<= Previous | March Issues Index | Next =>
Quotes of the Day for 13 March 2005 - Apathy

Early in the morning of this day in 1964 a slender 28-year-old woman parked her car twenty feet from her front door and was assaulted by a stranger. He stabbed her, she screamed for help, and he fled. Five minutes later he returned, stabbed her again and beat her. He drove off, leaving her lying against her building, but came back again to rape her and stab her again. In a quiet middle-class neighborhood in Queens, New York, no less than 38 neighbors heard or saw some part of the assault on Kitty Genovese before one picked up the phone to call police. She probably would still be alive today if officers had arrived after the first or second attack. The neighbors didn't want to get involved, some thought that someone else must have already called. Am I my brother's keeper, or am I as apathetic as those 37 men and women?

Callous, adj. Gifted with great fortitude to bear the evils afflicting another.
     - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, 1881 - 1906

Science may have found a cure for most evils, but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all - the apathy of human beings.
     - Helen Keller, 1880 - 1968

The difference between our decadence and the Russians' is that while theirs is brutal, ours is apathetic.
     - James Grover Thurber, 1894 - 1981

Apathy is one of the characteristic responses of any living organism when it is subjected to stimuli too intense or too complicated to cope with. The cure for apathy is comprehension.
     - John Dos Passos, 1896 - 1970

Man watches his history on the screen with apathy and an occasional passing flicker of horror or indignation.
     - Conor Cruise O'Brien

Slums may well be breeding-grounds of crime, but middle-class suburbs are incubators of apathy and delirium.
     - Cyril Connolly, 1903 - 1974

Would you like to see quotes like these in your mail tomorrow morning? Our 10,000 loyal subscribers hate to miss a day, perhaps you should sign up now! No cost or obligation, just be open to the enlightenment waiting for you among our 22,500+ quotes.