Quotes: Race. Radical. Rage. Rationalism. Rationality. Rationalizing.

A collection of quotes on various topics. The sentence in bold face is a plain statement of the quote that follows.

Race
WWII asked blacks to fight a Nazi master race in defense of rights denied them by their own master race.
Race 844 For that war [WWII] called on the American Negro to fight the idea of a master race in defense of rights denied them by their own master race. Schlesinger, A Thousand Days

We judge groups by their least worthy members.
Race 25 There is a tendency to judge a race, a nation or any distinct group by its least worthy members. Hoffer, The True Believer

Racism disappears when we see people as individuals.
Racism 362 As time passed in pro ball, more African Americans became distinct individuals to me. Bradley, Time Present, Time Past.

Racism is seeing people as a color rather than as distinct personalities.
Racism 362 …I often saw other people reacting to my teammates because of their skin color and not the quality of their personalities, and then I became deeply offended. Bradley, Time Present, Time Past.

If you’re black in America you never know when the next moment will bring a slight, insult or fist.
Racism 363 I saw that if you’re black in America you never know when the next moment might bring a slight, a slur, or a slug. Bradley, Time Present, Time Past.

Blacks are tense, always on guard against racist words or actions.
Racism 364 I sensed the tension created [anticipating racist words or actions] by always being on-guard, by never totally relaxing. Bradley, Time Present, Time Past.

We think poverty exists in black communities because black people are unwilling to work or incompetent, but impoverished whites outnumber poor black people by thirteen million.
Racism 373 Racial thinking obstructs America from seeing how to reduce poverty, because many in the white majority view many blacks as undeserving and unwilling to work…but…poor white people outnumber poor black people by thirteen million. Bradley, Time Present, Time Past.

America will begin to reach its potential when we see beyond race to the uniqueness of each person.
Racism 393 The more we can see beyond color to the uniqueness of each person, the clearer we can see the reflection of our national potential. Bradley, Time Present, Time Past.

Radical
Radicals and reactionaries despise the present.
Radical 77 The radical and the reactionary loathe the present. Hoffer, The True Believer

Stability encourages radical thoughts.
Radicalism 80 Radicalism is the luxury of stability. Will Durant, The Story of Philosophy, Aristotle.

Rage
He desires to beat and batter you because he is half fiend.
Rage 218 He trampled on and kicked you, and dashed you on the ground…and his mouth watered to tear you with his teeth; because he’s only half a man…and the rest fiend. E. Brontë, Wuthering Heights.

I would vivisect the two of them as an evening’s entertainment.
Rage 325 Heathcliff: Had I been born where laws are less strict and tastes less dainty, I should treat myself to a slow vivisection of those two, as an evening’s amusement. E. Brontë, Wuthering Heights.

Rationalism
Belief that brilliant, objective people could solve even the most difficult human problems.
Rationalism 99 There was no limit to what brilliant men, untrammeled by ideology and prejudice and partisanship, could do with their minds in solving the world’s problems. Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest.

Rationality
Rationality barely constrains behavior.
Rationality vii …a sense of how slight, how desperately slight is the hold of rationality on the way we behave. Foreword: Cooper. A Random Walk in Science.

People are basically irrational.
Rationality vii …irrationality is our basic natural state. Foreword: Cooper

Rationalizing
Belief that liquidating those unfit for work makes the camp more efficient. [How different from “liquidating” employees by laying them off in order to increase the bottom line?]
Rationalizing 420 The statement made by the Auschwitz detention-camp leader Aumeier in 1942 that prisoners unfit for work had to be liquidated “to lighten the load on the camp” is typical of the cynical yet bureaucratic mentality of the executioners. Bracher, The German Dictatorship

Collaboration was explained as staying on in order to keep things from getting worse.
Rationalizing 432 [Resistance] extends from job resignations, emigration, desertion and suicide to certain forms of collaboration, which was more often summed up by the phrase that one stayed on in office “in order to prevent something worse.” [reasoning] Bracher, The German Dictatorship

The Russian War produced misery for the Germans—who, however, started it.
Rationalizing 475 [Strategy of present-day Nazis]: The letter went on to describe the misery of the Russian war, without, however, saying who was responsible for it… Bracher, The German Dictatorship