Oppressed Quotes - Page 6

• As long as human labor power, and, consequently, life itself, remain articles of sale and purchase, of exploitation and robbery, the principle of the “sacredness of human life” remains a shameful lie, uttered with the object of keeping the oppressed slaves in their chains.

  Leon Trotsky

  Lying, Long, Principles

  Leon Trotsky, Slavoj Žižek, Henry Noel Brailsford (2007). “Terrorism and communism: a reply to Karl Kautsky”, Verso Books

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• Be faithful, be vigilant, be untiring in your efforts to break every yoke, and let the oppressed go free. Come what may - cost what it may - inscribe on the banner which you unfurl to the breeze, as your religious and political motto - "NO COMPROMISE WITH SLAVERY! NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS

  William Lloyd Garrison

  Religious, Effort, Political

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• But this I know. Those who seek Him will do well to look among the poor and the lowly, the sorrowful and the oppressed.

  Henry Van Dyke

  Looks, Poor, Sorrowful

  Henry van Dyke (2015). “The Story of Other Wise Man”, p.23, Editora Dracaena

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• I was oppressed with the sensations I then felt; I sunk under the weight of them.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Weight, Felt, Sensations

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1815). “The Sorrows of Werter: A Pathetic Story”, p.29

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• I don’t mind expressing my opinions and speaking out against injustice. I would be doing this even if I wasn’t a writer. I grew up in a household that believed in social justice. I have always understood myself as having an obligation to stand on the side of the silenced, the oppressed, and the mistreated.

  Tayari Jones

  Justice, Mind, Sides

  "Tayari Jones Knows Why She Sings". Interview with Ru Freeman, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 9, 2012.

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• It is not the responsibility of knights errant to discover whether the afflicted, the enchained and the oppressed whom they encounter on the road are reduced to these circumstances and suffer this distress for their vices, or for their virtues: the knight's sole responsibility is to succour them as people in need, having eyes only for their sufferings, not for their misdeeds.

  Miguel de Cervantes

  Eye, Responsibility, Knights

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• I am willing to admit that if the agriculturists are oppressed by peculiar burdens, they ought to be relieved from them, or be allowed a fair and just protection equivalent to all such peculiar burdens.

  Joseph Hume

  Peculiar, Protection, Burden

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• He who becomes a Prince through the favour of the people should always keep on good terms with them; which it is easy for him to do, since all they ask is not to be oppressed

  Niccolo Machiavelli

  People, Favour, Easy

  Niccolo Machiavelli, Sir Thomas More, Sir (2010). “Machiavelli, More & Luther”, p.36, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Genocide has two phases: one, destruction of the national pattern of the oppressed group; the other, the imposition of the national pattern of the oppressor. This imposition, in turn, may be made upon the oppressed population which is allowed to remain or upon the territory alone, after removal of the population and the colonization by the oppressor's own nationals.

  Raphael Lemkin

  Two, Groups, Population

  Raphael Lemkin (2008). “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe”, p.79, The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.

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• More than my questions about the efficacy of social actions were my questions about my own motives. Do i want social justice for the oppressed or do i jusy want to be known as a socially active person? I spend 95 percent of my time thinking about myself anyway. I dont have to watch the evening news to see the world is bad, i only have to look at myself. I am not brow beating here, i am only saying that true charge , true living giving, God honoring change would have to start with the individual. I was the very problem i had been protesting. I wanted to make a sign that read “I am the problem

  Donald Miller

  Thinking, Here I Am, Giving

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• If that means going onto their farms, releasing their animals and burning the place to the ground, that's morally justifiable, in our opinion...There were always innocent people who got hurt somewhere along the way but it was important that those who oppressed one group of people be stopped, and we don't see the animal liberation struggle being substantially different from these other struggles.... A sustained campaign against a particular industry or a particular organization has the potential to be quite effective.

  Jerry Vlasak

  Hurt, Struggle, Mean

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• No pedagogy which is truly liberating can remain distant from the oppressed by treating them as unfortunates and by presenting for their emulation models from among the oppressors. The oppressed must be their own example in the struggle for their redemption (Freire, 1970, p. 54).

