81 News Quotes To Remember

In a world inundated with information, certain statements manage to capture our attention and remain etched in our memories. Whether they offer profound insights, stark truths, or a touch of humor, these quotes resonate deeply, often serving as touchstones for our understanding of current events and historical milestones. In this collection, we've meticulously selected the top 81 news quotes that stand out not just for their content, but for their enduring impact. Let these words guide you through pivotal moments and provide clarity amidst the constant flow of headlines.

1. “We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."[Remarks on the 20th Anniversary of the Voice of America; Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, February 26, 1962]” - John F. Kennedy

2. “I would not know how I am supposed to feel about many stories if not for the fact that the TV news personalities make sad faces for sad stories and happy faces for happy stories. ” - Dave Barry

3. “Despite the variety and the differences, and however much we proclaim the contrary, what the media produce is neither spontaneous nor completely “free:” “news” does not just happen, pictures and ideas do not merely spring from reality into our eyes and minds, truth is not directly available, we do not have unrestrained variety at our disposal. For like all modes of communication, television, radio, and newspapers observe certain rules and conventions to get things across intelligibly, and it is these, often more than the reality being conveyed, that shape the material delivered by the media. ” - Edward Said

4. “A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself.” - Arthur Miller

5. “We have currently a built-in allergy to unpleasant or disturbing information. Our mass media reflect this. But unless we get up off our fat surpluses and recognize that television in the main is being used to distract, delude, amuse, and insulate us, then television and those who finance it, those who look at it, and those who work at it, may see a totally different picture too late. ” - Edward R. Murrow

6. “Our major obligation is not to mistake slogans for solutions.” - Edward R. Murrow

7. “People say conversation is a lost art; how often I have wished it were.” - Edward R. Murrow

8. “If we were to do the Second Coming of Christ in color for a full hour, there would be a considerable number of stations which would decline to carry it on the grounds that a Western or a quiz show would be more profitable.” - Edward R. Murrow

9. “We are in the same tent as the clowns and the freaks-that's show business.” - Edward R. Murrow

10. “A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves.” - Edward R. Murrow

11. “When the New York Times scratches its head, get ready for total baldness as you tear out your hair.” - Christopher Hitchens

12. “The more wonderful the means of communication, the more trivial, tawdry, or depressing its contents seemed to be.” - Arthur C. Clarke

13. “. . . the newspapers of Utopia, he had long ago decided, would be terribly dull.” - Arthur C. Clarke

14. “Why were you lurking under our window?""Yes - yes, good point, Petunia! What were you doing under our windows, boy?""Listening to the news," said Harry in a resigned voice.His aunt and uncle exchanged looks of outrage."Listening to the news! Again?""Well, it changes every day, you see," said Harry.” - J.K. Rowling

15. “News is something somebody doesn't want printed; all else is advertising.” - William Randolph Hearst

16. “A culture's ability to understand the world and itself is critical to its survival. But today we are led into the arena of public debate by seers whose main gift is their ability to compel people to continue to watch them.” - George Saunders

17. “But if we define the Megaphone as the composite of the hundreds of voices we hear each day that come to us from people we don't know, via high-tech sources, it's clear that a significant and ascendant component of that voice has become bottom-dwelling, shrill, incurious, ranting, and agenda-driven. It strives to antagonize us, make us feel anxious, ineffective, and alone; convince us that the world is full of enemies and of people stupider and less agreeable than ourselves; is dedicated to the idea that, outside the sphere of our immediate experience, the world works in a different, more hostile, less knowable manner. This braindead tendency is viral and manifests intermittently; while it is the blood in the veins of some of our media figures, it flickers on and off in others.” - George Saunders

18. “If you don't like the news, go out and make some of your own.” - Wes Nisker

19. “Would you like to know your future?If your answer is yes, think again. Not knowing is the greatest life motivator.So enjoy, endure, survive each moment as it comes to you in its proper sequence -- a surprise.” - Vera Nazarian

