jean-Paul SartreRead
All I want is' - and he uttered the final words through clenched teeth and with a sort of shame - 'to retain my freedom.' I should myself have thought,' said Jacques, 'that freedom consisted in frankly confronting situations into which one had deliberately entered, and accepting all one's responsibilities. But that, no doubt, is not your view.
Jean-Paul SartreRead
If you are lonely when you're alone, you are in bad company.
Jean-Paul SartreRead
A kiss without a moustache, they said then, is like an egg without salt; I will add to it: and it is like Good without Evil.
Jean-Paul SartreRead
I wanted pure love: foolishness; to love one another is to hate a common enemy: I will thus espouse your hatred. I wanted Good: nonsense; on this earth and in these times, Good and Bad are inseparable: I accept to be evil in order to become good.
Jean-Paul SartreRead
Night is falling: at dusk, you must have good eyesight to be able to tell the Good Lord from the Devil.
Jean-Paul SartreRead

Similar quotes

Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal.
Thomas MooreRead
Curses of vanished elders echoed down on me; too pretty, too soft, too pale, eyes far too full of the Devil, ah, that devilish smile
Anne RiceRead
We have many identities, and we can't be authentic to them all. The best we can do is be sincere in our efforts to earn the values we claim.
Adam GrantRead
It is not necessarily those lands which are the most fertile or most favored in climate that seem to me the happiest, but those in which a long struggle of adaptation between man and his environment has brought out the best qualities of both.
T. S. EliotRead
If minds are wholly dependent on brains and brains on biochemistry, and biochemistry (in the long run) on the meaningless flux of the atoms, I cannot understand how the thought of those minds should have any more significance than the sound of the wind in the trees.
C. S. LewisRead
We have become 99 percent money mad. The method of living at home modestly and within our income, laying a little by systematically for the proverbial rainy day which is due to come, can almost be listed among the lost arts.
George Washington CarverRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.

Quote by Jean-Paul Sartre | QuoteProject