Quotes & Sayings About Dirty Work

War is society's dirty work, usually done by kids cleaning up failures perpetrated by adults. — Karl Marlantes

The tagline behind "House of Lies" is funny, dirty, business. The show is a comedy satire about how big business operates. Most Americans that work in corporate America should be able to relate to this show. — Larenz Tate

I am not a man who looks for solutions in God or politics. If somebody else wants to do the dirty work and create a better world for us and he can do it, I will accept it. — Charles Bukowski

The dirty work at political conventions is almost always done in the grim hours between midnight and dawn. Hangmen and politicians work best when the human spirit is at its lowest ebb. — Russell Baker

My code of life and conduct is simply this: work hard, play to the allowable limit, disregard equally the good and bad opinion of others, never do a friend a dirty trick, eat and drink what you feel like when you feel like, never grow indignant over anything, trust to tobacco for calm and serenity, bathe twice a day ... learn to play at least one musical instrument and then play it only in private, never allow one's self even a passing thought of death, never contradict anyone or seek to prove anything to anyone unless one gets paid for it in cold, hard coin, live the moment to the utmost of its possibilities, treat one's enemies with polite inconsideration, avoid persons who are chronically in need, and be satisfied with life always but never with one's self. — George Jean Nathan

Fuck you, angel. Fuck you and all God's little prison bitches. He slips you some cigarettes and a con job smile and you run off to do his dirty work for him. Go and scare some sinners. No one's listening to you here. — Richard Kadrey

You are joking. You must want money. You work for money, don't you?"
"I want it very badly," I said. "But I can't take this money. It wouldn't belong to me, I would belong to it. It would expect me to do things, and I would have to do them. Sit on the lid of this mess of yours, the way Marfeld did, until dry rot sets in. — Ross Macdonald

Politics is still the man's game. The women are allowed to do the chores, the dirty work, and now and then
but only occasionally
one is present at some secret conference or other. But it's not the rule. They can go out and get the vote, if they can and will; they can collect money, they can be grateful for being permitted to work. But that is all. — Mary Roberts Rinehart

My only relationship policy is, don't bring your dirty laundry to work, no sex on company furniture and don't let it affect your work. — Paula Graves

So as I'm walking up and down the grocery aisles, I notice this distinct, mildewy, putrid odor following me. And I keep looking around for the responsible party, until I discover that she is me. I stink. When I get home, Craig rolls out of bed to help me with the groceries and I say "Honey, smell me. I stink." And he sniffs my shirt and says without surprise, "Yes, you do." And I say "Well, what IS that? It's disgusting." And he says the following:
"It's mildew. All our clothes smell like that. We always stink." I'll just give you a few seconds to digest that information. I know I needed a little time. "WHAT? WELL WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME, HUSBAND?" "I was scared to tell you. You get sensitive about ... . housekeeping stuff." "Oh. So let me clarify here. You'd rather reek all day at work and allow Chase to be THE STINKY KID IN CLASS than risk me getting mad?
"Yes. Yes, I would. Definitely. — Glennon Doyle Melton

I think I should be active politically. Because I look upon myself as a politician. That's not a dirty work you know. Some people think that there are something wrong with politicians. Of course, something wrong with some politicians. — Aung San Suu Kyi

There's two things you can do with a kid like that. Way I see it. You can burst his bubble. Or you can wait and let life burst it. Let life do the dirty work for you. If you burst it he'll hate you forever. And he'll never really believe he couldn't have made it. He'll always think it's your fault for standing in his way. For not having more faith in him. Now, life. When life bursts your bubble, well. It's a little harder to argue with life. — Catherine Ryan Hyde

It's a dirty little secret that I'm pretty self-conscious about coloring my own work. I just see so many people who love color more than me that I get freaked out every time I hit Photoshop. Black and white? I know exactly what to do, but color offers a million solutions to problems I don't even know exist. — Doug TenNapel

