Ayaan Hirsi Ali Quote

When a 'Life of Brian' comes out with Muhammad in the lead role, directed by an Arab equival...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

In Holland I have seen well-meaning, principled people blinded by multiculturalism, overwhelmed by t...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I think of Canada, first and foremost, in terms of space. The amount of space available is breathtak...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Every time you take a train, step into your car, walk into the shopping mall, go to the airport - ev...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

People ask me if I have some kind of death wish, to keep saying the things I do. The answer is no: I...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Of course, the overwhelming majority of Muslims are not terrorists or sympathetic to terrorists. Equ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

In 1985 as a teenager in Kenya, I was an adamant member of the Muslim Brotherhood.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I assume the closest members of my family don't actually want to kill me, but the truth is that ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Tolerance of intolerance is cowardice.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

The people who believe themselves to be on the left, and who defend the agents of Islam in the name ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Young people, some of whom are not born into the faith, are being fired up by preachers using basic ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

When a 'Life of Brian' comes out with Muhammad in the lead role, directed by an Arab equivalent of T...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

They decided to let immigrants in and I am an immigrant. They gave us a chance to participate in thi...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

If we don't take effective measures now, the Netherlands could be torn between two extreme rights.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

If such a young nation as the U.S. could make it to superpower status, we could do it as well.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I would rather clean than beg.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I do not believe in God, angels and the hereafter.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I confront the European elite's self-image as tolerant 'while under their noses women are living lik...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Every time I went on TV I got a threat.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Avoiding offense means that we don't accept each other as equals.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

My conscience is informed by reason. It's like Kant's categorical imperative: behave to othe...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

My first experience in the Netherlands was very pleasant, extremely pleasant. I mean, I got my resid...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

The liberal psyche wants to protect minorities, to apologize for imperialism, colonialism, slavery, ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Of course, the overwhelming majority of Muslims are not terrorists or sympathetic to terrorists. Equ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I'd like Muslims to look at their religion as a set of beliefs that they can appraise critically...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Americans have always welcomed people of all backgrounds, religions, and races. It's a spirit of...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

In a well-functioning democracy, the state constitution is considered more important than God's holy...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

It is always difficult to make the transition to a modern world. I moved from the world of faith to ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Islam was like a mental cage. At first, when you open the door, the caged bird stays inside: it is f...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

It's wrong to treat Muslims as if they will never find their John Stuart Mill. Christianity and ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I was a Muslim once, remember, and it was when I was most devout that I was most full of hate.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

We who don't want radical Islam to spread must compete with the agents of radical Islam. I want ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

My friend, the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, was murdered in 2004 for having been insufficiently re...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I grew up in Somalia, in Saudi Arabia, in Ethiopia, and in Kenya. I came to Europe in 1992, when I w...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I cannot emphasize enough how wrongheaded this is. Withholding criticism and ignoring differences ar...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I see no difference between Islam and Islamism. Islam is defined as submission to the will of Allah,...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I accept that there are multitudes seeking God, seeking meaning, and so on, but if they reject athei...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

With the first commandment, Mohammed tried to imprison common sense. And with the second commandment...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I am not against migration. It is simply pragmatic to restrict migration, while at the same time enc...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Christians - at least Christians in a liberal democracy - have accepted, after Thomas Hobbes, that t...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

When I was in Holland, the idea was, all cultures are equal and all are to be preserved. My idea was...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

If we don't take effective measures now, the Netherlands could be torn between two extreme right...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

When I look at people talking about intersectionality, what I see is the human being magnifying a bi...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

It is easy to be disgruntled if you are denied rights and freedoms to which you feel entitled. But i...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

As a woman you are better off in life earning your own money. You couldn't prevent your husband from...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Here is something I have learned the hard way, but which a lot of well-meaning people in the West ha...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

In April 2006, a Dutch court ordered that I leave my safe-home that I was renting from the State. Th...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Let us recognize that we can no longer tolerate violent oppression of women in the name of religion ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

There's peacetime and there's wartime, and you don't need polarization on wartime issues...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

You'll be pleased to hear, Christopher, that I am no longer a Muslim liberal but an atheist [....] I...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Many people in Europe and the U.S. dispute the thesis that we are living through a clash of civilisa...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I don't have much in me left for Somalia, because the country is so broken, it's not realist...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I am grateful to my father for sending me to school, and that we moved from Somalia to Kenya, where ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Over the course of my life, I have made many transitions - most of them taking me further away from ...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I call myself a liberal - a classical liberal as in John Stuart Mill.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

The only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance is atheism. It is not a creed. Death i...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

I would like to be judged on the validity of my arguments, not as a victim.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

