"We have no right to express an opinion until we know all of the answers"
About this Quote
The subtext is classic Cobain: suspicion of authority, including his own. He spent his career watching a fiercely personal art form get flattened into branding, and watching earnest politics get turned into aesthetic. “No right” is a heavy phrase, almost moralistic, but it also signals discomfort with being drafted as a spokesman. Cobain was treated as a generational mouthpiece; this is him resisting the job description. It’s also a preemptive defense against the purity tests that often surround counterculture: don’t demand perfect positions from imperfect people.
Context matters. Early-’90s America was thick with culture-war simplifications and media narratives that turned complex lives into two-sentence summaries. Cobain’s statement pushes back against that compression. It’s not an argument for silence; it’s an argument for humility, for staying porous to new information, for admitting that conviction without curiosity is just another form of conformity. In a world that rewards instant certainty, he makes doubt sound like integrity.
Quote Details
| Topic | Wisdom |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Cobain, Kurt. (2026, January 18). We have no right to express an opinion until we know all of the answers. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/we-have-no-right-to-express-an-opinion-until-we-15795/
Chicago Style
Cobain, Kurt. "We have no right to express an opinion until we know all of the answers." FixQuotes. January 18, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/we-have-no-right-to-express-an-opinion-until-we-15795/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"We have no right to express an opinion until we know all of the answers." FixQuotes, 18 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/we-have-no-right-to-express-an-opinion-until-we-15795/. Accessed 16 Feb. 2026.











