Quotes About Activism

My parents demonstrated against the Vietnam war, they were into the civil rights movement, the feminist movement, they started the first vegetarian restaurant in Pittsburgh.

Social justice has always been a part of my inspiration. For example, when the Vietnam War was going on, I wrote a song about that.

I contend that non-violent acts exert pressure far more effective than violent acts, for the pressure comes from goodwill and gentleness.

Nonviolence is absolute commitment to the way of love. Love is not emotional bash; it is not empty sentimentalism. It is the active outpouring of one's whole being into the being of another.

How can one not speak about war, poverty, and inequality when people who suffer from these afflictions don't have a voice to speak?

The anti-war movement should turn itself into a pro-democracy movement

What if when they called a war, no one went?

To some degree it matters who's in office, but it matters more how much pressure they're under from the public.

We should not forget that our tradition is one of protest and revolt, and it is stultifying to celebrate the rebels of the past ... while we silence the rebels of the present.

I wanted a racially just society. I wanted to end wars. I wanted to end white supremacy. I wanted to create a world that was based on egalitarianism, sharing, racial justice.

Once he [Negro] realizes that [he is at war ], then he can defend himself.

Well, I was a very strong opponent of the war, in fact, one of those who went door to door to my colleagues and thus achieved 60 percent of the Democrats voting no against this war.

It seems to be the thing now that young people are getting back into politics.

There's people coming in who've never done any politics at all, who've never been in a trade union, they've never been in a political party, they've never done anything, but they do feel a kind of urgency.

There is no degree of human suffering which in and of itself is going to bring about change. Only organisation can change things.

Martin White, who stood up and said his piece. Claimed that he was a good Free-State man, but a free white state man, and he intended to obey the laws, and the rest of us should as well.

One of the reasons so many women say "I'm not a feminist but..." (and then put forward a feminist position), is that in addition to being stereotyped as man-hating Amazons, feminists have also been cast as antifamily and antimotherhood.

I would rather be alone and a loud voice for action than be silent.

lynchings between 1900 and the 1950s, to the murders during the civil rights movement, to killings that happen right now. This moment.

I wanted to be Emma Goldman. I wanted to digest Doris Lessing's Golden Notebooks like biscuits. I felt like Harriet the Spy, looking for a dumbwaiter to hide in, scribbling down all I witnessed.

I want to start an uprising," I say.

I would rather die fighting for what is right, than live passively amidst all that is wrong.

Politics is traditionally a male domain in Russia. Until now, women have only been accessories. Now, female protest groups are emerging - not because men came up with the idea, but through their own efforts. That's something new for Russia.

I certainly did not know what the word 'socialism' meant growing up, because I was brought up in a very nonpolitical family. My brother was somewhat active, but my parents were not.