They decided to let immigrants in and I am an immigrant. They gave us a chance to participate in thi...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

A Western woman is not her brother's or her father's property. She's just herself. She c...
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Avoiding offense means that we don't accept each other as equals.
AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Some people tell me it doesn't make any difference -- a green-card holder is the same as a citizen. ...
ALI ALI

I hate to be waiting all my life. Just tell me.
ALI ALI

Working with Bill Cosby was incredible. I was lucky to be a part of that.
TATYANA ALI

Will Smith said if I ever need some help, he was there for me.
TATYANA ALI

I'm doing a play, a musical. The musical follows the Mamma Mia concept. It's my first LA the...
TATYANA ALI

I was only 11 when we filmed the pilot. The idea of a rapper being a star on a sitcom just wasn'...
TATYANA ALI

I never set out to be a role model, but I guess parents like it because I am dedicated to school.
TATYANA ALI

Combine that with the fact that we only had one week to get everything taken care of and to get to k...
TATYANA ALI

Being on Disney, a lot of young people look up to me.
TATYANA ALI

Before high school ended, I started applying to college. It really wasn't even a choice because ...
TATYANA ALI

I'm going to go to school. It doesn't matter what the outcome is as long as I did it. I can ...
TATYANA ALI

Videos are more like photography. It's not as much about trying to tell a story as it is creatin...
TATYANA ALI

Is America truly a democracy? Has America ever been a democracy with the institution of slavery?
TATYANA ALI

I even lived on campus to get the college experience. I had five roommates and I still keep in touch...
TATYANA ALI

I had short hair for a while, but I ended up loving it.
TATYANA ALI

Young women and men who joined the far-left groups did so for the best of reasons. They wanted to ch...
TARIQ ALI

Scandinavia was awash with Maoism in the '70s. Sweden had Maoist groups with a combined membersh...
TARIQ ALI

Those who really value Ukrainian sovereignty should opt for real independence and a positive neutral...
TARIQ ALI

Ralph Miliband was a socialist intellectual of great integrity. He belonged to a generation of socia...
TARIQ ALI

The hostility between India and Pakistan has become a habit to which both the elites have become add...
TARIQ ALI

Political pundits in Delhi and Islamabad have berated the West for its relativism and double-standar...
TARIQ ALI

The only decent daily paper of record in France is the online 'Mediapart,' which exposes gra...
TARIQ ALI

I don't regret what I did in the Sixties. I was young and took myself terribly seriously. In the...
TARIQ ALI

I was never totally what we would now call 'politically correct,' even in my most militant p...
TARIQ ALI

The human voice deployed to recite the Vedas and later aid the temple dancers was paramount before a...
TARIQ ALI

The weakness in traditional Scottish nationalism lay in its own inability to grasp that identity cou...
TARIQ ALI

History rarely repeats itself, but its echoes never go away.
TARIQ ALI

'Theogony' should be read before the great Homeric epics because it gives an account of the ...
TARIQ ALI

I was in my mid-teens when someone gave me a copy of 'Pears Encyclopaedia of Myth and Legends...
TARIQ ALI

Indian classical music was born when time barely existed. It developed further within the structures...
TARIQ ALI

The origins of Indian classical music, not unlike their western counterparts, lie in the Vedas, the ...
TARIQ ALI

In the calculus of western interests, there is no suffering, whatever its scale, which cannot be jus...
TARIQ ALI

Power can shape 'truth,' but not forever.
TARIQ ALI

The only continent where social movements have led to political parties that have pushed through ser...
TARIQ ALI

When I arrived to study at Oxford in October 1963, the bohemian style was black plastic or leather j...
TARIQ ALI

The Greek city-states politicised citizen and subject, creating institutions that were way ahead of ...
TARIQ ALI

Poland, after the First World War, was beset by chaos, disorder, and a foolish incursion by the Red ...
TARIQ ALI

In the Seventies, we still had dreams and hopes of Utopia, but by the end of the decade, the world h...
TARIQ ALI

I am, in general, favourable to activism and social movements and hostile to graft and corruption.
TARIQ ALI

I am a keen observer of my own films; I also try to discover myself through the movies I make.
IMTIAZ ALI

Usually, you lose interest in a story beyond a certain point. But with 'Highway,' there was ...
IMTIAZ ALI

I try to travel as much as I can... I'm always looking for a reason to.
IMTIAZ ALI

I have always tried to make profitable films because people's offices shut down if films fail, a...
IMTIAZ ALI

I'm not the 'look at me' kind of a person. I do not like showing off in public or writte...
IMTIAZ ALI

