C. Wright Mills

Sociologist

1916-08-28

Quotes by C. Wright Mills

• Once war was considered the business of soldiers, international relations the concern of diplomats. But now that war has become seemingly total and seemingly permanent, the free sport of kings has become the forced and internecine business of people, and diplomatic codes of honor between nations have collapsed. Peace in no longer serious; only war is serious. Every man and every nation is either friend or foe, and the idea of enmity becomes mechanical, massive, and without genuine passion. When virtually all negotiation aimed at peaceful agreement is likely to be seen as 'appeasement,' if not treason, the active role of the diplomat becomes meaningless; for diplomacy becomes merely a prelude to war an interlude between wars, and in such a context the diplomat is replaced by the warlord.

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• P6-the sociological imagination enables us to grasp history and biography and the relations between the two within sociey.

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• P6-the sociological imagination enables us to grasp history and biography and the relations between the two within sociey.

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• Once war was considered the business of soldiers, international relations the concern of diplomats. But now that war has become seemingly total and seemingly permanent, the free sport of kings has become the forced and internecine business of people, and diplomatic codes of honor between nations have collapsed. Peace in no longer serious; only war is serious. Every man and every nation is either friend or foe, and the idea of enmity becomes mechanical, massive, and without genuine passion. When virtually all negotiation aimed at peaceful agreement is likely to be seen as 'appeasement,' if not treason, the active role of the diplomat becomes meaningless; for diplomacy becomes merely a prelude to war an interlude between wars, and in such a context the diplomat is replaced by the warlord.

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• Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both.

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• Power is not of a man. Wealth does not center in the person of the wealthy. Celebrity is not inherent in any personality. To be celebrated, to be wealthy, to have power requires access to major institutions.

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• The aim of the college, for the individual student, is to eliminate the need in his life for the college; the task is to help him become a self-educating man.

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• The mass production of distraction is now as much a part of the American way of life as the mass production of automobiles.

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• The aim of college, for the individual student, is to eliminate the need in his life for the college; the task is to help him become a self-educating man.

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• Fate has to do with events in history that are the summary and unintended results of innumerable decisions of innumerable men.

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• Much work is merely a way to make money; much leisure is merely a way to spend it.

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• When white-collar people get jobs, they sell not only their time and energy, but their personalities as well. They sell by the week, or month, their smiles and their kindly gestures, and they must practice that prompt repression of resentment and aggression.

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