You didn't succeed. Well, what of that? There's nothing to prove, you know, and the revolution's not a question of virtue but of effectiveness. There is no heaven. There's work to be done, that's all. And you must do what you're cut out for; all the better if it comes easy to you. The best work is not the work that takes the most sacrifice. It's the work in which you can best succeed. — Jean-Paul Sartre

I think the man who designed this should have committed suicide. A man who can conceive a thing as beautiful as this should never allowed it to be erected. He should not want to exist. But he will let it be built, so that women will hang out diapers on his terraces, so that men will spit on his stairways and draw dirty pictures on his walls. He's given it to them and he's made it part of them, part of everything. He shouldn't have offered it for men like you to look at. For men like you to talk about. He's defiled his own work by the first word you'll utter about it. He's made himself worse than you are. You'll be committing only a mean little indecency, but he's committed a sacrilege. A man who knows what he must have known to produce this should not have been able to remain alive. — Ayn Rand

A man is always a little shamefaced on his wedding day, like a fox caught in a baited trap, ensnared because his greed overcame his better judgment. The menfolk laughed at Charlie that spring day, and said he was caught for sure now. As the bride, I was praised and fussed over, as if I had won a prize or done something marvelous that no one ever did before, and I could not help feeling pleased and clever that I had managed to turn myself from an ordinary girl into a shining bride. Now I think it is a dirty lie. The man is the one who is winning the game that day, though they always pretend they are not, and the poor girl bride is led into a trap of hard work and harsh words, the ripping of childbirth and the drubbing of her man's fists. It is the end of being young, but no one tells her so. Instead they make over her, and tell her how lucky she is. I wonder do slaves get dressed up in finery on the day they are sold. — Sharyn McCrumb

Aelin braced her forearms on the bar, crossing one ankle over the other. "Hello, Tern." Arobynn's second in command-or he had been two years ago. A vicious, calculating little prick who had always been more than eager to do Arobynn's dirty work. "I figured it was only a matter of time before one of Arobynn's dogs sniffed me out."
Tern flashed a too-bright smile. "If memory serves, you were always his favorite bitch. — Sarah J. Maas

Even in the civil rights movement, there were so many unbelievable women. They never, ever received the credit that they should have received. They did all of the, and I cannot say it, they did all of the dirty work. Hard work. — John Lewis

He never described himself as a poet or his work as poetry. The fact that the lines do not come to the edge of the page is no guarantee. Poetry is a verdict, not an occupation. He hated to argue about the techniques of verse. The poem is a dirty, bloody, burning thing that has to be grabbed first with bare hands. Once the fire celebrated Light, the dirt Humility, the blood Sacrifice. Now the poets are professional fire-eaters, freelancing at any carnival. The fire goes down easily and honours no one in particular. — Leonard Cohen

...there is a close correlation between low wages and high emissions...And why wouldn't there be? The same logic that is willing to work laborers to the bone for pennies a day will burn mountains of dirty coal while spending next to nothing on pollution controls because it's the cheapest way to produce. — Naomi Klein

And besides; the problem of land, at its worst, is a bye one; distribute the earth as you will, the principal question remains inexorable, Who is to dig it? Which of us, in brief word, is to do the hard and dirty work for the rest, and for what pay? — John Ruskin

I'm a bit insane when it comes to doing my own stunts and getting down and dirty. It's fun, you know? It's things I wouldn't normally do in my real life, so when I go to work and get to beat people up and shoot guns and get waterboarded, those are things I find completely interesting. — Katee Sackhoff

The division is based on knowledge, based on qualifications - but as I learned from the factionless, a system that relies on a group of uneducated people to do its dirty work without giving them a way to rise is hardly fair. — Veronica Roth

I am tired of the warmakers making war with our children. I am tired of our tired troops being sent over to do the dirty work for mob bosses who are going to squeeze the life out of Iraq and not leave until every asset and every natural resource has been raped from the country. I am tired of seeing Iraqis burying their loved ones and hearing the reverberating screams of mothers all over our country who are being destroyed for the benefit of a very few. — Cindy Sheehan

