Defending The Indefensible Quotes

Charity is the power of defending that which we know to be indefensible. Hope is the power of being cheerful in circumstances which we know to be desperate. It is true that there is a state of hope which belongs to bright prospects and the morning; but that is not the virtue of hope. The virtue of hope exists only in earthquake and eclipse. It is true that there is a thing crudely called charity, which means charity to the deserving poor; but charity to the deserving is not charity at all, but justice. It is the undeserving who require it, and the ideal either does not exist at all, or exists wholly for them. For practical purposes it is at the hopeless moment that we require the hopeful man, and the virtue either does not exist at all, or begins to exist at that moment. Exactly at the instant when hope ceases to be reasonable it begins to be useful.

I'm not religious, and I'm not a Christian, but I do reserve the right to believe in the possibility of a God. It's kind of defending the indefensible, though; I'm critical of what religions are becoming, the more destructive they're becoming. But I think as an artist, particularly, it's a necessary part of what I do, that there is some divine element going on within my songs.

If you accept – and I do – that freedom of speech is important, then you are going to have to defend the indefensible. That means you are going to be defending the right of people to read, or to write, or to say, what you don’t say or like or want said. The Law is a huge blunt weapon that does not and will not make distinctions between what you find acceptable and what you don’t. This is how the Law is made. People making art find out where the limits of free expression are by going beyond them and getting into trouble. [...] The Law is a blunt instrument. It’s not a scalpel. It’s a club. If there is something you consider indefensible, and there is something you consider defensible, and the same laws can take them both out, you are going to find yourself defending the indefensible.

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenseless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements.

When someone reacts violently and aggressively, it only goes to demonstrate the lack of truth, trust and confidence in oneself and issue that we are defending. It rather portrays the guilt, shame and self anger for defending the indefensible.

Whatever it was that people experience in Jesus has today come to be identified with medieval doctrines based on premodern assumptions that are no longer believable. That identification means that serious theological discussion seems to accomplish little more than to erect a division between the shouters and the disinterested. Jesus becomes the captive of the hysterically religious, the chronically fearful, the insecure and even the neurotic among us, or he becomes little more than a fading memory, the symbol of an age that is no more and a nostalgic reminder of our believing past. To me neither option is worth pursuing. Yet even understanding these things, I am still attracted to this Jesus and I will pursue him both relentlessly and passionately. I will not surrender the truth I believe I find in him either to those who seek to defend the indefensible or to those who want to be freed finally from premodern ideas that no longer make any sense.

political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness.

In our country, we don’t swear an oath to an individual, or a political party. We take our oath to defend the United States Constitution. And that oath must mean something. Tonight, I say this to my Republican colleagues who are defending the indefensible: There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain.

Doubt was nothing more than an epistemological humility: a deep and practical awareness that outside our sphere of knowledge there existed information and experiences that might show our position to be in error. Doubt causes us to hold a strong position a bit more loosely, such that an acknowledgment of ignorance or error doesn't crush our sense of self or leave us totally unmoored if our position proves untenable. Certainty is the opposite: it hampers inquiry and hinders growth. It teaches us to ignore evidence that contradicts our ideas, and encourages us to defend our position at all costs, even as it reveals itself as indefensible. Certainty sees compromise as weak, hypocritical, evil, suppressing empathy and allowing us to justify inflicting horrible pain on others.

The argument that a particular project will be "self-financing" is usually the first refuge of politicians defending the indefensible.

No more junk talk, no more lies. No more mornings in the hospital getting bad blood drained out of me. No more doctors trying to analyse what makes me a drug addict. No more futile attempts at trying to control my heroin use. No more defending myself when I know I am practically indefensible. No more police using me as practice. No more ODs, no more losses. No more trying to take an intellectual position on my heroin addiction when it takes more than it gives. No more dope-sick mornings, no more slow suicide, no more pain without end. No more AA. No more NA. No more mind control. No more being a victim, no more looking for reasons in childhood, in God in anything but what exists in HERE. No more admitting I am powerless. Down the dusty Los Angeles sidewalks, down the urine stained London back alleys … there goes the connection fading into the crowd like a 1960’s Polaroid. “Business…?” “Whachoo need…?” “Chiva…?

We have to touch such men, not with a bargepole, but with a benediction,” he said. “We have to say the word that will save them from hell. We alone are left to deliver them from despair when your human charity deserts them. Go on your own primrose path pardoning all your favourite vices and being generous to your fashionable crimes; and leave us in the darkness, vampires of the night, to console those who really need consolation; who do things really indefensible, things that neither the world nor they themselves can defend; and none but a priest will pardon. Leave us with the men who commit the mean and revolting and real crimes; mean as St. Peter when the cock crew, and yet the dawn came.