20. “Looking back, I still can't believe how unprofessional the news media was. So much spin, so few hard facts. All those digestible sound bites from an army of 'experts' all contradicting one another, all trying to seem more 'shocking' and 'in-depth' than the last one. It was all so confusing, nobody seemed to know what to do.” - Max Brooks

21. “You know what's truly weird about any financial crisis? We made it up. Currency, money, finance, they're all social inventions. When the sun comes up in the morning it's shining on the same physical landscape, all the atoms are in place.” - Bruce Sterling

22. “Media work needs ideals. Maybe thirty years from now, after I retire, I'll see the media mature and make the transition from political party, interest group, and corporate to truly public. But over the next ten years, the encroachment of commercialism and worldliness will loom much larger than the democratization we imagine. -Jin Yongquan in China Ink” - Judy Polumbaum

23. “Our stable and eternal verities are being challenged. There's a kind of postmodern breakdown in journalism. The breadth of information sources and the speed of transmission are growing; but the traditional gravity of news has eroded. -Jin Yongquan ” - Judy Polumbaum

24. “I think that of all the principles for journalism, the most important is to complicate simple things and simplify complicated things. At first sight, you may think something is simple, but it may conceal a great deal. However, facing a very complex thing, you should find out its essence. -Jin Yongquan” - Judy Polumbaum

25. “I would tell young journalists to be brave and go against the tide. When everyone else is relying on the internet, you should not; when nobody's walking, you should walk; when few people are reading profound books, you should read. ... rather than seeking a plusher life you should pursue some hardship. Eat simple food. When everyone's going for quick results, pursue things of lasting value. Don't follow the crowd; go in the opposite direction. If others are fast, be slow. -- Jin Yongquan” - Judy Polumbaum

26. “I think journalism anywhere should be based on social justice and impartiality, making contributions to society as well as taking responsibility in society. Whether you are capitalist or socialist or Marxist, journalists should have the same professional integrity. --Tan Hongkai” - Judy Polumbaum

27. “I used to think the most important thing for a reporter was to be where the news is and be the first to know. Now I feel a reporter should be able to effect change. Your reporting should move people and motivate people to change the world. Maybe this is too idealistic. Young people who want to be journalists must, first, study and, second, recognize that they should never be the heroes of the story. ..A journalist must be curious, and must be humble. --Zhou Yijun” - Judy Polumbaum

28. “Th' newspaper does ivrything f'r us. It runs th' polis foorce an' th' banks, commands th' milishy, controls th' ligislachure, baptizes th' young, marries th' foolish, comforts th' afflicted, afflicts th' comfortable, buries th' dead an' roasts thim aftherward.” - Finley Peter Dunne

29. “Our willingness to believe the news is, in many cases, not entirely innocent.” - Eula Biss

30. “The speed of communications is wondrous to behold. It is also true that speed can multiply the distribution of information that we know to be untrue.” - Edward R. Murrow

31. “One reason that cats are happier than people is that they have no newspapers.” - Gwendolyn Brooks

32. “Now he turned the radio on to the news. As we did our separate chores, we listened and commented idly to each other on what we heard—the politics, the plane crashes and crimes, the large disasters of the day, which we all use to keep the smaller, more long-term sorrows at bay.” - Sue Miller

33. “This is how it works now with the news: the story begins with a moral, then a narrative is fashioned to support it.” - Walter Kirn

34. “All the papers that matter live off their advertisements, and the advertisers exercise an indirect censorship over news.” - George Orwell

35. “Hey, the ubiquitous Leak-Cam is to 2010 as the bottom-of-the-screen news ticker was to late 2001: What you're seeing beneath the news anchor or talking head may not actually include any new information, but you feel like you're watching something dramatic.” - Jim Geraghty

36. “Without news to feed it, the biggest story starves.” - Emlyn Williams

37. “News travels fast in places where nothing much ever happens.” - Charles Bukowski

38. “My Miracle, living through a Traumatic brain Injury” - Rodney Barnes

39. “It may be escapist, but if I have a choice between watching the news or reading a book which gets me to see the world through different eyes, I will always choose the latter!” - Christina Westover