I was called to audition for a play when I was very young, following which I continued to act as wel...
IMTIAZ ALI

I want to direct what I feel is interesting - not what is supposed to be my zone.
IMTIAZ ALI

I come from a middle class background. I have travelled a lot by trains and have lived in the world....
IMTIAZ ALI

All the conscious decisions that I have taken in my life have never borne fruit. Not even come close...
IMTIAZ ALI

I enjoy looking beyond the obvious and look at the stories happening all around me - you kind of for...
IMTIAZ ALI

Anything I wanted to do and achieve has not been influential in my life, but my failures have.
IMTIAZ ALI

Through travel, you discover a new aspect to your personality. You discover things which you wouldn&...
IMTIAZ ALI

The story of 'Highway' is completely about travel. It is about the fascination of travel to ...
IMTIAZ ALI

I think I am a travel junkie, and I have never enjoyed anything else in my life more than travelling...
IMTIAZ ALI

I was complexed and awkward that I was good for nothing and was always lying. I would lie to my scho...
IMTIAZ ALI

Especially on unexpected journeys, you have time; you can figure certain deeper things out, like who...
IMTIAZ ALI

When you write a story, it just flows and you don't control it. It's subconscious.
IMTIAZ ALI

All of us are so mixed. My great-grandfather was white.
MUHAMMAD ALI

Ever since I first came here in 1963 to fight Henry Cooper, I have loved the people of England.
MUHAMMAD ALI

It's in my blood to be around people while I was training.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I had a good time boxing. I enjoyed it - and I may come back.
MUHAMMAD ALI

If I said I would knock out Sonny Liston in 1 minute and 49 seconds of the first round, that would h...
MUHAMMAD ALI

You think the world was shocked when Nixon resigned? Wait till I whup George Foreman's behind.
MUHAMMAD ALI

No boxer in the history of boxing has had Parkinson's. There's no injury in my brain that su...
MUHAMMAD ALI

White people just don't want their slaves to be free. That's the whole thing.
MUHAMMAD ALI

Never put your money against Cassius Clay, for you will never have a lucky day.
MUHAMMAD ALI

When you can whip any man in the world, you never know peace.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I'm more at home with my log cabins than I am in my house in Cherry Hill.
MUHAMMAD ALI

The white man is destroying the world.
MUHAMMAD ALI

We who follow the teachings of Elijah Muhammad don't want to be forced to integrate. Integration...
MUHAMMAD ALI

The fact is, I was never too bright in school. I ain't ashamed of it, though. I mean, how much d...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I didn't want to submit to the army and then, on the day of judgment, have God say to me, 'W...
MUHAMMAD ALI

My lectures, based on Islamic teachings, were on various subjects. Some of the titles were, 'The...
MUHAMMAD ALI

You can't keep your mind on fighting when you're thinking about a woman. You can't keep ...
MUHAMMAD ALI

Anywhere I go, there is always an incredible crowd that follows me. In Rome, as I land at the airpor...
MUHAMMAD ALI

All black Americans have slave names. They have white names; names that the slave master has given t...
MUHAMMAD ALI

To be able to give away riches is mandatory if you wish to possess them. This is the only way that y...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I used to tease Joe Louis by reminding him that I was the greatest of all time. But Joe Louis was th...
MUHAMMAD ALI

Joe Frazier got hit more than me - and he doesn't have Parkinson's.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I had to prove you could be a new kind of black man. I had to show the world.
MUHAMMAD ALI

People don't realize what they had till it's gone. Like President Kennedy, there was no one ...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I know I got it made while the masses of black people are catchin' hell, but as long as they ain...
MUHAMMAD ALI

Joe Frazier is so ugly that when he cries, the tears turn around and go down the back of his head.
MUHAMMAD ALI

My trainer don't tell me nothing between rounds. I don't allow him to. I fight the fight. Al...
MUHAMMAD ALI

God tries you in certain, certain ways. Some people are rich, and they believe in God. They lose the...
MUHAMMAD ALI

No one knows what to say in the loser's locker room.
MUHAMMAD ALI

There are no pleasures in a fight but some of my fights have been a pleasure to win.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I wish people would love everybody else the way they love me. It would be a better world.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I have been so great in boxing they had to create an image like Rocky, a white image on the screen, ...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I said I was 'The Greatest,' I never said I was the smartest!
MUHAMMAD ALI

At home I am a nice guy: but I don't want the world to know. Humble people, I've found, don&...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I figure I'll be champ for about ten years and then I'll let my brother take over - like the...
MUHAMMAD ALI