To defend the indefensible, George Orwell once observed, political figures employ language that consists largely of “euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness.

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness.

Tell me what it is that man can build, to protect himself, which other men cannot destroy? What are we trying to defend? Only what is old, useless, dead, indefensible. Every defense is a provocation to assault. Why not surrender? Why not give—give all? It’s so damned practical, so thoroughly effective and disarming.

Doubt causes us to hold a strong position a bit more loosely, such that an acknowledgment of ignorance or error doesn’t crush our sense of self or leave us totally unmoored if our position proves untenable. Certainty is the opposite: it hampers inquiry and hinders growth. It teaches us to ignore evidence that contradicts our ideas, and encourages us to defend our position at all costs, even as it reveals itself as indefensible.

Well, nobody’s perfect; all are sinners; remember King David” can be used to defend the indefensible. Such an argument, when applied to the ministry, nullifies the biblical character qualifications of 1 Timothy 2–3 and elsewhere. And, when applied to oneself, can justify literally anything. “Even if I embezzle a little from my company, we’re all sinners.” “I cheat on my spouse a little, but Jesus said lust is adultery of the heart, so who hasn’t?” This is precisely the kind of argument the Bible says is a contradiction of the gospel itself (Rom. 3:1–8).

Charity means pardoning what is unpardonable, or it is no virtue at all. Hope means hoping when things are hopeless, or it is no virtue at all. And faith means believing the incredible, or it is no virtue at all. It is somewhat amusing, indeed, to notice the difference between the fate of these three paradoxes in the fashion of the modern mind. Charity is a fashionable virtue in our time; it is lit up by the gigantic firelight of Dickens. Hope is a fashionable virtue to-day; our attention has been arrested for it by the sudden and silver trumpet of Stevenson. But faith is unfashionable, and it is customary on every side to cast against it the fact that it is a paradox. Everybody mockingly repeats the famous childish definition that faith is “the power of believing that which we know to be untrue.” Yet it is not one atom more paradoxical than hope or charity. Charity is the power of defending that which we know to be indefensible. Hope is the power of being cheerful in circumstances which we know to be desperate. It is true that there is a state of hope which belongs to bright prospects and the morning; but that is not the virtue of hope. The virtue of hope exists only in earthquake and, eclipse. It is true that there is a thing crudely called charity, which means charity to the deserving poor; but charity to the deserving is not charity at all, but justice. It is the undeserving who require it, and the ideal either does not exist at all, or exists wholly for them. For practical purposes it is at the hopeless moment that we require the hopeful man, and the virtue either does not exist at all, or begins to exist at that moment. Exactly at the instant when hope ceases to be reasonable it begins to be useful.

Doubt was nothing more than epistemological humility: a deep and practical awareness that outside our sphere of knowledge there existed information and experiences that might show our position to be in error. Doubt causes us to hold a strong position a bit more loosely, such that an acknowledgment of ignorance or error doesn’t crush our sense of self or leave us totally unmoored if our position proves untenable. Certainty is the opposite: it hampers inquiry and hinders growth. It teaches us to ignore evidence that contradicts our ideas, and encourages us to defend our position at all costs, even as it reveals itself as indefensible.

Leader: What right do we have to dine at the Table of Jesus? Family: We have every right to dine at his Table. Leader: What gives us this right? Family: We have this right because Jesus came not for the strong, but for the weak; not for the righteous, but for sinners; not for the self-sufficient, but for those who know they need rescue. To all who are weary and need rest; to all who mourn and long for comfort; to all who feel worthless and wonder if God even cares; to all who are weak and frail and desire strength; to all who sin and need a Savior—Jesus welcomes into his circle, adopts into his family, and reserves a place at his Table. For he is the mighty friend of sinners, the ally of his enemies, the defender of the indefensible, and the justifier of those who have no excuses left.7

Alberto’s predicament dramatizes a core principle: making a statement to the police is never --never --in a criminal defendant’s interest. Talking to the cops is generally a bad idea, even if you’re the one who called them. This is true whether you are Martha Stewart, who secured a jail term when she foolishly decided to make a voluntary statement to the authorities, or Alberto, who fancied himself a clever jailhouse lawyer, confident that he could get even by manipulating the cops. It is one of the few things that every criminal lawyer will agree on: in the crucible of police interrogation, the police will always win.

Charity is the power of defending that which we know to be indefensible... It is true that there is a thing crudely called charity, which means charity to the deserving poor; but charity to the deserving is not charity at all, but justice. It is the undeserving who require it, and the ideal either does not exist at all, or exists wholly for them.

But it should be Soon. Already I defend hotly Certain of our indefensible faults, Resent being reminded; already in my mind Our language becomes freighted with a richness No common tongue could offer, while the mountains Are like nowhere on earth, and the wide rivers.

He's like a drug to me. There's no point in me trying to defend this. It's indefensible. But I can't keep away from him.

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things ... can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness…. Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them.

There was, again, another poetic element entirely peculiar to Tennyson, which his critics have, in many cases, ridiculously confused with a fault. This was the fact that Tennyson stood alone among modern poets in the attempt to give a poetic character to the conception of Liberal Conservatism, of splendid compromise. The carping critics who have abused Tennyson for this do not see that it was far more daring and original for a poet to defend conventionality than to defend a cart-load of revolutions. His really sound and essential conception of Liberty, "Turning to scorn with lips divine The falsehood of extremes," is as good a definition of Liberalism as has been uttered in poetry in the Liberal century. Moderation is not a compromise; moderation is a passion; the passion of great judges. That Tennyson felt that lyrical enthusiasm could be devoted to established customs, to indefensible and ineradicable national constitutions, to the dignity of time and the empire of unutterable common sense, all this did not make him a tamer poet, but an infinitely more original one. Any poetaster can describe a thunderstorm; it requires a poet to describe the ancient and quiet sky.

[W]hat concerns me more than a potentially slippery slope is that our Church's brightest people (especially the young) will increasingly abandon their faith if we let our worries get the best of us and back them into the corner of having to defend the indefensible by forcing them to reject evolution.

However nothing can excuse Cromwell’s extreme cruelty in Ireland. No matter what his medical condition, the savagery at Drogheda shocked even his most faithful followers. Even some of his commanders, including old campaigners like Ludlow, thought the slaughter at Drogheda “extraordinary”. Cromwell admitted in a letter to Lenthall that he personally had led the charge on Mill Mount, although quarter had already been given and revoked by himself at the last minute. He also ordered the firing of St Peter’s Church steeple in which one hundred people were sheltering. His excuse for all this bloodletting was to instil terror and thus save lives. “The enemy were filled with much terror. And truly I believe this bitterness will save much blood through the goodness of God.” Another reason he gave for the savagery at Drogheda was that it was a “righteous judgement of God upon these barbarous wretches, who have imbrued their hands in so much innocent blood”. Cromwell’s third excuse for the slaying of the garrison was that it was the law of war. If the defenders of a fortress which had been summoned to surrender had refused, they then had no claim to mercy, the more so if the fortress was patently indefensible.

While the US stumped for the Bosnians, Russians defended the interests of Milošević (as distinct from the Bosnian Serb leader) and Germans supported Croats. .....Srebrenica itself was indefensible as Izetbegović admitted to a senior UN official 22 Sep 1994. ....Silajdžić indicated that if the Serbs traded Sarajevo for the enclaves he would be prepared to go to Srebrenica and explain to the people that they had to leave. ....The envoy said Izetbegović was ready to discuss a trade-off of the eastern enclaves for Sarajevo on the condition that Milošević was prepared to recognize BiH. Although the Bosnian government and Western gov all privately admitted that ultimately Srebrenica and Žepa would go to the Serbs, no government was prepared to be seen publicly making territorial deals with the Serbs. After all, would not such a move be perceived as a rewarding of the ethnic cleansing and aggression? Dilemma was especially acute for countries where public opinion was strongly anti-Serbian - post pointedly the US, Germany and NL. .... Clinton administration in particular did not want to be publicly associated with any diplomatic proposal that ceded the enclaves to the Serbs.

Doubt was nothing more than epistemological humility: a deep and practical awareness that outside our sphere of knowledge there existed information and experiences that might show our position to be in error. Doubt causes us to hold a strong position a bit more loosely, such that an acknowledgment of ignorance or error doesn’t crush our sense of self or leave us totally unmoored if our position proves untenable. Certainty is the opposite: it hampers inquiry and hinders growth. It teaches us to ignore evidence that contradicts our ideas, and encourages us to defend our position at all costs, even as it reveals itself as indefensible. Certainty sees compromise as weak, hypocritical, evil, suppressing empathy and allowing us to justify inflicting horrible pain on

This much is sure: as the humanemeconomy asserts its own power, it's own logic, and it's essential decency, an an older order is passing away, and the near-universal reaction to each new step will be "good riddance." By every measure, life will be better when human satisfaction and need are no longer built upon the foundation of animal cruelty, Indefensible practices will no longer need defending; unnecessary evils will no longer need excuses. In their place, in market after market, we'll see the products of human creativity inspired by human compassion, a combination that can solve any problem and overcome any wrong.

Politics and the English Language Orwell says the following on the use of euphemism by politicians: In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenseless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers.