George carlin quotes

Have you ever noticed that the only metaphor we have in our public discourse for solving problems is to declare war on it? We have the war on crime, the war on cancer, the war on drugs. But did you ever notice that we have no war on homelessness? You know why? Because there's no money in that problem. No money to be made off of the homeless. If you can find a solution to homelessness where the corporations and politicians can make a few million dollars each, you will see the streets of America begin to clear up pretty damn quick!

Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist.

Before they invented drawing boards, what did they go back to?

In America, anyone can become president. That's the problem.

Don’t just teach your children to read… Teach them to question what they read. Teach them to question everything.

A crazy person doesn't really lose his mind. It just becomes something more entertaining.

If black boxes survive air crashes - why don't they make the whole plane out of that stuff?

Here's all you have to know about men and women: women are crazy, men are stupid. And the main reason women are crazy is that men are stupid.

The caterpillar does all the work, but the butterfly gets all the publicity.

The wisest man I ever knew taught me something I never forgot. And although I never forgot it, I never quite memorized it either. So what I’m left with is the memory of having learned something very wise that I can’t quite remember.

A lot of times when they catch a guy who killed twenty-seven people, they say, He was a loner. Well, of course he was a loner; he killed everyone he came in contact with.

What hair color do they put on the driver's licenses of bald men?

Why is the man who invests all your money called a broker?

If at first you don't succeed, redefine success.

Your dog thinks you're a god. Your cat thinks the dog's an asshole.

Religion has convinced people that there's an invisible man ... living in the sky. Who watches everything you do every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a list of ten specific things he doesn't want you to do. And if you do any of these things, he will send you to a special place, of burning and fire and smoke and torture and anguish for you to live forever, and suffer, and suffer, and burn, and scream, until the end of time. But he loves you. He loves you. He loves you and he needs money.

Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity.

Government want to tell you things you can't say because they're against the law, or you can't say this because it's against a regulation, or here's something you can't say because its a... secret; "You can't tell him that because he's not cleared to know that." Government wants to control information and control language because that's the way you control thought, and basically that's the game they're in.

They'll get it all from you sooner or later 'cause they own this f**kin' place. It's a big club and you ain't in it. You and I are not in the big club. By the way, it's the same big club they use to beat you over the head with all day long when they tell you what to believe. All day long beating you over the head with their media telling you what to believe, what to think and what to buy. The table is tilted, folks. The game is rigged and nobody seems to notice. Nobody seems to care. Good, honest, hard-working people: white collar, blue collar, it doesn't matter what color shirt you have on.

Political discourse has been reduced to "Where's the beef?" "Read my lips," and "Make my day." Where are the assassins when we really need them?

We've learned how to make a living, but not a life. We've added years to life, not life to years.

Governments don't want a population capable of critical thinking, they want obedient workers, people just smart enough to run the machines and just dumb enough to passively accept their situation.You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own, and control the corporations. They've long since bought, and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the state houses, the city halls, they got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies, so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear.

This country was founded by a group of slave owners who told us that all men are created equal.

The future will soon be a thing of the past.

The larger the group, the more toxic, the more of your beauty as an individual you have to surrender for the sake of group thought. And when you suspend your individual beauty you also give up a lot of your humanity. You will do things in the name of a group that you would never do on your own. Injuring, hurting, killing, drinking are all part of it, because you've lost your identity, because you now owe your allegiance to this thing that's bigger than you are and that controls you.

Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.

When I hear a person talking about political solutions, I know I am not listening to a serious person.

I think TV remotes should have a button that allows you to kill the person on the screen.

Just cause you got the monkey off your back doesn't mean the circus has left town.

I like Florida. Everything is in the 80s. The temperatures, the ages and the IQ's.

If you have selfish, ignorant citizens, you're gonna get selfish, ignorant leaders.

People who say they don't care what people think are usually desperate to have people think they don't care what people think.

In the United States, anybody can be President. That's the problem.

The following statement is true. The previous statement is false.

Trying to be happy by accumulating possessions is like trying to satisfy hunger by taping sandwiches all over your body

Politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don't.

Tell people an invisible man in the sky created all things, they believe you. Tell them what you've painted is wet, they have to touch it to believe.

Every day I beat my own previous record for the number of consecutive days I’ve stayed alive.

The next time they give you all that civic bullshit about voting, keep in mind that Hitler was elected in a full, free democratic election

Ever wonder about those people who spend $2 apiece on those little bottles of Evian water? Try spelling Evian backward.

War is rich old men protecting their property by sending middle class and lower class young men off to die. It always has been.

One good reason to only maintain a small circle of friends is that three out of four murders are committed by people who know the victim.

It's the old American Double Standard, ya know: Say one thing, do somethin' different. And of course this country is founded on the double standard. That's our history. We were founded on a very basic double standard: This country was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free.

Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?

Why do they put Braille on the drive-through bank machines?

I went to a bookstore and asked the saleswoman, 'Where's the self-help section?' She said if she told me, it would defeat the purpose.

When you're born you get a ticket to the freak show. When you're born in America, you get a front row seat.

If 4 out of 5 people SUFFER from diarrhea…does that mean that 1 enjoys it?

Ah, to be a bird. To fly the skies, sing my song, and best of all occasionally peck someone's eyes out.

Those who dance are considered insane by those who cannot hear the music.

Some people have no idea what they're doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.

There are three kinds of people: those who can count, and those who cannot.

Honesty may be the best policy, but it's important to remember that apparently, by elimination, dishonesty is the second-best policy.

If voting changed anything, it would be illegal.

A person of good intelligence and of sensitivity cannot exist in this society very long without having some anger about the inequality - and it's not just a bleeding-heart, knee-jerk, liberal kind of a thing - it is just a normal human reaction to a nonsensical set of values where we have cinnamon flavored dental floss and there are people sleeping in the street.

Traditional American values: Genocide, aggression, conformity, emotional repression, hypocrisy, and the worship of comfort and consumer goods.

Governments don't want a population capable of critical thinking, they want obedient workers, people just smart enough to run the machines and just dumb enough to passively accept their situation.

If work is so terrific, how come they have to pay you to do it?

I've begun worshipping the sun for a number of reasons. First of all, unlike some other gods I could mention, I can see the sun. It's there for me every day. And the things it brings me are quite apparent all the time: heat, light, food, and a lovely day. There's no mystery, no one asks for money, I don't have to dress up, and there's no boring pageantry. And interestingly enough, I have found that the prayers I offer to the sun and the prayers I formerly offered to "God" are all answered at about the same 50% rate.

Isn’t it a bit unnerving that doctors call what they do “practice”?

Some people try to get out of jury duty by lying. You don't have to lie. Tell the judge the truth. Tell him you'd make a terrific juror because you can spot guilty people.

Language is a tool for concealing the truth. If we could read each other's minds, this would be a horror show.

If you try to fail, and succeed, which have you done?

... the important thing is to, first of all, question everything you read or hear or see or are told. Question it, and try to see the world for what it actually is, as opposed to what someone or some company or some organization or some government is trying to represent it as, or present it as, however they've mislabeled it or dressed it up or told you.

Somewhere in the world is a doctor who is worse than all other doctors...and someone has an appointment with him in the morning.

All the media and the politicians ever talk about is things that separate us, things that make us different from one another

Religion is like a pair of shoes.....Find one that fits for you, but don't make me wear your shoes.

When fascism comes to America, it will not be in brown and black shirts. It will not be with jack-boots. It will be Nike sneakers and Smiley shirts. Germany lost the Second World War. Fascism won it. Believe me, my friend.

If you're looking for self-help, why would you read a book written by somebody else?

They're only words. You can't be afraid of words that speak the truth, even if it's an unpleasant truth.

I've set my own rules to live by. The first one is: 'Never believe ANYthing the government says.'

I knew a transsexual guy whose only ambition is to eat, drink, and be Mary.

We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often.

We are a nation of sheep, and someone else owns the grass.

You're all going to die. I hate to remind you, but it is on your schedule. It probably won't happen when you'd like; generally, it's an inconvenience.

Life is a near-death experience.

Life is sacred? Who said so, God? Hey, if you read history you'll realize that God is one of the leading causes of death...has been for thousands of years. Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Jews, all taking turns killing each other because God told them it was a good idea.

Not only do I not know what's going on, I wouldn't know what to do about it if I did.

I have a suggestion that I think would help fight serious crime. Signs. There are lots of signs for minor infractions: No Smoking, Stay Off the Grass, Keep Out, and they seem to work fairly well. I think we should also have signs for major crimes: Murder Strictly Prohibited, NO Raping People, Thank You for Not Kidnapping Anyone. It's certainly worth a try. I'm convinced Watergate would never have happened if there had just been a sign in the Oval Office that said, Malfeasance of Office Is Strictly Against the Law, or Thank You for Not Undermining the Constitution.

The real reason that we can’t have the Ten Commandments in a courthouse: You cannot post “Thou shalt not steal,” “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” and “Thou shalt not lie” in a building full of lawyers, judges, and politicians. It creates a hostile work environment.

You know what they want? They want obedient workers. Obedient workers, people who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork. And just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime and vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it. And now they're coming for your Social Security money. They want your f**kin' retirement money. They want it back so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street.

We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values.

That's why they call it the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it.

The god excuse, the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument.

Conservatives say if you don't give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they've lost all incentive because we've given them too much money.

There's a humorous side to every situation. The challenge is to find it.

