Quotes from Cornel West

Neofascism in the United States takes the form of big money, big banks, big corporations, tied to xenophobic scapegoating of the vulnerable, like Mexicans and Muslims and women and black folk, and militaristic policies abroad, with strongman, charismatic, autocratic personality, and that's what Donald Trump is.

If they think they have issues with the president not doing enough for the poor now, wait and see what happens if the opposition takes office. Then they would really need a poverty tour.

There is something about boldness and fearlessness and being free enough to speak what is on one's mind that warrants freedom.

There is always a very delicate interplay between individual actions and institutional conditions. But there is no such thing as institutional conditions without any individual actions and no such thing as individual action without institutional conditions. So there is always personal responsibility.

It's impossible to translate Wall Street greed into one or two demands.

Every president needs to deal with the permanent government of the country, and the permanent government of the country is Wall Street oligarchs and corporate plutocrats and the questions becomes what is the relationship between that president and Wall Street.

I am excited to have a black president because white supremacy is real and it needs to be shattered.

Jesus loves a free black man.

You keep folks so intimidated. You can give them money, access, but they're still scared. And as long as you're scared, you're on the plantation.

The only countervailing force against organized money at the top, is organized people at the bottom.

To get up in the morning & do the monumental tasks that face us, our labor is best fueled by love.

Patriarchy is a disease and we are in perennial recovery and relapse. So you have to get up every morning and struggle against it.

Music is what we need when language fails us, but we cannot remain silent.

For me, music is in no way ornamental or decorative, it's constitutive of who I am.

Nihilism is a natural consequence of a culture (or civilization) ruled and regulated by categories that mask manipulation, mastery and domination of peoples and nature.

We're beings toward death, we're … two-legged, linguistically-conscious creatures born between urine and feces whose body will one day be the culinary delight of terrestrial worms.

I think philosophy is all about lived experience, which is to say life in the streets, life in a variety of different contexts.

Philosophy is fundamentally about how you come to terms with living your life and trying to do it in a wise manner, and, for me, that means decently and compassionately and courageously and so forth.

I believe philosophy must go to school with the poets; it's not either/or, it's not over or against.

We [Americans] have to get beyond the greed-run-amok. We have to get beyond indifference to the poor and working people. We have to get beyond polarized politics.

None of us alone can save the nation or the world. But each of us can make a positive difference if we commit ourselves to do so. (p. 109)

All individuals have the same value, not to be determined by market price. They're made in the image and likeness of God.

For most of the history of the American empire, government has been a tool for preserving and furthering the power and might of white male corporate elites.

I take my fundamental cue from John Coltrane that says there must be a priority of integrity, honesty, decency, and mastery of craft.