# "For people who like this sort of thing...

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-like-this-sort-of-thing/616703>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [March 24, 2012, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-like-this-sort-of-thing/616703 "2012-03-24T18:41:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\
**Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-like-this-sort-of-thing/616703/1 "2012-03-24T18:41:21Z")

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… this is the sort of thing they like."

Who said it first, and of what? Googling the quote gives me multiple uses, no attribution.

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**Author:** ![Miss\_Mapp](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miss_mapp/32/369_2.png) [@Miss\_Mapp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Mapp)\
**Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-like-this-sort-of-thing/616703/2 "2012-03-24T19:08:17Z")

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I first heard it in _The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie_, spoken by Miss Brodie. She was referring dismissively to the Girl Guides (Scouts), which one of her students was a member of.

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**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\
**Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-like-this-sort-of-thing/616703/3 "2012-03-24T19:37:40Z")

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[Wikiquote.org](http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln) gives the original as

> [@](#):
>
> Well, for people that like that sort of thing, I think it is just about the sort of thing they would like.

and adds:

> [@](#):
>
> Attributed to “an American President” in Ármin Vámbéry (1884), All the Year Round. It more likely originates in a spoof testimonial that Artemus Ward (Charles Farrar Browne) wrote in an advertisement in 1863:
> 
> > [@](#):
> >
> > I have never heard any of your lectures, but from what I can learn I should say that for people who like the kind of lectures you deliver, they are just the kind of lectures such people like.
> > 
> > Yours respectfully,  
> > O. Abe

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**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\
**Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-like-this-sort-of-thing/616703/4 "2012-03-24T19:48:41Z")

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> [@KneadToKnow](#):
>
> [Wikiquote.org](http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln) gives the original as  
> and adds:

Great, thanks. That explains the Lincoln attribution I noticed, which seemed screwy to me. (I’d’ve guessed Dorothy Parker.)

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**Author:** ![Sam\_A.Robrin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sam_a.robrin/32/14497_2.png) [@Sam\_A.Robrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_A.Robrin)\
**Post date:** [March 25, 2012, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-like-this-sort-of-thing/616703/5 "2012-03-25T03:43:30Z")

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I don’t know if Lincoln said that, but Eisenhower is supposed to have said “Things are more like they are now than they have ever been before.”…