Democracy divides people into workers and loafers. It makes no provision for those who have no time to work.
Moral responsibility is what is lacking in a man when he demands it of a woman.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote highlights the hypocrisy in demanding moral responsibility from others while failing to uphold it oneself, particularly in gender dynamics.
Karl Kraus emphasizes the moral hypocrisy that often exists in societal expectations around gender roles. In this quote, he suggests that when a man expects a woman to bear the burden of moral responsibility, it often reflects his own inadequacies and lack of accountability. This statement critiques the unequal standards that society places on men and women, urging for a deeper understanding of personal responsibility and equality.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about gender roles, to highlight the need for shared responsibility.
More from Karl Kraus
All quotes βThe mission of the press is to spread culture while destroying the attention span.
War: first, one hopes to win; then one expects the enemy to lose; then, one is satisfied that he too is suffering; in the end, one is surprised that everyone has lost.
Stupidity is an elemental force for which no earthquake is a match.
Experiences are savings which a miser puts aside. Wisdom is an inheritance which a wastrel cannot exhaust.
Sexuality poorly repressed unsettles some families; well repressed, it unsettles the whole world.
Similar quotes
Compared with that of Taoists and Far Eastern Buddhists, the Christian attitude toward Nature has been curiously insensitive and often downright domineering and violent. Taking their cue from an unfortunate remark in Genesis, Catholic moralists have regarded animals as mere things which men do right to regard for their own ends. . . .
You don't have to love animals to recognize that it is immoral and unjust to exploit them. But if you do love animals, but you continue to participate in their exploitation, you need to rethink your idea of what love means.
Magic: it was what happened when the mind met the world, and the mind won for a change.
I have lived temperately, eating little animal food, and that not as an aliment, so much as a condiment for the vegetables, which constitute my principal diet.
Inner-life questions are the kind everyone asks, with or without benefit of God-talk: 'Does my life have meaning and purpose?' 'Do I have gifts that the world wants and needs?' 'Whom and what shall I serve?' 'Whom and what can I trust?' 'How can I rise above my fears?'
A bad review is even less important than whether it is raining in Patagonia.