"They won't soon forget the name "Oskar Schindler" around here. "Oskar Schindler," they'll say, "Everybody remembers him. He did something extraordinary. He did what no one else did. He came with nothing, a suitcase, and built a bankrupt company into a major manufactory. And left with a steamer trunk, two steamer trunks, of money. All the riches of the world.""
—Oskar Schindler, Schindler's List
"Have we come, so far that we've forgotten what it's like to start out with nothing but a dim chance and a bright hope? I will not be the one to snuff that hope, gentlemen. Not I."
—J.W. Harper, Iron Will
"Being born wealthy is no accomplishment! That's why I became a cowboy! To find the life I missed by not being born poor like you!"
—Theodore Roosevelt to a young Scrooge McDuck, The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck
“Now, on your diplomas, there will be only one name on it and this is yours. But I hope that that doesn’t confuse and that you think that you maybe made it this far by yourself. No you didn’t. It took a lot of help. None of us can make it alone. None of us. Not even the guy that is talking to you right now that was the greatest bodybuilder of all time. Not even me that has been the Terminator and went back in time to save the human race. Not even me that fought and killed predators with his bare hands."
“I always tell people that you can call me anything that you want. You can call me Arnold. You can call me Schwarzenegger. You can call me the Austrian Oak. You can call me Schwarzie. You can call me Arnie. But don’t ever ever call me a self-made man."
“This is so important for you to understand. I didn’t make it that far on my own. I mean, to accept that credit or that mantle would discount every single person that has helped me to get here today — that gave me advice, that made an effort, that gave me time, that lifted me when I fell. It gives the wrong impression that we can do it alone. None of us can. The whole concept of self-made man, or woman, is a myth.”
“I always tell people that you can call me anything that you want. You can call me Arnold. You can call me Schwarzenegger. You can call me the Austrian Oak. You can call me Schwarzie. You can call me Arnie. But don’t ever ever call me a self-made man."
“This is so important for you to understand. I didn’t make it that far on my own. I mean, to accept that credit or that mantle would discount every single person that has helped me to get here today — that gave me advice, that made an effort, that gave me time, that lifted me when I fell. It gives the wrong impression that we can do it alone. None of us can. The whole concept of self-made man, or woman, is a myth.”
— 'Arnold Schwarzenegger, Deconstructing and Defying the trope
"There are a lot of wealthy, successful Americans who agree with me — because they want to give something back. They know they didn't — look, if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own. You didn’t get there on your own. I'm always struck by people who think, 'Well, it must be because I was just so smart.' There are a lot of smart people out there. 'It must be because I worked harder than everybody else.' Let me tell you something -- there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there.
If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you've got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet.
The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together. There are some things, just like fighting fires, we don’t do on our own. I mean, imagine if everybody had their own fire service. That would be a hard way to organize fighting fires."
— Barack Obama, discussing and deconstructing this trope
