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Quote by Rudolf Rocker

“For the machine, because of the way it is built, can work only in a given direction, no matter who pulls its levers.”

Quote by Rudolf Rocker

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Rudolf Rocker
Rudolf Rocker

Rudolf Rocker (March 25, 1873 - September 19, 1958) was a German socialist, anarchist, writer, and translator, known for his contributions to anarchist theory and social philosophy. He is considered one of the most important anarchists of the 20th century. more

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“Power operates only destructively, bent always on forcing every manifestation of life into the straitjacket of its laws. Its intellectual form of expression is dead dogma, its physical form brute force. And this unintelligence of its objectives sets its stamp on its supporters also and renders them stupid and brutal, even when they were originally endowed with the best of talents. One who is constantly striving to force everything into a mechanical order at last becomes a machine himself and loses all human feeling.”

HumansFeelingsLastsFormLawOrderForceLosesTalentStupidExpressionIntellectualMachinesStriveObjectivesManifestationDogmaBrutalSupporterBentStampsBrutesBrute ForceDead Dog
Author:Rudolf Rocker
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“Anarchism is no patent solution for all human problems, no Utopia of a perfect social order, as it has often been called, since on principle it rejects all absolute schemes and concepts. It does not believe in any absolute truth, or in definite final goals for human development, but in an unlimited perfectibility of social arrangements and human conditions which are always straining after higher forms of expression, and to which for this reason one can assign no definite terminus nor set any fixed goal.”

BelieveHumansDoeReasonProblemFormOrderSocialGoalPerfectPrinciplesConditionsExpressionDevelopmentHigherSolutionsConceptsAbsolutesFinalsFixedRejectsHuman ConditionSchemesArrangementsDefiniteUnlimitedUtopiaAnarchismHuman DevelopmentPatentsAbsolute TruthSocial OrderHuman Problems
Book:Anarcho-Syndicalism: Theory and Practice
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“Power always acts destructively, for its possessors are ever striving to lace all phenomena of social life into a corset of their laws to give them a definite shape. Its mental expression is dead dogma; its physical manifestation of life, brute force. This lack of intelligence in its endeavours leaves its imprint likewise on the persons of its representatives, gradually making them mentally inferior and brutal, even though they were originally excellently endowed. Nothing dulls the mind and soul of man as does the eternal monotony of routine, and power is essentially routine.”

MenGivingMindPersonsDoeSoulLawForceSocialExpressionShapesEternalStriveManifestationRoutineDogmaRepresentativesBrutalInferiorsDefiniteBrutesSocial LifeEndeavourLaceMonotonyBrute ForceCorsetsDead Dog
Author:Rudolf Rocker
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“Political rights do not exist because they have been legally set down on a piece of paper, but only when they have become the ingrown habit of a people, and when any attempt to impair them will meet with the violent resistance of the populace... One compels respect from others when he knows how to defend his dignity as a human being... The people owe all the political rights and privileges which we enjoy today in greater or lesser measure, not to the good will of their governments, but to their own strength.”

PeopleKnowsHumansHas BeensGovernmentTodayPoliticalIndividualEnjoyHuman BeingsKnow HowGreaterPiecesRightsHabitPaperDignityPrivilegeViolentResistanceGood WillIndividual RightsPolitical RightsRights And PrivilegesEnjoy Today
Author:Rudolf Rocker
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“People forgot that industry is not an end in itself, but should be only a means to insure to man his material subsistence and to make accessible to him the blessings of a higher intellectual culture. Where industry is everything and man is nothing begins the realm of a ruthless economic despotism whose workings are no less disastrous than those of any political despotism.”

PeopleMenShouldMeanEndsPoliticalCultureEconomicMaterialsIndustryHigherBlessingIntellectualRealmsRuthlessDespotismSubsistence
Book:Anarcho-Syndicalism: Theory and Practice
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“All the great establishments, of every kind, now in the hands of a few proprietors, but employing a great number of wage laborers, would be broken up; for few or no persons, who could hire capital and do business for themselves would consent to labour for wages for another.”

KindPersonsHandsWould BeNumbersBrokenLabourEstablishmentConsentWagesLaborersBroken UpEmploying
Book:A Letter to Grover Cleveland on His False Inaugural Address, the Usurpation and Crimes of Lawmakers and Judges, and Consequent Poverty, Ignorance, and Servitude of the People
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“It is self-evident that no number of men, by conspiring, and calling themselves a government, can acquire any rights whatever over other men, or other men's property, which they had not before, as individuals. And whenever any number of men, calling themselves a government, do anything to another man, or to his property, which they had no right to do as individuals, they thereby declare themselves trespassers, robbers, or murderers, according to the nature of their acts.”

MenSelfGovernmentIndividualNumbersRightsCallingPropertyAcquireEvidentMurdererAnother ManRobbersConspiring
Author:Lysander Spooner
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