  Paulo Freire

  Struggle, Example, Redemption

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• I asked for very little from life, and even this little was denied me. A nearby field, a ray of sunlight, a little bit of calm along with a bit of bread, not to feel oppressed by the knowledge that I exist, not to demand anything from others, and not to have others demand anything from me - this was denied me, like the spare change we might deny a beggar not because we're mean-hearted but because we don't feel like unbuttoning our coat.

  Fernando Pessoa

  Mean, Rays, Demand

  Fernando Pessoa (2007). “The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa”, p.321, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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• The oppressed, having internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom.

  Paulo Freire

  Guidelines, Pedagogy Of The Oppressed, Adopted

  Paulo Freire (2014). “Pedagogy of the Oppressed: 30th Anniversary Edition”, p.33, Bloomsbury Publishing USA

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• God's Word teaches a very hard, disturbing truth. Those who neglect the poor and the oppressed are really not God's people at all—no matter how frequently they practice their religious rituals nor how orthodox are their creeds and confessions.

  Ronald J. Sider

  Religious, Truth, Hypocrite

  Ronald J. Sider (2005). “Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger: Moving from Affluence to Generosity”, p.58, Thomas Nelson Inc

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• It cannot be denied that too often the weight of the Christian movement has been on the side of the strong and the powerful and against the weak and oppressed-this, despite the gospel.

  Howard Thurman

  Christian, Strong, Powerful

  Howard Thurman (2014). “A Strange Freedom: The Best of Howard Thurman on Religious Experience and Public Life”, p.145, Beacon Press

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• The women are, of course, the biggest single group of oppressed people in the world and, if we are to believe the Book of Genesis, the very oldest.

  Chinua Achebe

  Believe, Book, People

  Chinua Achebe (1988). “Anthills of the Savannah”, p.98, Heinemann

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• A second way that oppressed people sometimes deal with oppression is to resort to physical violence and corroding hatred.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Inspirational, People, Hatred

  Martin Luther King (Jr.) (1964). “A Martin Luther King Treasury”

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• The oppressed should rebel, and they will continue to rebel and raise disturbance until their civil rights are fully restored to them and all partial distinctions, exlusions, and incapacitations are removed.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Rights, Adoption, Rebel

  Thomas Jefferson, Martin Alfred Larson (1981). “Jefferson, magnificent populist”, Devin-Adair Pub

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• The process of liberation brings with it a profound conflict. Having the project be clear is not enough. What is necessary is a spirituality of resistance and of renewed hope to turn ever back to the struggle in the face of the defeats of the oppressed.

  Leonardo Boff

  Struggle, Profound, Resistance

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• You go overseas and people are oppressed and scared and worried but we're not like that... we're more like my films and how people come out at the end of seeing them - they feel good.

  Yahoo Serious

  People, Feel Good, Scared

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• It is not good enough to know why we are oppressed and by whom. We must join the struggle for what is right and just. Jesus does not promise that it will be an easy way to live life and His own life certainly points in a hard direction; but it does promise that we will be "satisfied" (not stuffed; but satisfied). He promises that by giving life we will find life - full, meaningful life as God meant it.

  Cesar Chavez

  Meaningful, Jesus, Struggle

  Cesar Chavez (2008). “An Organizer's Tale: Speeches”, p.157, Penguin

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• Jesus' life and words are a challenge at the same time that they are Good News. They are a challenge to those of us who are poor and oppressed. By His life He is calling us to give ourselves to others, to sacrifice for those who suffer, to share our lives with our brothers and sisters who are also oppressed. He is calling us to "hunger and thirst after justice" in the same way that we hunger and thirst after food and water: that is, by putting our yearning into practice.

  Cesar Chavez

  Jesus, Brother, Sacrifice

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• Religious distress is at the same time the expression of the real distress and also the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of the spiritless condition. It is the opium of the people.

  Karl Marx

  Religious, Real, Heart

  Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels (1975). “Collected works”

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• Always remember that there is no conversion to God if there is no conversion to the oppressed.

  Ignacio Ellacuria

  Remember, Conversion, Ifs

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