Quotes from Derrick Jensen

Love does not imply pacifism.

I get asked quite often if I'm an anarchist. If they want to put a label on me, that's fine. What is most important to me is to live in a world that is not being murdered.

For us to maintain our way of living, we must tell lies to each other and especially to ourselves. The lies are necessary because, without them, many deplorable acts would become impossibilities.

People say 'what do you mean' when you talk about 'bringing down civilization.' What I really mean is depriving the rich of the ability to steal from the poor and depriving the powerful of the ability to destroy the planet. That's what I really mean.

In all of my books, I've emphasized that the fundamental difference between civilized and indigenous ways of being is that, for even the most open-minded of the civilized, listening to the natural world is a metaphor.

When we realize the degree of agency we actually do have, we no longer have to "hope" at all. We simply do the work.

Writing is really very easy. Tap a vein and bleed onto the page. Everything else is just technical.

No matter what we call it, poison is still poison, death is still death, and industrial civilization is still causing the greatest mass extinction in the history of the planet.

We have been too kind to those who are killing the planet. We have been inexcusably, unforgivably, insanely kind.

The stories we are told shape the way we see the world, which shapes the way we experience the world.

If your homeland were invaded by aliens who cut down the forests, poisoned the water and air and contaminated the food supply, would you resist?

We have a need for enchantment that is as deep and devoted as our need for food and water.