40. “There wasn't a single item of importance [in the newspaper]. A tower of illusion, all of it, made of illusory bricks and full of holes. If life were made up only of important things, it really would be a dangerous house of glass, scarcely to be handled carelessly. But everyday life was exactly like the headlines. And so everybody, knowing the meaninglessness of existence, sets the center of his compass at his own home.” - Abe Kōbō

41. “He was intrigued by the power of words, not the literary words that filled the books in the library but the sharp, staccato words that went into the writing of news stories. Words that went for the jugular. Active verbs that danced and raced on the page.” - Robert Cormier

42. “Cram them full of non-combustible data, chock them so damned full of 'facts' they feel stuffed, but absolutely 'brilliant' with information. Then they’ll feel they’re thinking, they’ll get a sense of motion without moving. And they’ll be happy, because facts of that sort don’t change. Don’t give them any slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with. That way lies melancholy.” - Ray Bradbury

43. “كل يوم أكتشف في وطني مجداً جديداًوعاراً جديداًأخباراً ترفع الرأسوأخرى ترفع الضغط” - محمد الماغوط

44. “I spent my time drinking and staring at a television in the airport bar. More death and destruction. Crime. Pollution. All the news stories were telling me to be frightened. All the commercials were telling me to buy things I didn´t need. The message was that people could only be passive victims or consumers.” - John Twelve Hawks

45. “News told, rumors heard, truth implied, facts buried.” - Toba Beta

46. “News is only the first rough draft of history.” - Alan Barth

47. “The ordinary public is a puppet of worthless news and media.” - Santosh Kalwar

48. “Most neuroses and some psychoses can be traced to the unnecessary and unhealthy habit of daily wallowing in the troubles and sins of five billion strangers.” - Robert A. Heinlein

49. “The greatest influence over content was necessity--they had holes to fill on every page and jammed in any vaguely newsworthy string of words, provided it didn't include expletives, which they were apparently saving for their own use around the office.” - Tom Rachman

50. “I came only to report the news, to gather information. I didn't come to find out the truth.” - Siriworn Kaewkan

51. “Suicides? Heart attacks? The papers didn't seem interested. The world was full of ways to die, too many to cover. Newsworthy deaths had to be exceptional. Most people go unobserved.” - Haruki Murakami

52. “People differ to such a degree they agree on nothing,Except death that is, and even on that they disagree.Some say the soul goes on after the death of the bodyWhile others claim the soul, with the body, dies too.” - Mutannabi

53. “All of the strife in this world is due to three people: a newscaster, a news seeker, and a news listener.” - Ibn al-Qasim al-Hakim

54. “A free press doesn't mean it's not a tame press.” - Andrew Vachss

55. “لا شيء سوى الترهات هنا، الباحثون عن الحقيقة لا يقرؤون الصّحف” - Ahlam Mustafa

56. “إن ضغط الدم و القلق و الأرق الذى يصيبنى من الحقائق أفضل من الخنوثة و التراخى و الفتور الذى يصيبنى من التطامن و التفاؤل.إن تطامن يربى الشحم على قلبى و شعورى,و يميتنى بالسكتة لأقل خيبة أمل و لأتفه خبر غير متوقع,و كل الأخبار تصبح فى هذه الحالة غير متوقعة.” - مصطفى محمود

57. “In the age of technology there is constant access to vast amounts of information. The basket overflows; people get overwhelmed; the eye of the storm is not so much what goes on in the world, it is the confusion of how to think, feel, digest, and react to what goes on.” - Criss Jami

58. “When it comes to world news, attitude is what marks the distinction between justice and vengeance. Justice is pure, but vengeance brings more ruin.” - Criss Jami

59. “The news isn't there to tell you what happened. It's there to tell you what it wants you to hear or what it thinks you want to hear.” - Joss Whedon

60. “I killed the Google Alert I used to have on myself two years ago. I don’t need any more information about myself. I get more than enough of that just by being me.” - Lev Grossman

