Mean quotes
28K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Explore further
Browse quotes that often appear alongside mean — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
Quote collection
Follow a thought to its author, or read the full quote page.
"Without [diversion] we would be in a state of weariness, and this weariness would spur us on to seek a more solid means of escaping from it. But diversion amuses us, and leads us unconsciously to death."
"The present is never the mark of our designs. We use both past and present as our means and instruments, but the future only as our object and aim."
"Some vices only lay hold of us by means of others, and these, like branches, fall on removal of the trunk."
"Facts are neutral until human beings add their own meaning to those facts. People make their decisions based on what the facts mean to them, not on the facts themselves. The meaning they add to facts depends on their current story … facts are not terribly useful to influencing others. People don’t need new facts—they need a new story."
"The band has always been such a huge part of my life and it kept me very busy. That, in combination with something like running a record label, just means my whole life revolves completely around metal music and I can't do that anymore."
"Being an evil dude: You create this false identity of who you really are and hide behind that as a means to deal with your peers and to hide behind your social awkwardness and inabilities and inadequacies."
"Too much of nothing, it just makes a fellow mean."
"In the long run, greater investment would mean greater productivity and income growth."
"Freedom of speech does not mean that you have to agree with everything that a comedian says, but that comedian should have the freedom to be able to try to make that funny. It's the attempt that I'm trying to defend so hard, no necessarily the execution."
"I admire ventriloquists, because I can't do that. I mean, I might get mistaken for a ventriloquist dummy every now and then, but I can't do what they do."
"Yeah, people do need to realize that just because they've seen me perform for an hour does not mean that we are now close."
"I don't want to be mean. I try not to be."
"I don't think I'm extremely intelligent by any means."
"I try not to be mean for the sake of being mean, and if I do do a joke or a tweet or something that is at someone's expense - and those are my fine lines; obviously they're there - I want it to be something that's pretty much across the board we all as a society agree this is bad."
"Well for me, courage means having the courage to walk off the edge of what is known, with complete faith that you're not going to go crashing to the bottom. Stepping outside of your own self-perceived boundaries and limitations."
"I mean I do whatever I need to do to get into character. Sometimes it's being incredibly quiet and sometimes it's being loose and goofy."
"I'd like to widen my education. I'd definitely like to widen my film range. I mean, I'd love to do some theater."
"I fell, you see. Trod on my abbot, Father Habit. Oh, dear! I mean."
"The alternative to intellectual property is straightforward: intellectual products should not be owned, as in the case of everyday language. That means not owned by individuals, corporations, governments, or the community as common property. It means that ideas are available to be used by anyone who wants to."
"I think having simplicity doesn't always mean that you make a good movie. I have a theory that a movie that's easy to make is hard to watch."
