Jane Jacobs - American Quotes

10 Sourced Quotes

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Not TV or illegal drugs but the automobile has been the chief destroyer of American communities.

Jane Jacobs
I was taught that the American's right to be a free individual, not at the mercy of the state, was hard-won and that its price was eternal vigilance, that I too would have to be vigilant. I was made to feel that it would be a disgrace to me, as an individual, if I should not value or should give up rights that were dearly bought. I am grateful for that upbringing.

Jane Jacobs
We must demonstrate that it is possible to overcome poverty, misery and decay by democratic means, and we must ourselves believe, and must show others, that our American tradition of the dignity and liberty of the individual is not a luxury for easy times but is the basic source of the strength and security of a successful society.

Jane Jacobs
Privately run jails are a mark of American "reinvented government" that has been picked up by neoconservatives in Canada.

Jane Jacobs
I was brought up to believe that there is no virtue in conforming meekly to the dominant opinion of the moment. I was encouraged to believe that simple conformity results in stagnation for a society, and that American progress has been largely owing to the opportunity for experimentation, the leeway given initiative, and to a gusto and a freedom for chewing over odd ideas.

Jane Jacobs
There are dangers in sentimentalizing nature. Most sentimental ideas imply, at bottom, a deep if unacknowledged disrespect. It is no accident that we Americans, probably the world's champion sentimentalizers about nature, are at one and the same time probably the world's most voracious and disrespectful destroyers of wild and rural countryside.

Jane Jacobs
Credentialing, not education, has become the primary business of North American universities.

Jane Jacobs
There are still an awful lot of intelligent, clever constructive Americans, and they are still doing clever constructive things.

Jane Jacobs
I think that may be the biggest difference between Americans and people elsewhere. Unlike Americans, Canadians know that there are places just as real as Canada. It's a self-centeredness that's a very strange thing.

Jane Jacobs
Americans don't really think that other places are as real as America.

Jane Jacobs