Quotes by Political Activists

In many respects, the United States is a great country. Freedom of speech is protected more than in any other country. It is also a very free society. In America, the professor talks to the mechanic. They are in the same category.
Noam Chomsky
The new crimes that the US and Israel were committing in Gaza as 2009 opened do not fit easily into any standard category—except for the category of familiarity.
Noam Chomsky
In the case of Tunisia, it was indeed this single act that sparked what had been long-standing active protest movements and moved them forward. But that's not so unusual. Let's look at our own history. Take the civil rights movement. There had been plenty of concern and activism about violent repression of blacks in the South, and it took a couple of students sitting in at a lunch counter to really set it off. Small acts can make a big difference when there is a background of concern, understanding, and preliminary activism.
Noam Chomsky
A truly living human being cannot remain neutral.
Nadine Gordimer
I remember the philosopher Bertrand Russell was asked why he spent his time protesting against nuclear war and getting arrested on demonstrations. Why didn’t he continue to work on the serious philosophical and logical problems which have major intellectual significance? And his answer was pretty good. He said: “Look, if I and others like me only work on those problems, there won’t be anybody around to appreciate it or be interested.
Chomsky Noam
Ah, what sights and sounds and pain lie beneath that mist. And we had thought that our hard climb out of that cruel valley led to some cool, green and peaceful, sunlit place---but it's all jungle here, a wild and savage wilderness that's overrun with ruins. But put on your crown, my Queen, and we will build a New City on these ruins.
Eldridge Cleaver
A man may write himself out of reputation when nobody else can do it.
Thomas Paine
It is only through fiction and the dimension of the imaginary that we can learn something real about individual experience. Any other approach is bound to be general and abstract.
Nicola Chiaromonte
There is no victory without pain.
Lolita Lebron
The harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheaply we esteem too lightly 'tis dearness only that gives everything its value.
Thomas Paine
No good work is ever done while the heart is hot and anxious and fretted.
Olive Schreiner
Remember the dignity of your womanhood. Do not appeal do not beg do not grovel. Take courage join hands stand beside us fight with us.
Christabel Pankhurst
Wars are not fought for territory but for words. Man's deadliest weapon is language. He is as susceptible to being hypnotized by slogans as he is to infectious diseases. And where there is an epidemic the group-mind takes over.
Arthur Koestler
When we can't dream any longer we die.
Emma Goldman
The truth isn't always beauty but the hunger for it is.
Nadine Gordimer
These are the times that try men's souls.
Thomas Paine
Today is the first day of the rest of your life.
Abbie Hoffman
I know there will be spring as surely as the birds know it when they see above the snow two tiny quivering green leaves. Spring cannot fail us.
Olive Schreiner
Nature gave men two ends-one to sit on and one to think with. Ever since then man's success or failure has been dependent on the one he used most.
George R. Kirkpatrick
Ability is sexless.
Christabel Pankhurst
We bear the world and we make it.... There was never a great man who had not a great mother-it is hardly an exaggeration.
Olive Schreiner
The surest sign of fitness is success.
Olive Schreiner
We do not make beams from the hollow decaying trunk of the fallen oak. We use the upsoaring tree in the full vigor of its sap.
Sylvia Pankhurst
Nothing is more sad than the death of an illusion.
Arthur Koestler
Better that we should die fighting than be outraged and dishonored. Better to die than to live in slavery.
Emmeline Pankhurst
It is necessary to the happiness of man that he be mentally faithful to himself.
Thomas Paine
The history of human growth is at the same time the history of every new idea heralding the approach of a brighter dawn and the brighter dawn has always been considered illegal outside of the law.
Emma Goldman
The world is my country all mankind are my brethren and to do good is my religion.
Thomas Paine
My own mind is my own church.
Thomas Paine
Wisdom never kicks at the iron walls it can't bring down.
Olive Schreiner
The harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap we esteem too lightly 'tis dearness only that gives everything it's value.
Thomas Paine
Man has bought brains but all the millions in the world have failed to buy love. Man has subdued bodies but all the power on earth has been unable to subdue love. Man has conquered whole nations but all his armies could not conquer love. Man has chained and fettered the spirit but he has been utterly helpless before love. Thus love has the magic power to make of a beggar a king.
Emma Goldman
If you stop struggling then you stop life.
Huey Newton
It is necessary to the happiness of man that he be mentally faithful to himself.
Thomas Paine
The history of human growth is at the same time the history of every new idea heralding the approach of a brighter dawn and the brighter dawn has always been considered illegal outside of the law.
Emma Goldman
The world is my country all mankind are my brethren and to do good is my religion.
Thomas Paine
My own mind is my own church.
Thomas Paine
Wisdom never kicks at the iron walls it can't bring down.
Olive Schreiner
The harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap we esteem too lightly 'tis dearness only that gives everything it's value.
Thomas Paine
Man has bought brains but all the millions in the world have failed to buy love. Man has subdued bodies but all the power on earth has been unable to subdue love. Man has conquered whole nations but all his armies could not conquer love. Man has chained and fettered the spirit but he has been utterly helpless before love. Thus love has the magic power to make of a beggar a king.
Emma Goldman
If you stop struggling then you stop life.
Huey Newton
A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper is always a virtue but moderation in principle is always a vice.
Thomas Paine
Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must like men undergo the fatigue of supporting it.
Thomas Paine
These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will in this crisis shrink from the service of their country but he that stands it now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny like hell is not easily conquered yet we have this consolation with us that the harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph.
Thomas Paine
Nothing is more sad than the death of an illusion.
Arthur Koestler
The world is my country all mankind are my brethren and to do good is my religion.
Thomas Paine
The motto should not be: Forgive one another rather understand one another.
Emma Goldman
Someone has said that it requires less mental effort to condemn than to think.
Emma Goldman
No one has yet realized the wealth of sympathy the kindness and generosity hidden in the soul of a child. The effort of every true education should be to unlock that treasure.
Emma Goldman
Justice and judgment lie often a world apart.
Emmeline Pankhurst
We bear the world and we make it. ... There was never a great man who had not a great mother-it is hardly an exaggeration.
Olive Schreiner
There is nothing in life but refraining from hurting others and comforting those that are sad.
Olive Schreiner
The demand for equal rights in every vocation of life is just and fair but after all the most vital right is the right to love and be loved.
Emma Goldman
I think if I were dying and I heard of an act of injustice it would start me up to a moment's life again.
Olive Schreiner
There are only two things that are absolute realities love and knowledge and you can't escape them.
Olive Schreiner
It is necessary to the happiness of man that he be mentally faithful to himself.
Thomas Paine
There is nothing ridiculous in love.
Olive Schreiner
Government even in its best state is but a necessary evil in its worst state an intolerable one.
Thomas Paine
God seems to have the receiver off the hook.
Arthur Koestler
Action is the only reality not only reality but morality as well.
Abbie Hoffman