Oppressed Quotes

• To hold a people in oppression you have to convince them first that they are supposed to be oppressed.

  John Henrik Clarke

  People, Firsts, Oppression

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• The oppressed must never allow the conscience of the oppressor to slumber. Religion reminds every man that he is his brother's keeper.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Inspirational, Brother, Men

  Martin Luther King (Jr.) (1968). “I Have a Dream: The Quotations of Martin Luther King, Jr”

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• A government which uses force to maintain its rule teaches the oppressed to use force to oppose it.

  Nelson Mandela

  Teaching, Government, Use

  Nelson Mandela (1988). “The Historic Speech of Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela at the Rivonia Trial: As Delivered from the Dock on April 20, 1964”

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• The most potent weapon of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.

  Steven Biko

  Historical, Mind, Weapons

  "White Racism and Black Consciousness" (paper presented at workshop sponsored by Abe Bailey Institute of Interracial Studies),Cape Town, South Africa, Jan. 1971

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• Serve humanity, regardless of religion. Show solidarity for those suffering and oppressed.

  Tariq Ramadan

  Humanity, Suffering, Solidarity

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• Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.

  Frederick Douglass

  Peace, Patriotic, Ignorance

  Speech on the twenty-fourth anniversary of emancipation in the District of Columbia,Washington, D.C., Apr. 1886

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• The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppose.

  Frederick Douglass

  Freedom, Democracies Have, Tyrants

  Frederick Douglass, Philip Sheldon Foner, Yuval Taylor (1999). “Frederick Douglass: Selected Speeches and Writings”, p.367, Chicago Review Press

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• Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  Interesting, Social Justice, Oppression

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• You can't hold a man down without staying down with him.

  Booker T. Washington

  Letting Go, Stay Strong, Men

  "The Great Quotations" edited by George Seldes, (p. 641), 1971.

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• In order for the oppressed to be able to wage the struggle for their liberation, they must perceive the reality of oppression not as a closed world from which there is no exit , but as a limiting situation which they can transform.

  Paulo Freire

  Struggle, Reality, Order

  Paulo Freire (2014). “Pedagogy of the Oppressed: 30th Anniversary Edition”, p.35, Bloomsbury Publishing USA

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• Nature in darkness groans and men are bound to sullen contemplation in the night: restless they turn on beds of sorrow; in their inmost brain feeling the crushing wheels, they rise, they write the bitter words of stern philosophy and knead the bread of knowledge with tears and groans.

  William Blake

  Crush, Philosophy, Writing

  William Blake (1966). “Complete Writings: With Variant Readings”, p.379, Oxford University Press, USA

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• Do not be misled by the fact that you are at liberty and relatively free; that for the moment you are not under lock and key: you have simply been granted a reprieve.

  Ryszard Kapuscinski

  Keys, Liberty, Locks

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• The oppressed, instead of striving for liberation, tend themselves to become oppressors.

  Paulo Freire

  Strive, Liberation, Pedagogy Of The Oppressed

  Paulo Freire (2014). “Pedagogy of the Oppressed: 30th Anniversary Edition”, p.32, Bloomsbury Publishing USA

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• You know, it's not the world that was my oppressor, because what the world does to you, if the world does it to you long enough and effectively enough, you begin to do to yourself.

  James A. Baldwin

  Long, Doe, World

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• Though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Majority Rule, Tyranny Of The Majority, Minorities

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1801

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• Never elated when someone's oppressed, never dejected when another one's blessed.

  Alexander Pope

  Attitude, Blessed, Dejected

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• the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Rights, Law, Majority Rule

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1801

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• The history of an oppressed people is hidden in the lies and the agreed myth of its conquerors.

  Meridel Le Sueur

  Lying, People, Oppression

  Meridel Le Sueur, Elaine Hedges (1990). “Ripening: Selected Work”, p.66, Feminist Press at CUNY

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• The will to domination is a ravenous beast. There are never enough warm bodies to satiate its monstrous hunger. Once alive, this beast grows and grows, feeding on all the life around it, scouring the earth to find new sources of nourishment. This beast lives in each man who battens on female servitude.

  Andrea Dworkin

  War, Men, Female

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• When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression no matter how holy the motives.

  Robert A. Heinlein

  Atheist, Government, Church

  Robert A. Heinlein (2007). “Glory Road”, p.318, Macmillan

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• All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Freedom, Patriotic, Equality

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1801

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• It is essential for the oppressed to realize that when they accept the struggle for humanization they also accept, from that moment, their total responsibility for the struggle.

  Paulo Freire

  Struggle, Responsibility, Essentials

  Paulo Freire (2014). “Pedagogy of the Oppressed: 30th Anniversary Edition”, p.48, Bloomsbury Publishing USA

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• True enough, the country is calm. Calm as a morgue or a grave, would you not say?

  Vaclav Havel

  Country, Calm, Oppression

  Open letter to Dr. Gustáv Husák, Communist President, April 08, 1975.

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• Gossip is the opiate of the oppressed.

  Erica Jong

  Reality, Envy, Gossip

  Fear of Flying ch. 6 (1973)

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• The oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class are to represent and repress them in parliament.

  Vladimir Lenin

  Years, Class, Politics

  "The State and Revolution". Chapter 5, www.marxists.org. 1917.

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