When I won the Golden Gloves in 1960, that made me realize I had a chance. And when I won at the Oly...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I got no quarrel with them Vietcong.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I should be a postage stamp, because that's the only way I'll ever get licked. I'm beaut...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I'm not the greatest; I'm the double greatest. Not only do I knock 'em out, I pick the r...
MUHAMMAD ALI

No intelligent black man or black woman in his or her right black mind wants white boys and white gi...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I shook up the world, I shook up the world.
MUHAMMAD ALI

The only thing that matters is submitting to the will of God.
MUHAMMAD ALI

Frazier is so ugly that he should donate his face to the U.S. Bureau of Wild Life.
MUHAMMAD ALI

To make America the greatest is my goal, so I beat the Russian and I beat the Pole. And for the U.S....
MUHAMMAD ALI

I always bring out the best in men I fight, but Joe Frazier, I'll tell the world right now, brin...
MUHAMMAD ALI

It will be a killer, and a chiller, and a thriller, when I get the gorilla in Manila.
MUHAMMAD ALI

The Nation of Islam's main focus was teaching black pride and self-awareness. Why should we keep...
MUHAMMAD ALI

A rooster crows only when it sees the light. Put him in the dark and he'll never crow. I have se...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I don't have to be what you want me to be.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I've been everywhere in the world, seen everything, had everything a man can have.
MUHAMMAD ALI

My only fault is that I don't realize how great I really am.
MUHAMMAD ALI

Go up in an airplane. Go high enough, and it's like we don't even exist.
MUHAMMAD ALI

It's the repetition of affirmations that leads to belief. And once that belief becomes a deep co...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I would say things like 'I am the greatest! I'm pretty! If you talk jive, you'll drop in...
MUHAMMAD ALI

Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.
MUHAMMAD ALI

Don't feel sorry for me.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I calculate that I took 20,000 punches, but I earned millions and kept a lot of it. I may talk slow,...
MUHAMMAD ALI

America is the greatest country in the world.
MUHAMMAD ALI

Life is so, so short. Bible says it's like a vapor.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I'm the most recognized and loved man that ever lived cuz there weren't no satellites when J...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I wanted to use my fame and this face that everyone knows so well to help uplift and inspire people ...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I'm no leader; I'm a little humble follower.
MUHAMMAD ALI

I've made my share of mistakes along the way, but if I have changed even one life for the better...
MUHAMMAD ALI

Hating people because of their color is wrong. And it doesn't matter which color does the hating...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I never thought of losing, but now that it' s happened, the only thing is to do it right. That&#...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I'm so fast that last night I turned off the light switch in my hotel room and was in bed before...
MUHAMMAD ALI

I'll beat him so bad he'll need a shoehorn to put his hat on.
MUHAMMAD ALI

My way of joking is to tell the truth. That's the funniest joke in the world.
MUHAMMAD ALI

A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life.
MUHAMMAD ALI

It's not bragging if you can back it up.
MUHAMMAD ALI

Wars of nations are fought to change maps. But wars of poverty are fought to map change.
MUHAMMAD ALI

All fighters run. The constant motion prepares you for being in the ring. And running strengthens yo...
LAILA ALI

Running is my time for myself. I'm like, 'I'm going for a run!' and my husband knows...
LAILA ALI

People like to see me fight. A name can only take you so far. There are only a few fighters out of t...
LAILA ALI

My kids know the importance of being active - and that's why teaming up with the USTA was such a...
LAILA ALI

I don't play video games. My husband does. He plays sometimes the football, and every once in a ...
LAILA ALI

I want to encourage women to take control of their health.
LAILA ALI

I never ran with my dad. He was old-school. He had a whole different idea of training. He ran in ste...
LAILA ALI

My dad lived by example. I lived by watching him. I watched all the great things he did and said. I ...
LAILA ALI

I never intended to box forever, and always planned to move on to do other things.
LAILA ALI

I'm Muhammad Ali's daughter, but my father and I are very different in that area. I don'...
LAILA ALI

I'm a professional world champion. Of course if you're a world champion, you're working ...
LAILA ALI

I do my best to work out 5 days a week. There are times when I can only get in 3 days a week because...
LAILA ALI

I love engaging in conversation with other moms because we can relate to one another, and we swap va...
LAILA ALI

I'd love to go and visit the Mosque in Mecca again, just for the sheer beauty of it, not for God - much the way a non-Catholic might go to Vatican City because of the beauty of the buildings and the artifacts.

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Ayaan Hirsi Ali

I'd love to go and visit the Mosque in Mecca again, just for the sheer beauty of it, not for God - much the way a non-Catholic might go to Vatican City because of the beauty of the buildings and the artifacts.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

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