I work for him despite his faults and he lets me work for him despite my deficiencies.
Bill MoyersRead
We have to face the unpleasant as well as the affirmative side of the human story, including our own story as a nation, our own stories of our peoples. We have got to have the ugly facts in order to protect us from the official view of reality. Otherwise, we are squeezed empty and filled with what other people want us to think and feel and experience.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Confronting both the negative and positive aspects of our history is essential for genuine understanding and self-awareness.
Bill Moyers emphasizes that to fully grasp the human experience and the narrative of our nation, we must accept and acknowledge both the unpleasant truths and the affirming stories. Without facing these 'ugly facts,' we risk being misled and shaped by external influences that dictate our perceptions of reality, leading to a distorted sense of identity and purpose.
Themes
TruthRealityHistorySelf-AwarenessIdentity
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about national identity and history, one might use this quote to emphasize the importance of facing past injustices.
More from Bill Moyers
All quotes →This is the first time in my 32 years in public broadcasting that PBS has ordered up programs for ideological instead of journalistic reasons.
Bill MoyersRead
Capitalism is out of control, thanks in no small part to Citizens United, the Supreme Court decision which said that a corporation is a person, even though it doesn't eat, drink, make love, sing, raise children or take care of aging parents. You can't have a people's democracy as long as corporations are considered people.
Bill MoyersRead
I'll believe corporations are people when Texas executes one
Bill MoyersRead
Democracy may not prove in the long run to be as efficient as other forms of government, but it has one saving grace: it allows us to know and say that it isn't.
Bill MoyersRead
When I learn something new - and it happens every day - I feel a little more at home in this universe, a little more comfortable in the nest.
Bill MoyersRead
Similar quotes
True progress lies in the direction of decentralization, both territorial and functional, in the development of the spirit of local and personal initiative, and of free federation from the simple to the compound, in lieu of the present hierarchy from the centre to the periphery.
Peter KropotkinRead
I love my country, and it hurts not to be able to see my country, as I did for so many years. I hope that I will one day be able to live in a peaceful Colombia.
Fernando BoteroRead
And I think both the left and the right should celebrate people who have different opinions, and disagree with them, and argue with them, and differ with them, but don't just try to shut them up.
Roger EbertRead
Justice is the grammar of things. Mercy is the poetry of things.
Frederick BuechnerRead
Collectivism answers: The power of society is unlimited. Society may make any laws it wishes, and force them upon anyone in any manner it wishes.
Ayn RandRead
For what can war, but endless war, still breed?
John MiltonRead