With your votes you are working for your future. It is not a holiday; it is the most serious day of work since you were born. Better to come in clothing dirty from work than with your soul filthy from having sold your right to justice. — Luis Munoz Marin

But the truth is, I want to be some woman's work boots, not her high heels."
"Work boots?" What was sexy about that? And did women have work boots?
"Yeah. You know, the boots she pulls out when she wants to get down and dirty, hiking or gardening or boating or painting the kitchen. The ones she relies on and trusts and lives her life hard and good and on her terms in. Her favorites. — Erin McCarthy

People expect your life to change completely. The main difference is I can get work now. I can do my hobby as a job. It's great. It's a privilege. But in terms of the rest of the stuff, I still got all the same group of friends I always had. I don't do anything different. We still go to the same dirty bars and do the same things. So nothing really changes. — Jeremy Irvine

I like doing things where I can get dirty, work with my hands, and use power tools. Last weekend, I did some grouting. — Nathan Fillion

The door flew open, revealing a wrinkled, forward-thrusting face wreathed with a nimbus of wispy white hair, a face resembling nothing so much as a mole emerging from its burrow. Her spectacles were so dirty that I could hardly see the use of them. She peered at us as if at two scabrous street dogs and tightened her grasp on her cane.
"What do you want? I don't let rooms, and if you've business with my sons or my husband, they work for a living. — Lyndsay Faye

I tried to imagine what it would be like if Constantin were my husband.
It would mean getting up at seven and cooking him eggs and bacon and toast and
coffee and dawdling about in my nightgown and curlers after he'd left for work to wash up the dirty plates and make the bed, and then when he came home after a lively, fascinating day he'd expect a big dinner, and I'd spend the evening washing up even more dirty plates till I fell into bed, utterly exhausted. This seemed a dreary and wasted life for a girl with fifteen years of straight A's, but I knew that's what marriage was like, because cook and clean and wash was just what Buddy Willard's mother did from morning till night, and she was the wife of a university professor and had been a private school teacher herself. — Sylvia Plath

I go home at the end of the day and I rarely talk about what I did that day. So my wife's experience is just like that of anybody else whose husband goes away to a blue collar job and comes home bruised and dirty and often proud of the work that they're doing. — Adam Savage

Most men I know rely on women to do all the literal dirty work. — Elizabeth Banks

Life is messy though, you know? Sometimes it's worth it to jump in and get your hands dirty. Happiness and contentment don't come along very often, so when they do, you need to hold on with everything you've got. If it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out, but at least you can say you tried. — Cate Ashwood

The love that makes community is the willingness to do someone else's dirty work. — Shane Claiborne

save what little resources we have, to be able to feed those people they deemed worthy to live. But who are they to decide who's worthy?" He paused for a moment before he continued. "Well, ladies and gentlemen, it seems that we are not worthy. They sent us here to do their dirty work and now they've decided to cut us off. Who are they, I ask all of you! — James Dashner

His smile was instinctive. A little bit apology, a little bit politeness. And a little bit of charm because, of all the things he'd expected to come from his trip to the market, meeting a cute girl with messy hair and dirty work gloves had definitely not been one of them. — Marissa Meyer

Cut your morning devotions into your personal grooming. You would not go out to work with a dirty face. Why start the day with the face of your soul unwashed? — Robert A. Cook

That's what most people don't realize; that's why one out of every two marriages fail. Because people go into them with hearts in their eyes and forever on their lips and no concept whatsoever of what that truly means. Of course it's going to be hard work. Of course you are going to get angry and upset and wonder why, out of everyone in the world entire world, you decided to fall in love with an idiot who farts in his sleep and eats like a pig and can't ever be assed to pick up his own dirty underwear off the fucking floor. — Lielabell

Do you know that besides our Tania, I don't know any other women who work outside the home?"
The women at the table seconded with murmurs. The men glanced at Alexander and then at their dirty forks. Tatiana stared at Alexander sitting across from her, and he gave her a look that said, You want to handle this one?
All right, Shura, I'll handle it. "Well, Karen," said Tatiana, putting down her fork and folding her hands, "I know I'm not the only nurse in my hospital. There are 194 other nurses, all women. And Anthony's teachers - all women. The librarians - women. Oh, and the tall ladies selling you makeup at the cosmetics counter at Macy's, women, too. Maybe," Tatiana said, "you don't know any women working outside the home, because they're too busy working. — Paullina Simons