The word bipartisan usually means some larger-than-usual deception is being carried out.

What if there were no hypothetical questions?

We kind of shape our truths as we speak them. We fashion things to suit the occasion or the person or our own needs in the moment.

Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.

What exactly is 'viewer discretion'? If viewers had discretion, most television shows would not be on the air.

Why do they bother saying "raw sewage"? Do some people actually cook that stuff?

I often warn people: "Somewhere along the way, someone is going to tell you, 'There is no "I" in team.' What you should tell them is, 'Maybe not. But there is an "I" in independence, individuality and integrity.

If God created everything, he's got a serious quality control problem.

The IQ and the life expectancy of the average American recently passed each other in opposite directions.

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

There is nothing wrong with the planet. The planet is fine ... been here 4 1/2 billion years. We've been here, what, a 100,000 years, maybe 200,000. And we've only been engaged in heavy industry a little over 200 years. 200 years versus 4 1/2 billion. And we have the conceit to think that somehow we're a threat? The planet isn't going away. We are.

Environmentalists changed the word jungle to rain forest, because no one would give them money to save a jungle. Same with swamps and wetlands.

Even in a fake democracy, people ought to get what they want once in a while.

Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

To my way of thinking, there is every bit as much evidence for the existence of UFOs as there is for the existence of God. Probably far more. At least in the case of UFOs there have been countless taped and filmed and, by the way, unexplained sightings from all over the world, along with documented radar evidence seen by experienced military and civilian radar operators.>&gt.

Keep in mind, the news media are not independent; they are a sort of bulletin board and public relations firm for the ruling class-the people who run things. Those who decide what news you will or will not hear are paid by, and tolerated purely at the whim of, those who hold economic power. If the parent corporation doesn't want you to know something, it won't be on the news. Period. Or, at the very least, it will be slanted to suit them, and then rarely followed up.

Did you ever stop to thnk about all the people we kill? They're always people who tell us to live together in harmony and try to love one another: Jesus, Ghandi, Lincoln, John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, John Lennon. They all said: 'Try to live together peacefully.' BAM! Right in the f--in head! Aparently we're not ready for that!

People are wonderful. I love individuals. I hate groups of people. I hate a group of people with a 'common purpose'. 'Cause pretty soon they have little hats. And armbands. And fight songs. And a list of people they're going to visit at 3am. So, I dislike and despise groups of people but I love individuals. Every person you look at; you can see the universe in their eyes, if you're really looking.

Some people see the glass half full. Others see it half empty. I see a glass that's twice as big as it needs to be.

The only person who is with us our entire life, is ourselves.

Looking back, I realize that my life has been a series of incidents where one person has said to another, "Get this asshole outta here!"

Something is wrong. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, crime, torture, corruption and the ice capades. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed. This is not what you expect to find on the resume of a supreme being. It's what you expect from an office temp with a bad attitude.

Medical researchers have discovered a new disease that has no symptoms. It is impossible to detect, and there is no known cure. Fortunately, no cases have been reported thus far.

I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions.

If honesty were suddenly introduced into American life, the whole system would collapse.

Future historians will be able to study at the Jimmy Carter Library, the Gerald Ford Library, the Ronald Reagan Library, and the Bill Clinton Adult Bookstore.

Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breaths away.

There's a reason education sucks, and it's the same reason it will never ever ever be fixed. It's never going to get any better. Don't look for it. Be happy with what you've got, because the owners of this country don't want that. I'm talking about the real owners now... the real owners. The big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don't. You have no choice. You have owners.

My first rule: I don't believe anything the government tells me.

The main reason Santa is so jolly is because he knows where all the bad girls live.

There is a planet named Pluto, but we don't have one named Goofy. Goofy would be a good name for this planet. It certainly qualifies.

Everyone smiles in the same language.

I wanted to get a job as a gynecologist, but I couldn't find an opening.

Oh Beautiful for smoggy skies, insecticided grain, For strip-mined mountain's majesty above the asphalt plain. America, America, man sheds his waste on thee, And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea.

Censorship that comes from the outside assumes about people an inability to make reasoned choices.

"No comment" is a comment.

If you vote and you elect dishonest, incompetent people into office who screw everything up, you are responsible for what they have done. You caused the problem; you voted them in; you have no right to complain

Military cemeteries around the world are packed with brainwashed dead soldiers who were convinced God was on their side. America prays for God to destroy our enemies. Our enemies pray for God to destroy us. Somebody's gonna be disappointed! Somebody's wasting their time! Could it be.. everyone?

I, myself, have killed six people. All random, all undetected, no way to trace them to me. And, let me tell you, there's nothin' like it. It's a great feeling. Yeah, I know, you're thinking. 'Aw, he's a comedian. He's just sayin' that stuff.' Good. That's exactly what I want you to think.