Quotes By Noam Chomsky

Governments don't control people like they used to.

The intellectual tradition is one of servility to power, and if I didn't betray it I'd be ashamed of myself.

In the late 1990s, some of the worst terrorist atrocities in the world were what the Turkish government itself called state terror, namely massive atrocities, 80 percent of the arms coming from the United States, millions of refugees, tens of thousands of people killed, hideous repression, that's international terror, and we can go on and on.

The major advances in speed of communication and ability to interact took place more than a century ago. The shift from sailing ships to telegraph was far more radical than that from telephone to email!

Humans have certain properties and characteristics which are intrinsic to them, just as every other organism does. That's human nature.

Either you repeat the same conventional doctrines everybody is saying, or else you say something true, and it will sound like it's from Neptune.

Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it.

Stability is when the U.K. and U.S. invade a country and impose the regime of their choice.

There is massive propaganda for everyone to consume. Consumption is good for profits and consumption is good for the political establishment.

Now financial liberalization is just a catastrophe waiting to happen, and there are very well understood reasons for that.

In many respects, the United States is a great country. Freedom of speech is protected more than in any other country. It is also a very free society.

There are massive efforts on the part of the internet's corporate owners to try to direct it to become a technique of marginalisation and control.

The 'anti-globalisation movement' is the most significant proponent of globalisation - but in the interests of people, not concentrations of state-private power.

In the US, there is basically one party - the business party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations on the same policies. By and large, I am opposed to those policies. As is most of the population.

Anywhere in Latin America there is a potential threat of the pathology of caudillismo and it has to be guarded against.

The only justification for repressive institutions is material and cultural deficit. But such institutions, at certain stages of history, perpetuate and produce such a deficit, and even threaten human survival.

Any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the U.S. media.

All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is constant pressure to make people feel that they are helpless, that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume.

Human language appears to be a unique phenomenon, without significant analogue in the animal world.

The people who were honored in the Bible were the false prophets. It was the ones we call the prophets who were jailed and driven into the desert.

Wanton killing of innocent civilians is terrorism, not a war against terrorism.

In the academic world, most of the work that is done is clerical. A lot of the work done by professors is routine.

I don't want followers.

In this possibly terminal phase of human existence, democracy and freedom are more than just ideals to be valued - they may be essential to survival.

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.

As a research tool, the internet is invaluable.

Resistance is feasible even for those who are not heroes by nature, and it is an obligation, I believe, for those who fear the consequences and detest the reality of the attempt to impose American hegemony.

The more you can increase fear of drugs and crime, welfare mothers, immigrants and aliens, the more you control all the people.

If there was an observer on Mars, they would probably be amazed that we have survived this long.

State formation has been a brutal project, with many hideous consequences. But the results exist, and their pernicious aspects should be overcome.