It's a dirty little secret that most New Yorkers are pleasant, thoughtful, patient, and polite. The Chamber of Commerce must work overtime to maintain the surly, off-putting image that is widely believed to define the city. In truth, niceness is nearly epidemic in this town. — Judith Kelman

It's certainly hard to find fault with a work that quotes Shakespeare, Homer, and a dirty limerick about "the young man from Oswego. — Simon Sheppard

I told him. We got a library here. Got plenty of good books, too. -Larry Brown, Dirty Work — Larry Brown

With that said, don't be trifling about being a feminist. It really infuriates me when high-profile people in your position self-identity as feminists just because it's trendy at the moment and then don't do any of the, you know, actual work of trying to make things equal for everybody. You're going to have to roll up your sleeves and get dirty in order to create a society that takes women as seriously as the men. The type that encourages us to not define ourselves by who we go to bed with at night, but by who and what we see reflected back at us in the mirror in the morning. The type that recognizes that women are not a monolith and that they have wildly different experiences informed by their race and/or sexuality. Be that beacon of light that we can look toward. Be the feminist who will help normalize the idea of Feminism for society. Be the feminist everyone needs. No presh. 3C. — Phoebe Robinson

There is no plan ... You need to make smart choices, But you can make career decisions for two different types of reasons.
You can do something for instrumental reasons
because you think it's going to lead to something else, regardless of whether you enjoy it or it's worthwhile ... or you can do something for fundamental reasons
because you think it's inherently valuable, regardless of what it may or may not lead to.
The dirty little secret is that insturmental reasons usually don't work. Things are too complicated, too unpredictable. You never know what' going to happen. So you end up stuck. The most successful people
not all of the time, but most of the time
make decisions for fundamental reasons.
They take a job or join a company because it will let them do interesting work in a cool place
even if they don't know exactly where it will lead. They're not fools. They're enlightened pragmatists. — Daniel H. Pink

Seth lay on a sofa. His large dirty work boots were defiantly planted on the sofa cushion, all his energy focused on smoking a cigarette, as if it were a job. — Frederick Weisel

He was doing Tony's dirty work, in a way - like Tony had done his in New York. One hand washing the other, neither of them getting clean. — Aleksandr Voinov

Amber emerged from behind the screen. But it was not Amber who stood before her. Instead, it was a smudge-faced slave girl. A tattoo sprawled across one wind-reddened cheek. A crusty sore encompassed half her upper lip and her left nostril. Her dirty hair was pulling free from a scruffy braid. Her shirt was rough cotton and her bare feet peeked out from under her patched skirts. A dirty bandage bound one of her ankles. Rough canvas work gloves had replaced the lacy ones Amber habitually wore. — Robin Hobb

The tyranny of this dictatorship isn't primarily the fault of Big Business, nor of the demagogues who do their dirty work. It's the fault of Doremus Jessup! Of all the conscientious, respectable, lazy-minded Doremus Jessups, who have let the demogogues wriggle in, without fierce enough protest." 14 — Sinclair Lewis

We are to blame for this destruction, we who don't speak your tongue and don't know how to keep quiet either. We who didn't come by boat, who dirty up your doorsteps with our dust, who break your barbed wire. We who came to take your jobs, who dream of wiping your shit, who long to work all hours. We who fill your shiny clean streets with the smell of food, who brought you violence you'd never known, who deliver your dope, who deserve to be chained by neck and feet. We who are happy to die for you, what else could we do? We, the ones who are waiting for who knows what. We, the dark, the short, the greasy, the shifty, the fat, the anemic. We the barbarians. — Yuri Herrera

Politics were so very simple, the Cardinal thought, just so long as a man believed no one, double-crossed everyone, kept a full treasury, and inveigled others into doing the dirty work. — Bernard Cornwell

