A Quote by Phil Donahue

There is no democracy without dissent.

Phil Donahue

Quote Topics

Democracy Dissent Without

Quote Author

Phil Donahue
American - Entertainer
Born: December 21, 1935

We must dissent from the indifference. We must dissent from the apathy. We must dissent from the fear, the hatred and the mistrust. We must dissent from a nation that has buried its head in the sand, waiting in vain for the needs of its poor, its elderly, and its sick to disappear and just blow away. We must dissent from a government that has left its young without jobs, education or hope. We must dissent from the poverty of vision and the absence of moral leadership. We must dissent because America can do better, because America has no choice but to do better.

Thurgood Marshall

Once you start choking the space for dissent in a democracy, people feel pushed to the wall and then it leads to further dissent and alienation.

Mehbooba Mufti

Disagreement produces debate but dissent produces dissension. Dissent (which come from the Latin, dis and sentire) means originally to feel apart from others. People who disagree have an argument, but people who dissent have a quarrel. People may disagree and both may count themselves in the majority. But a person who dissents is by definition in a minority. A liberal society thrives on disagreement but is killed by dissension. Disagreement is the life blood of democracy, dissension is its cancer.

Daniel J. Boorstin

In a democracy, dissent is an act of faith.

J. William Fulbright

Bring it on. Dissent is central to any democracy.

Harry Belafonte

Dissent and dissenters have no monopoly on freedom. They must tolerate opposition. They must accept dissent from their dissent.

Abe Fortas

I wish I could say that racism and prejudice were only distant memories... We must dissent from the indifference. We must dissent from the apathy. We must dissent from the fear, the hatred and the mistrust... We must dissent because America can do better, because America has no choice but to do better.

Thurgood Marshall

During President George W. Bush's two terms, you couldn't drive far without seeing a particular bumper sticker: Dissent is the highest form of patriotism. Now that Democrats control the White House and Congress, the left treats dissent as the lowest form of treason.

Monica Crowley

It would be a tragedy for democracy if dissent goes away.

Mahesh Bhatt

In America, religious dissent is as vital as it is elusive. Like the secretions of the pituitary, the juices of dissent are essential to ongoing life even if we do not always know precisely how, when or where they perform their tasks, and the not knowing - the flimsy, filmy elusiveness - is supremely characteristic of America's expressions of religious dissent. For in the United States no stalwart orthodoxy stands ever ready to parry the sharp thrust or clever feints of dissent.

Edwin Gaustad

Dissent is what rescues democracy from a quiet death behind closed doors.

Lewis H. Lapham

growth requires purposeful division. Responsible dissent is the essence of democracy.

Abigail McCarthy

The fact that there are singer-songwriters dealing with substantive issues is encouraging. It's important for young people to perceive that there are acceptable avenues of dissent, because we live in a world where dissent is hard-pressed; treated as if it were unpatriotic. I've always liked the concept of the loyal opposition. It allows for dissent to be a respectable part of the whole.

Mary Travers

In a democracy dissent is an act of faith. Like medicine, the test of its value is not in its taste, but in its effects.

J. William Fulbright

To oppose the policies of a government does not mean you are against the country or the people that the government supposedly represents. Such opposition should be called what it really is: democracy, or democratic dissent, or having a critical perspective about what your leaders are doing. Either we have the right to democratic dissent and criticism of these policies or we all lie down and let the leader, the Fuhrer, do what is best, while we follow uncritically, and obey whatever he commands. That's just what the Germans did with Hitler, and look where it got them.