Fairness Quotes

“Equality is not a concept. It's not something we should be striving for. It's a necessity. Equality is like gravity. We need it to stand on this earth as men and women, and the misogyny that is in every culture is not a true part of the human condition. It is life out of balance, and that imbalance is sucking something out of the soul of every man and woman who's confronted with it. We need equality. Kinda now.”
― Joss Whedon

“The world isn't fair, Calvin."
"I know Dad, but why isn't it ever unfair in my favor?”
― Bill Watterson, The Essential Calvin and Hobbes: A Calvin and Hobbes Treasury

“We don't need to be good. But let's try to be fair.”
― Holly Black, The Cruel Prince

“Death is the fairest thing in the world. No one's ever gotten out of it. The earth takes everyone - the kind, the cruel, the sinners. Aside from that, there's no fairness on earth.”
― Svetlana Aleksievich, Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster

“I am a person who is unhappy with things as they stand. We cannot accept the world as it is. Each day we should wake up foaming at the mouth because of the injustice of things.”
― Hugo Claus

“Sooner or later in life, we will all take our own turn being in the position we once had someone else in.”
― Ashly Lorenzana

“Being good is easy, what is difficult is being just.”
― Victor Hugo

“Until every soul is freely permitted to investigate every book, and creed, and dogma for itself, the world cannot be free. Mankind will be enslaved until there is mental grandeur enough to allow each man to have his thought and say. This earth will be a paradise when men can, upon all these questions differ, and yet grasp each other's hands as friends. It is amazing to me that a difference of opinion upon subjects that we know nothing with certainty about, should make us hate, persecute, and despise each other. Why a difference of opinion upon predestination, or the trinity, should make people imprison and burn each other seems beyond the comprehension of man; and yet in all countries where Christians have existed, they have destroyed each other to the exact extent of their power. Why should a believer in God hate an atheist? Surely the atheist has not injured God, and surely he is human, capable of joy and pain, and entitled to all the rights of man. Would it not be far better to treat this atheist, at least, as well as he treats us?

Christians tell me that they love their enemies, and yet all I ask is—not that they love their enemies, not that they love their friends even, but that they treat those who differ from them, with simple fairness.

We do not wish to be forgiven, but we wish Christians to so act that we will not have to forgive them. If all will admit that all have an equal right to think, then the question is forever solved; but as long as organized and powerful churches, pretending to hold the keys of heaven and hell, denounce every person as an outcast and criminal who thinks for himself and denies their authority, the world will be filled with hatred and suffering. To hate man and worship God seems to be the sum of all the creeds.”
― Robert G. Ingersoll, Some Mistakes of Moses

“Fairness does not mean everyone gets the same. Fairness means everyone gets what they need.”
― Rick Riordan, The Red Pyramid

“Nothing is fair in this world. You might as well get that straight right now”
― Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees

“In case of dissension, never dare to judge till you've heard the other side.”
― Euripides, The Children of Herakles

“I will never deny that life isn't fair. It seems as though when a woman leaves a man she is strong and independent, but when a man leaves a woman he is a pig and a jerk.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“Equality is treating everyone the same. But equity is taking differences into account, so everyone has a chance to succeed.”
― Jodi Picoult, Small Great Things

“To expect life to treat you good is foolish as hoping a bull won't hit you because you are a vegetarian.”
― Roseanne Barr

“In the end we are always rewarded for our good will, our patience, fair-mindedness, and gentleness with what is strange.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

“Live your life in such a way that you'll be remembered for your kindness, compassion, fairness, character, benevolence, and a force for good who had much respect for life, in general.”
― Germany Kent

“Have you noticed how difficult it is just to get along in the world? If you're no good at all in your job, people treat you badly and eventually you will be unemployed. And if you're a little better than competent, everyone expects miracles from you, every single time. Like most of life, it's a no-win situation. And if you dare to mention it, no matter how creatively you phrase your complaints, you are shunned as a whiner.”
― Jeff Lindsay, Dexter Is Delicious

“Let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarcy, that in America the law is King. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other.”
― Thomas Paine

“I mean, I really do think that love is the best thing in the world, except for cough drops. But I also have to say, for the umpty-umpth time, that life isn't fair. It's just fairer than death, that's all.”
― William Goldman, The Princess Bride

“Armed neutrality makes it much easier to detect hypocrisy.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“The guest will judge better of a feast than the cook”
― Aristotle

“Do not complain of life's unfairness. It is never fair - at best it is impartial.”
― David Gemmell, Lion of Macedon

“Everyone cares about fairness, but there are two major kinds. On the left, fairness often implies equality, but on the right it means proportionality —people should be rewarded in proportion to what they contribute, even if that guarantees unequal outcomes.”
― Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion

“We need to defend the interests of those whom we've never met and never will.”
― Jeffrey D. Sachs

“Satire's nature is to be one-sided, contemptuous of ambiguity, and so unfairly selective as to find in the purity of ridicule an inarguable moral truth.”
― E. L. Doctorow

“You could say to the universe this is not fair. And the universe would say: Oh, isn’t it? Sorry.”
― Terry Pratchett, Interesting Times

“We are way less likely to love someone just because they love us than we are to hate someone just because they hate us.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“What's fair ain't necessarily right.”
― Toni Morrison, Beloved

“How can you expect humans to be fair, if life itself is unfair!”
― Mouloud Benzadi

“Teach all men to fish, but first teach all men to be fair. Take less, give more. Give more of yourself, take less from the world. Nobody owes you anything, you owe the world everything.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem