Quotes by Penn Jillette

What I have a problem with is not so much religion or god, but faith. When you say you believe something in your heart and therefore you can act on it, you have completely justified the 9/11 bombers. You have justified Charlie Manson. If its true for you, why isnt it true for them? Why are you different? If you say I believe theres an all-powerful force of love in the universe that connects us all, and I have no evidence of that but I believe it in my heart, then its perfectly okay to believe in your heart that Sharon Tate deserves to die. Its perfectly okay to believe in your heart that you need to fly planes into buildings for Allah.

Love and respect all people. Hate and destroy all faith.

If every trace of any single religion were wiped out and nothing were passed on, it would never be created exactly that way again. There might be some other nonsense in its place, but not that exact nonsense. If all of science were wiped out, it would still be true and someone would find a way to figure it all out again.

Its not arrogant to say that you cant figure out the answers to the universe with your internal faith. Its not arrogant to know that theres no omniscient, omnipotent prime mover in the universe who loves you personally. Its not sad to feel that life and the love of your real friends and family is more than enough to make life worth living. Isnt it much sadder to feel that there is a more important love required than the love of the people who have chosen to spend their limited time with you?

Once youve condoned faith in general, youve condoned any crazy shit done because of faith.

But [he] had lost god, and all his family and friends were staying behind with his imaginary friend. A silly dream goes away and takes with it your whole real life.

As I’m fond of saying, if you want to find utopia, take a sharp right on money and a sharp left on sex and it’s straight ahead.

The only difference between Obama and Bush is that Obama is killing more people. He’s about double the numbers now. Can you imagine if McCain had won and did precisely what Obama has done, with every speech and every political maneuver overseas? There’d be riots in the streets about the people we’re killing. And yet because it’s Obama, and he’s better looking and better at reading the teleprompter, we let him get away with it.

Technology adds nothing to art. Two thousand years ago, I could tell you a story, and at any point during the story I could stop, and ask, Now do you want the hero to be kidnapped, or not? But that would, of course, have ruined the story. Part of the experience of being entertained is sitting back and plugging into someone elses vision.

Nobody that has seen a baby born can believe in god for a second. When you see your child born, and the panic, and the amount of technology that is saving the life of the two people you love most in the world, when you see how much stainless steel and money it takes to fight off the fact that god wants both those people dead, no one, no one can look into the eyes of a newborn baby and say theres a god, because Ill tell ya, if we were squatting in the woods, the two people I love most would be dead. Theres just no way around that. If I were in charge, no way. We need technology to fight against nature; nature so wants us dead. Nature is trying to kill us.

Democracy without respect for individual rights sucks. Its just ganging up against the weird kid, and Im always the weird kid.

You don’t have to be brave or a saint, a martyr, or even very smart to be an atheist. All you have to be able to say is “I don’t know”.

If theres something you really want to believe, thats what you should question the most.

Astrology is a cousin of racism.

[On hearing that 86% of gay teens have experienced harassment] Eighty-six percent? Eighty-six per-fuckin-cent WERE harassed?! That means fourteen per-fuckin-cent WERENT harassed? WHAT?!At MY school a hundred percent of the children - gay, straight, transgendered, bi, sell... or trade - WERE harassed. Shes saying that fourteen percent of the gay students were NOT harassed? That seems impossible.At MY school any one of us would have sucked Elton Johns COCK at a mandatory school assembly for a fourteen percent chance of NOT being harassed.

Has any non-dipshit man ever used the word ladies not followed by the word room?

In any conflict, the crazier party generally wins.

We are only here for a little while, and our bodies belong to ourselves and no one else.

Behaving morally because of a hope of reward or a fear of punishment is not morality. Morality is not bribery or threats. Religion is bribery and threats. Humans have morality. We dont need religion.

A lot of people, to attack an outspoken atheist, one of the things theyll do is say, You are as bad as the fundamentalist Christians. And my answer is always, I hope so.