self-censorship

Self-censorship is more efficient than any police. You write and say not what you really think, but what you believe is acceptable. By that process we lose those revolutionary ideas that could change society for the better

It's harder to pick and choose when you're dead. It's like a photograph, you know. It doesn't matter as much.

In order to protect their good names for posterity, many writers never wrote what they thought or the truth as it stood. That's why truth still lies hidden in matters of power, sex and religion. No wonder they chose to do so, many who dared paid with their heads

Our words had to be circumspect. We could not write anything too negative about our circumstances. This was tricky, since the very form of a married woman's letter needed to include the usual complaints -- that we were pathetic, powerless, worked to the bone, homesick, and sad. We were supposed to speak directly about our feelings without appearing ungrateful, no-account, or unfilial.

I know the fashion is that everything is fair game [for comedy material] but I don't believe that.

It is really exhausting to live in a dictatorship of 'Me', which is basically a tyranny of others.

At CBS, I__ in your house. I__ mindful of that. When I do standup, you__e in my home and I can say what I want to.