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Censorship

The test of democracy is freedom of criticism. – David Ben-Gurion

If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. – John Stuart Mill, On Liberty, 1859

To choose a good book, look in an inquisitor’s prohibited list. – John Aikin

To limit the press is to insult a nation; to prohibit reading of certain books is to declare the inhabitants to be either fools or slaves. – Claude-Adrien Helvétius

Censorship offends me. – Author Unknown

We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people. – John F. Kennedy

Imagine a world in which we are all enlightened by objective truths rather than offended by them. – Neil deGrasse Tyson, 2014

[T]he German censorship forbade or mutilated my every book, which was like sticking pins into my soul… – Israel Zangwill, Dreamers of the Ghetto, “From a Mattress Grave,” 1897 [characte

The worst part of censorship is XXX XXXXXX XX XXXXXXX. – Bumper sticker, author unknown

God forbid that any book should be banned. The practice is as indefensible as infanticide. – Rebecca West

Censorship: protecting you from reality. – Author unknown

Take away the right to say “fuck” and you take away the right to say “fuck the government.” – Lenny Bruce

Every human being has a right to hear what other wise human beings have spoken to him. It is one of the Rights of Men; a very cruel injustice if you deny it to a man! – Thomas Carlyle

You can cage the singer but not the song. – Harry Belafonte, in International Herald Tribune, 1988 October 3rd

A mans first care should be to avoid the reproaches of his own heart, and his next to escape the censures of the world. – Joseph Addison

Your own mind is a sacred enclosure into which nothing harmful can enter except by your permission. – Arnold Bennett

Censor, n. An officer of certain governments, employed to supress the works of genius. Among the Romans the censor was an inspector of public morals, but the public morals of modern nations will not bear inspection. – Ambrose Bierce

Those expressions are omitted which can not with propriety be read aloud in the family. – Thomas Bowdler

Censors tend to do what only psychotics do: they confuse reality with illusion. – David Cronenberg

One of the curious things about censorship is that no one seems to want it for himself. We want censorship to protect someone else; the young, the unstable, the suggestible, the stupid. I have never heard of anyone who wanted a film banned because otherwise he might see it and be harmed. – Edgar Dale