Many people excuse themselves by claiming that they don't have to do work anymore because they are beyond it. They are simply afraid of getting their hands dirty. Getting your hands dirty washes your being. — Frederick Lenz

I can say the willingness to get dirty has always defined us as an nation, and it's a hallmark of hard work and a hallmark of fun, and dirt is not the enemy. — Mike Rowe

I don't mind if after the job is done you put me in front of a Nuremberg Trial and then jail me for life. Hang me if you want, as a war criminal. What you don't understand is that the dirty work of Zionism is not finished yet, far from it. — Ariel Sharon

How 'bout this? You go ahead and feel guilty about being an accomplice, and I'll go ahead keep doing your dirty work so you don't break a fuckin' nail or something. Then tonight we'll open a bottle of wine and talk about how today made us deel. Maybe eat some chocolate while we're at it, then watch The Notebook together. That work for you? — Joanna Wylde

Converts have it soft," said Mary. "They come to it late, without ever having had the Devil under the bed. They sail in and admire the stained-glass windows. All the dirty work has been done. — Mavis Gallant

I've learned how to be open and bold about my faith, but in terms of my influence, I just try to lead in a godly way. What that means for me is to serve them, whether it's just doing the dirty work, like cleaning up sweat on the floor, or deferring to other people, or carrying equipment bags. — Jeremy Lin

Men are always for hire who like dirty work. — Robert A. Heinlein

Every few years when it's been another five years that have passed and I haven't made a film and the depression starts taking over totally, I allow myself to do a commercial. And then I feel really dirty and get to work promptly. — Terry Gilliam

We need to understand that Jesus is a thinker, that this is not a dirty word but an essential work, and that his other attributes do not preclude thought, but only ensure that he is certainly the greatest thinker of the human race: "the most intelligent person who ever lived on earth" — Dallas Willard

Horseback riding is my passion. Other than work. People can't imagine me getting dirty, but that's what I love about it. — Kaley Cuoco

Ha-shem to do His dirty work, namely, punishing sin. It can be read that Mastema, not Adonai, — J.A. Konrath

We need to get you laid."
Despite the fact she couldn't see my face, my brow furrowed. "How is that going to help?"
"Rebound sex is exactly what you need right now, sweaty, dirty, work-your-frustration-out sex. In fact, I have the perfect guy in mind - "
I jolted up quickly at the sound of a firm tapping. I looked over at the window to see Kacey's sun kissed face, his shades resting at the edge of his long nose, baby blue eyes fixed on me.
I placed my hand over my thumping heart. "You ass."
"Bitch?"
"Not you, Jayne." I climbed off my bed. "Kay and Ty are here."
"Speak of the devil, and his sexy ass will most definitely appear. — Elizabeth Morgan

He made a pit and digged it. He was cunning in his plans and industrious in his labors. He stooped to the dirty work of digging. He did not fear to soil his own hands. He was willing to work in a ditch if others might fall therein. What mean things men will do to wreak revenge on the godly. They hunt for good men as if they were brute beasts - they that will not give them the fair chase afforded to the hare or the fox, but must secretly entrap them because they can neither run them down nor shoot them down. Our enemies will not meet us to the face for they fear us as much as they pretend to despise us. But let us look on to the end of the scene. The verse says he has fallen into the ditch that he has made. Ah, there he is. Let us laugh at his disappointment. Lo, he is himself the beast. He has hunted his own soul. The chase has brought him a goodly victim. So should it ever be. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Hey, I'm like the Wayne Gretsky of the entertainment biz - I have other people do my dirty work while I skate around and get to be a nice guy. What can I say? I'm a coward. — Paul Feig

It's funny; it's a real balancing act. In TV, everybody's talking about authenticity. In order to make 'Dirty Jobs' authentic, I really can't be overly informed. The minute I am, I become a host ... It's a very tricky business paying a tribute to work, because TV is very bad at it. — Mike Rowe

it is true that both the Red Army and the secret police traditionally gave vodka to soldiers who were being asked to do dirty work: empty bottles are almost always found inside mass graves. — Anne Applebaum

