|
My SO has a wonderful book that I stumbled upon while we were getting our bookcases and books together recently. It's entitled "The Best Liberal Quotes Ever, Why the Left is Right", and groups the quotes into many different categories. Quotes from a hundred or more years ago are included with more contemporary quotes, to give a sense of the solidity and continuity of our philosophical thought over the centuries. I thought I'd share some of the quotes here, to remind us all of who we are, what we are fighting for, and the importance of carrying on the struggle that is, really, never-ending. I'm going to break them down into several threads, this being the first one, obviously. And feel free to add quotes of your own that you've encountered that have influenced your own beliefs and principles.
On Justice:
"When the man who feeds the world by toiling in the fields is himself deprived of the basic rights of feeding, sheltering and caring for his own family, the whole community of man is sick."
Cesar Chavez
I think there are many variations of this that are just as true and powerful. For instance, the person who folds your hospital sheets and empties your bedpans, etc., should, themselves, have the right to receive medical treatment in those same beds regardless of whether they're insured or not. And people who work hard all day or night should receive a real, living wage that's enough to support themselves and their families and to provide health care, etc.
"Charity begins at home and justice begins next door."
Charles Dickens
This has always been one of my favorite sayings from one of my favorite authors. Dickens knows exactly what he's talking about, too. When he was only twelve years old, his father was put into debtor's prison, as he'd fallen on hard times and was unable to pay his obligations, much less support his family. Dickens was put to work in a factory, working 12-hour shifts six days a week, at the tender age of twelve. That would have been his life for the next fifty years, had he not received the intervention and assistance of a generous benefactor who recognized his potential and "rescued" him. Think what the world of literature, humanitarianism and philosophy would have lost had it not been for that one person. And how many thousands of other contributions have we lost because of the attitudes that put his father in jail and Dickens to work 12 hours a day at twelve years old? How many times have we had to say that just because someone is born poor it doesn't mean that they're unworthy, and just because someone is born rich, it doesn't mean that they're automatically worthy and a better person. And just because someone has money it doesn't automatically mean they worked for it, and because someone is poor, it doesn't mean that they don't work hard.
"An injustice is tolerable only when it is necessary to avoid an even greater injustice."
John Rawls
"The answer to injustice is not to silence the critic, but to end the injustice."
Paul Robeson
The RW seems particularly adept at smearing the critic and dissenter instead of addressing the issues they raise, don't they?
"A society that has more justice is a society that needs less charity."
Ralph Nader
"Military justice is to justice what military music is to music."
Groucho Marx
"Don't let the politicians chip away at the New Deal and the Great Society programs like Social Security and Medicare, that puts a floor beyond which the elderly, the sick, the powerless do not starve or lack for medicine or shelter."
Helen Thomas
Seems pretty simple, doesn't it? Especially for a nation that claims to be oh-so-Christian. Politicians need to realize that every single decision they make has a real affect on the lives of real, living, breathing human beings, and people need to realize that the politicians for whom they vote have a real affect on their lives.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
Martin Luther King, Jr.
'Nuff said.
"Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity."
Horace Mann
Sounds like a worthy life slogan to me!
On Poverty:
"I used to think I was poor. Then they told me I was not poor, I was needy. They told me it was self-defeating to think of myself as needy, I was deprived. Then they told me underprivileged was overused, I was disadvantaged. I still do not have a dime, but I have a great vocabulary."
Jules Feiffer
"What would you think of me if I were capable of seating myself at a table and gorging myself with food and saw about me the children of my fellow beings starving to death?"
Eugene V. Debs
Unfortunately, too many on the right, and even some who claim to be on the left, do exactly that, with no shame whatsoever. But, shhhhhhh, we can't bring Debs up because he is, God in heaven forbid, a (whisper it with me here) socialist, and wanting to ensure that the hungry are fed is, God in heaven forbid (whisper it with me here) socialist. Never mind that Jesus was the ultimate socialist. I guess it's better to see children starve than to do anything about it because it's against your political "philosophy."
"The war against hunger is truly mankind's war of liberation."
John F. Kennedy
Say what you will about the flaws of the Kennedys, and yes, they do have them, but they never forgot where they came from originally and they've never forgotten their obligation to those less fortunate. Unlike a certain other "dynasty" family who shall remain nameless.
"The reason we are fighting the war on drugs is because we lost the war on poverty."
Sargent Shriver
"Poverty is the worst form of violence."
Mahatma Ghandi
Amen! And what's especially impressive about Ghandi is that he was a member of the Brahmin class, who could have everything he wanted at his fingertips without ever having to worry about anything. But he chose to associate with the lowest caste, the lowest of the low, and to make himself one of them, not only to help them but to send a powerful message to the world. And that he did, indeed.
"People who claw their way to the top are not likely to find very much wrong with the system that enabled them to rise."
Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.
This one should be particularly noteworthy considering Schlesinger just died this week, at the ripe old age of 93. A friend of and adviser to the Kennedys, especially Bobby, he was a true old-style liberal, his life worthy and deserving of celebration.
"Many of us regard ourselves as mildly liberal or centrist politically, voice fairly pleasant sentiments about our poor children, contribute money to send our poor kids to summer camp, feel benevolent.......Meanwhile, we put other people's children into an economic and environmental death zone and say to ourselves "well, I hope they don't kill each other off, but if they do, it's not my fault."
Jonathan Kozol
Ahh, yes, the "limousine liberal." Truly annoying and hypocritical, isn't he?
"The poverty of our century is unlike that of any other. It is not, as poverty was before, the result of natural scarcity, but of a set of priorities imposed upon the rest of the world by the rich. Consequently, the modern poor are not pitied, but written off as trash."
John Berger
Hurricane Katrina and the Ninth Ward, anyone? Locating toxic waste dumps in poor neighborhoods, anyone?
"I don't believe that it's true that the poor will always be with us. I think that kind of pious fatalism is just an excuse for keeping things the way they are."
Margaret Culkin Banning
On Dissent: (wingnuts, prepare for your heads to explode)
"Dissent is the highest form of patriotism."
Thomas Jefferson
Oh, yes, that commie pinko anti-American founding father, himself. What the RW has always failed to understand is that we would not BE a country today had the colonists and the founders not dissented against the unfair and, in many cases unlawful, policies of England.
"One has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws."
Martin Luther King, Jr.
The man would certainly know about unjust laws, wouldn't he? As a paralegal, I have the highest respect for the law. HOWEVER. Just because a law exists, does NOT make it morally right. What is legal and what is moral are often not the same things and should not be confused.
"The dissenter is every human being at those moments of his life when he resigns momentarily from the herd and thinks for himself."
Archibald MacLeish
Indeed. And I wonder where we'd be if many people throughout the ages had not had the courage and foresight to do exactly that? Too bad most on the right and too many on the left don't have such courage and foresight.
"We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. When the loyal opposition dies, I think the soul of America dies with it."
Edward R. Murrow
Talk about a member of the loyal (and very courageous, I might add) opposition! I think Jefferson would have gotten along just fine with Murrow.
"Intellect does not attain its full force unless it attacks power."
Madame de Stael
I don't know who she is, but it makes perfect sense to me.
"I have spent many years of my life in opposition and I rather like the role."
Eleanor Roosevelt
And think where we'd be as a country had she NOT liked such a role!
So, there you have Part I. There are many, many, many more wonderful quotes I'll be sharing in threads to come, but I think this is a good start!
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