61. “You totally need to watch the news.""Can't.""Why?""It's too depressing.""Right, because hanging with dead people isn't.” - Darynda Jones

62. “Set out time to worship God in your closet, give Him quality praise and watch Him raise you.” - Jaachynma N.E. Agu

63. “BREAKING NEWS: You're awesome and designed for success; live this day accordingly!” - Steve Maraboli

64. “The news media are, for the most part, the bringers of bad news… and it’s not entirely the media’s fault, bad news gets higher ratings and sells more papers than good news.” - Peter McWilliams

65. “The news can be poison to your soul, don't let it kill your joy, be compassionate but not consumed. Be empathetic not enraged.” - Rob Liano

66. “Voting, we might even say, is the next to last refuge of the politically impotent. The last refuge is, of course, giving your opinion to a pollster, who will get a version of it through a desiccated question, and then will submerge it in a Niagara of similar opinions, and convert them into--what else?--another piece of news. Thus we have here a great loop of impotence: The news elicits from you a variety of opinions about which you can do nothing except to offer them as more news, about which you can do nothing.” - Neil Postman

67. “I have learned to read the papers calmly and not to hate the fools I read about.” - Edmund Wilson

68. “Eli Willard just looked at her for a long moment, and then he announced, 'Lady of the Lake strikes iceberg in mid-Atlantic; 215 drown. New York City fire destroys 700 buildings. Japanese earthquake kills 12,000. Worldwide cholera epidemic kills millions. Wages rise, but prices rise faster. Financial crash occurs on Van Buren's 36th day in office. Nation begins first great depression. Bank failures and closings spread like plague. 200,000 are unemployed. Business bankrupt; only pawnbrokers prosper. Van Buren declares ten-hour days on all federal jobs. There. Does that make you feel any better?” - Donald Harington

69. “When other people are grieving, the newspaperman turns efficient.” - Stieg Larsson

70. “Popular culture is a place where pity is called compassion, flattery is called love, propaganda is called knowledge, tension is called peace, gossip is called news, and auto-tune is called singing.” - Criss Jami

71. “Apparently even the most awful tragedies, and the people they'd ruined, got a little stale after a while.” - Tom Perrotta

72. “That could be a very sexy story.” - LynDee Walker

73. “All new news is old news happening to new people” - Malcolm Muggeridge

74. “Photographs shock insofar as they show something novel.” - Susan Sontag

75. “(O)n a whole range of issues, there has been a massive popular shift in public opinion toward a progressive critique of the current political economic system. It is, of course, largely subliminal, not carefully worked out, and lacks a coherent vision for what needs to be done -- but there can be little doubt that this shift has happened, and is deepening. People are increasingly disenchanted, and they are hungry for alternatives.” - Dr. Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed introduction to Censored 2013

76. “Life goes on in the same manner,evil wins and peace is slaughtered.Change the channel, change the view,tired of the same reruns on the evening news.” - Susie Clevenger

77. “What most people want to keep under wraps (from reporters) is trivial: petty jealousies, professional feuds, etc. By contrast, most of the things they have thought about most seriously all their lives they are perfectly winning to uncover.” - Thomas Boswell

78. “If one has not read the newspapers for some months and then reads them all together, one sees, as one never saw before, how much time is wasted with this kind of literature.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

79. “People would say bad things about you, because it is the only way their insignificant self can feel better than you.” - Dennis E. Adonis

80. “Usually I spare myself from the news, because if it’s not propaganda, then it’s one threat or another exaggerated to the point of absurdity, or it’s the tragedy of storm-quake-tsunami, of bigotry and oppression misnamed justice, of hatred passed off as righteousness and honor called dishonorable, all jammed in around advertisements in which a gecko sells insurance, a bear sells toilet tissue, a dog sells cars, a gorilla sells investment advisers, a tiger sells cereal, and an elephant sells a drug that will improve your lung capacity, as if no human being in America any longer believes any other human being, but trusts only the recommendations of animals.” - Dean Koontz

81. “Rumors spread faster than news and news spreads faster than the happenings” - Amit Abraham