If it is wrong for you to take money from someone else who earned it, to take their money by force for your own needs, then it is certainly just as wrong for you to demand that the government step forward and do this dirty work for you. — Neal Boortz

Bree arched, trying to stretch out her muscles and Alessandro gave her a dirty look as if she was displaying herself to him on purpose. Well, maybe she was a little. Even though he blocked her from the hotel attendant's gaze with his body in the doorway, Bree was sure to cover herself with the blanket. Alessandro turned around, pulling in the tray with him and his eyes flared hungrily as he looked down at her. "You look like a beautiful debauched angel," he said, his voice rough with desire. "And you're what, the demon that's corrupted me?" Bree asked raising an eyebrow and letting the blanket fall down to her waist, baring her to him. "It's my life's work, you know?" Alessandro grinned, going down on to his knees and leaning over her. Bree placed a hand on his chest, halting him. "Is that coffee, I smell?" she asked. "The debauched angel is kind of hungry." She bit her lip and smiled up at his frustrated face. — E. Jamie

I nodded again, but I knew I would not grow up to drive a bulldozer. It would be awful to be dirty all day like these men. I didn't say it, but at best I would keep one in the backyard, like a goat. — Augusten Burroughs

Soldiering was about fighting. It was about killing people before they killed you. It was about having your way by force and guile in a dangerous world, taking a shit in the woods, living in dirty, difficult conditions, enduring hardships and risks that could - and sometimes did - kill you. It was ugly work. Which is not to say that certain men didn't enjoy it, didn't live for it. Garrison was one of those men. He embraced its cruelty. He would say, this man needs to die. Just like that. Some people needed to die. — Mark Bowden

I was bleeding but hoped he wouldn't notice. I do this sometimes; a game I personally call, I have my period, let's see if I can hide it! A darkish room and quick condom removal (make it seem like you're just really nice and thorough, and use baby wipes to take it off) and even quicker moving of towels to cover any spots on the bed take care of this-though more than once I then saw smears on the pillowcase. Dirty! I love it. I want to not, like, ruby-shower heavy bleed on someone, but reach inside myself with a couple fingers and write my name on a dude's chest with it. C-h-l-o-e. Smiley face. — Kelley Kenney

Take a bullet for the client. Make everything about the client. Honor the client's work. Do the dirty work. — Patrick Lencioni

We are so vain as to set the highest value upon those things to which nature has assigned the lowest place. What can be more coarse and rude in the mind than the precious metals, or more slavish and dirty than the people that dig and work them? And yet they defile our minds more than our bodies, and make the possessor fouler than the artificer of them. Rich men, in fine, are only the greater slaves. — Seneca The Younger

Therefore, to you, and to the fifty governors, I have a request. Please, do not send me politicians. We do not have the time to do the things that must be done through that process. I need people who do real things in the real world. I need people who do not want to live in Washington. I need people who will not try to work the system. I need people who will come here at great personal sacrifice to do an important job, and then return home to their normal lives. I want engineers who know how things are built. I want physicians who know how to make sick people well. I want cops who know what it means when your civil rights are violated by a criminal. I want farmers who grow real food on real farms. I want people who know what it's like to have dirty hands, and pay a mortgage bill, and raise kids, and worry about the future. I want people who know they're working for you and not themselves. That's what I want. That's what I need. I think that's what a lot of you want, too. — Tom Clancy

I'd gotten the message in my home, starting with my grandfather, that real work, the kind that makes you sweat and gets your hands dirty, is a respectable, necessary thing. But I wanted to write - and writing didn't qualify. Whenever I told my parents I dreamed of becoming a writer, they said, 'Great, but what are you going to do for work?' — Ali Liebegott

The best way to learn is by doing. The only way to build a strong work ethic is getting your hands dirty. — Alex Spanos

The one consistent policy running through this [Clinton] administration is the love it has lavished on Marxists
food aid for North Korea, diplomatic recognition of the Hanoi regime, chronic kowtowing to Beijing and now doing Castro's dirty work. How can the Clinton gang
which carried the Viet Cong flag during anti-war demonstrations and decorated their dorm rooms with pictures of Che Guevara
not feel contempt for people who insist, with every fiber of their being, that communism is mankind's mortal enemy? — Don Feder

Dirt used to be a badge of honor. Dirt used to look like work. But we've scrubbed the dirt off the face of work, and consequently we've created this suspicion of anything that's too dirty. — Mike Rowe

When my parents went off to Knoxville to work, I lived with my father's mother. She was strict - the kind who starched and ironed dresses. I had to sit more than I played. Oh, I was miserable. I liked being out with the animals. I'd come in the house with my hair pulled out, sash off the dress, dirty as heck. I was always getting spanked. — Tina Turner

Men rarely worry about using or being used because all relationships work that way. A man perceives himself as owning and being owned by a woman. 'Use' is a dirty word only when there's an imbalance in the relationship. — Warren Farrell

It's only when the settlement work has gone on for months that one realizes how bad things are. As our secretary said to me, your finger-nails never seem dirty until you wash your hands. — F Scott Fitzgerald

This woman.
The one right in front of him making keen moaning noises.
He wanted her so fucking badly.
All the time. She was a thirst in his throat, and goddamn, most of the time he thought he was stroking out, what with his heart thumping when she laughed. She made him work hard to get her smiles, so her laugh... fuck... golden. — V. Theia

To serve means to work alongside the neediest, first of all to establish a close human relationship with them, based on solidarity. Solidarity - this word elicits fear in the developed world. They try not to say it. It is almost a dirty word for them. But it's our word! — Pope Francis

Is it healthy for a society to entrust its defense to one percent of its population, while the other 99 percent thanks its lucky stars that it doesn't have to do the dirty work? — Steven Pressfield

With just about every script, in almost every corner of the set, I was faced with the truth: This was my parents' life. My mother had sat in handcuffs; my father had once worn an orange jumpsuit like the dozens that sat folded in our wardrobe department. For the other actors and me on our show, this was all fantasy, the re-creation of a world we knew little about; for Mami and Papi, it could not have been any more real or painful...I've had so many scenes in which Flaca & I are doing the dirty work, like cleaning the kitchen or mopping the floors, which is when I think of my parents most. Long before they ended up in prison, they'd spent years handling the nastiest jobs, the ones often avoided by others. Manual labor. Low pay. No respect. They must've felt so trapped. It must've been so hard for them to maintain their dignity when others looked down on them or, worse, didn't see them at all. — Diane Guerrero

I'll kill you all," yelled Bill, and swore for three or four minutes, calling us every dirty name he could think of for being so chicken-hearted. When people talk about "leadership quality" I often think of Bill Unsworth; he had it. And like many people who have it, he could make you do things you didn't want to do by a kind of cunning urgency. We were ashamed before him. Here he was, a bold adventurer, who had put himself out to include us
lily-livered wretches
in a daring, dangerous, highly illegal exploit, and all we could do was worry about being hurt! We plucked up our spirits and swore and shouted filthy words, and set to work to wreck the house. — Robertson Davies

He looks again towards the door, expecting Mum to walk in and remind him of something he's forgotten. He smiles awkwardly.
'Is that it, Dad? I've got to go.'
'Your Mum said I should mention ... um ... satisfaction.'
'What!'
'She said young men should know things, should be told things so that the girl won't be ... ' his eyes plead for understanding, ' ... disappointed.'
[ ... ] 'No worries, Dad. My biology teacher said I was a natural.'
Dad looks confused.
'I'm kidding, Dad.'
[ ... ] Poor bloke, having to do the dirty work while Mum's off with her gang.
'Dad? What did Grandpa tell you about sex?'
'He said if I got a girl pregnant, he'd kill me. — Steven Herrick

I would say it is because the striving and the power keep you from realizing just how helpless you really are. It protects you from facing the fact that others are manipulating you, that regardless of what you might claim, your philosophy is simply a way to rationalize what you do for others too afraid to do their own dirty work; that you are in a way also a victim of the apartheid state. You — Chris Abani

Tam considers me a challenge. I consider Tam a work in progress. I also think there's a gentleman lurking under that calculating exterior. Tam thinks 'gentleman' is a dirty word. I talk dirty to Tam every chance I get. — Lisa Shearin

I think the perception of me can be, you know, confused. But that's only because people only see that side of me when I'm at work, in front of the camera. So they don't see Miranda at home; they don't see behind the scenes. They see the glamour of it all but they don't see Miranda standing barefoot in a dirty old house. — Miranda Kerr

We don't want to be uncomfortable. We want a quick and dirty "how-to" list for happiness. I don't fit that bill. Never have. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to skip over the hard stuff, but it just doesn't work. We don't change, we don't grow, and we don't move forward without the work. If we really want to live a joyful, connected, and meaningful life, we must talk about things that get in the way. — Brene Brown

I've got the best of all worlds. It's every actor's dream to wake up in New York City and go to an acting job rather than to a restaurant to wash dirty dishes. And I live so close to the studios that I ride my bike to work. — Christopher Meloni

There had been three priests, proponents of so-called liberation theology. They had opposed the reactionary tide from Rome. And in all three cases the IEA had done the dirty work for Iwaszkiewicz and his Congregation. Corona, Ortega, and Souza were prominent progressive priests working in marginal dioceses, poor districts of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paolo. They believed in saving man here on earth, not waiting for the Kingdom of Heaven. — Arturo Perez-Reverte

Every society needs particular individuals to do its dirty work for it. — Kevin Dutton

Sign at a Kentucky appliance store: Don't kill your wife. Let our washing machine do the dirty work. — Dave Barry

Punishment? You don't have any right to punish me. And I can curse. I choose not to most of the time, but don't think it doesn't go through my head, asshole. I was trying to give you something. I was trying to give you my body."
"That's where you fucked up, little girl. I don't want your body. I want your soul. I want your everything. And I definitely want your orgasms. I want them all. I'll be a greedy bastard, savoring them and hoarding them all for myself. You wanted to give me your body? I can buy that on a street corner, sweetheart. You're the one who's being selfish now."
"How is it selfish to offer to have sex? I don't understand what you want."
"First off, I want you to stop hiding yourself from me. You're the one making this tawdry by pretending it's dirty and not worthy of the light of day."
"I didn't mean it that way."
"We're going to do this my way. We tried yours and it didn't work, so I'm taking control. I should have done it in the first place. — Lexi Blake

Even today I am willing to volunteer to do the dirty work for Israel, to have everyone hate us, to pull the rug from underneath the feet of the Diaspora Jews, so that they will be forced to run to us crying. Even if it means blowing up one or two synagogues here and there, I don't care. — Ariel Sharon

High Europe always played at ethnic contempt because it was High Europe, and so had the strength, the authority, to make the racial rules. We great unwashed of the outer world, on the coasts of new continents, though we might ourselves have behaved atrociously to indigenes, were baffled by the determination with which Europe returned to the frenzies of racial myth. Nice boys and not-so-nice boys took up the theme, put on the uniform, did the dirty work. — Thomas Keneally

Feeling weightless ... it's so many things together. A feeling of pride, of healthy solitude, of dignified freedom from everything that's dirty, sticky. You feel exquisitely comfortable ... and you feel you have so much energy, such an urge to do things, such an ability to do things. And you work well, yes, you think well, without sweat, without difficulty as if the biblical curse in the sweat of thy face and in sorrow no longer exists, As if you've been born again. — Wally Schirra

Narayan explained how they had spent the morning, and Dukhi laughed to hear it. the entire episode made Radha furious. "Why must you torment the boy? There is no need to make my Om do such dirty work." ... "How will he appreciate what he has if he does not learn what his forefathers did? Once a week he will come with me! Whether he likes it or not! — Rohinton Mistry