Best slavery & has-beens Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings

“No nation ever yet found any inconvenience from too close an inspection into the conduct of its officers, but many have been brought to ruin and reduced to slavery by suffering gradual impositions and abuses.”

Has Beens Suffering Found Nations Abuse Slavery Ruins Officers Inconvenience Imposition Inspection

Book:A System of Penal Law for the State of Louisiana

Source: A System of Penal Law for the State of Louisiana

“No revolution can ever succeed as a factor of liberation unless the MEANS used to further it be identical in spirit and tendency with the PURPOSES to be achieved. Revolution is the negation of the existing, a violent protest against man's inhumanity to man with all the thousand and one slaveries it involves. It is the destroyer of dominant values upon which a complex system of injustice, oppression, and wrong has been built up by ignorance and brutality. It is the herald of NEW VALUES, ushering in a transformation of the basic relations of man to man, and of man to society.”

“The confused mass of rules of conduct called law, which has been bequeathed to us by slavery, serfdom, feudalism, and royalty, has taken the place of those stone monsters, before whom human victims used to be immolated, and whom slavish savages dared not even touch lest they should be slain by the thunderbolts of heaven.”

Should Humans Has Beens Law Used Heaven Taken Mass Stones Victim Slavery Monsters Used To Be Confused Savages Royalty Feudalism Thunderbolts

Book:Anarchism: A Collection of Revolutionary Writings

Source: Anarchism: A Collection of Revolutionary Writings

“Each of us has been endowed with the perfect power to be free. Slavery is a state of mind that fails to acknowledge the slave's own power.”

Mind Has Beens States Perfect Failing Slavery Slave Acknowledge State Of Mind

Book:Give Me Liberty: Freeing Ourselves in the Twenty-First Century

Source: Give Me Liberty: Freeing Ourselves in the Twenty-First Century

“Insofar as we may at all claim that slavery has been abolished today, we owe its abolition to the practical consequences of science”

May Has Beens Today Consequence Claims Slavery Practicals Abolition

Book:The Albert Einstein Collection: Essays in Humanism, The Theory of Relativity, and The World As I See It

Source: The Albert Einstein Collection: Essays in Humanism, The Theory of Relativity, and The World As I See It

“Human nature is full of riddles; . . . one of those riddles is: how is it that people who have been crushed by the sheer weight of slavery and cast to the bottom of the pit can nevertheless find strength in themselves to rise up and free themselves first in spirit and then in body while those who soar unhampered over the peaks of freedom suddenly lose the taste of freedom, lose the will to defend it, and, hopelessly confused and lost, almost begin to crave slavery?'”

“You point out that war is only a symptom of the whole horrid business of human behavior, and cannot be isolated. And that, even if we abolish war, we shall not abolish hate and greed. So might it have been argued about slave emancipation, that slavery was but one aspect of human disgustingness, and that to abolish it would not end the barbarity that causes it. But did the abolitionists therefore waste their breath? And do we waste ours now in protesting against war?”

“It has been petrified into a slavery of thought and sentiment, as intolerant superiority on the part of the few and an intolerable burden on the part of the many.”

Has Beens Atheism Slavery Burden Positive Atheism Sentiments Superiority

Book:Human Nature and Conduct

Source: Human Nature and Conduct

“Although all men are born free, slavery has been the general lot of the human race. Ignorant--they have been cheated; asleep--they have been surprised; divided--the yoke has been forced upon them. But what is the lesson...? The people ought to be enlightened, to be awakened, to be united, that after establishing a government they should watch over it.... It is universally admitted that a well-instructed people alone can be permanently free.”

People Men Should Humans Wells Has Beens Government Born United Race Watches Ought Lessons Slavery Ignorant Human Race Enlightened Over It Divided Awakened Cheated Yoke Born Free

Author:James Madison

“Since the early days, [the church] has thrown itself violently against every effort to liberate the body and mind of man. It has been, at all times and everywhere, the habitual and incorrigible defender of bad governments, bad laws, bad social theories, bad institutions. It was, for centuries, an apologist for slavery, as it was an apologist for the divine right of kings.”

“Over the centuries, we've moved on from Scripture to accumulate precepts of ethical, legal and moral philosophy. We've evolved a liberal consensus of what we regard as underpinnings of decent society, such as the idea that we don't approve of slavery or discrimination on the grounds of race or sex, that we respect free speech and the rights of the individual. All of these things that have become second nature to our morals today owe very little to religion, and mostly have been won in opposition to the teeth of religion.”

“It's therapy. [people] say true healing requires honest confrontation, and that can be seen on a macro scale with America and the things that have been swept under the rug, whether it be with the native Americans or slavery, or whatever holocaust that's happened on this soil.”

People Has Beens America Healing Happened Honest Slavery Scales Therapy Soil Native Holocaust Native American Confrontation Macro

Author:Nate Parker

“It is just this rage for consideration that has betrayed the dog into his satellite position as the friend of man. The cat, an animal of franker appetites, preserves his independence. But the dog, with one eye ever on the audience, has been wheedled into slavery, and praised and patted into the renunciation of his nature. Once he ceased hunting and became man's plate-licker, the Rubicon was crossed. Thenceforth he was a gentleman of leisure; and except the few whom we keep working, the whole race grew more and more self-conscious, mannered and affected.”

Source: Memories and Portraits: Stevenson's Vol. 21

“The presence of the blacks is the greatest evil that threatens the United States. They increase, in the Gulf States, faster than do the whites. They cannot be kept for ever in slavery, since the tendencies of the modern world run strongly the other way. They cannot be absorbed into the white population, for the whites will not intermarry with them, not even in the North where they have been free for two generations. Once freed, they would be more dangerous than now, because they would not long submit to be debarred from political rights. A terrible struggle would ensue.”

“... some of my people could have been left [in Africa] and are living there. And I can't understand them and they don't know me and I don't know them because all we had was taken away from us. And I became kind of angry; I felt the anger of why this had to happen to us. We were so stripped and robbed of our background, we wind up with nothing.”

People Knows Kind Has Beens I Can Happens Left Felt Taken Wind Slavery Angry Backgrounds Oppression Know Me Could Have Been

Author:Fannie Lou Hamer

“. . . what a burning shame it is that many of the pieces on the subject of slavery and the slave trade, contained in different school books, have been lost sight of, or been subject to the pruning knife of the slaveholding expurgatorial system!”

Has Beens Book Different School Lost Pieces Subjects Sight Shame Slavery Trade Slave Burning Knives Slave Trade Pruning

Author:Robert Purvis

“Without the institution of slavery, civilization would never have been achieved, for no one could ever have done anything intellectual if he had to spend all his time hewing and digging and fighting.”

Ifs Has Beens Done Fighting Civilization Intellectual Institutions Slavery Digging

Author:Jeff Cooper

“I envy neither the heart nor the head of any legislator who has been born to an inheritance of privileges, who has behind him agesof education, dominion, civilization, and Christianity, if he stands opposed to the passage of a national education bill, whose purpose is to secure education to the children of those who were born under the shadow of institutions which made it a crime to read.”

“It is said that the Negro is ignorant. But why is he ignorant? It comes with ill grace from a man who has put out my eyes to makea parade of my blindness,--to reproach me for my poverty when he has wronged me of my money.... If he is poor, what has become of the money he has been earning for the last two hundred and fifty years? Years ago it was said cotton fights and cotton conquers for American slavery. The Negro helped build up that great cotton power in the South, and in the North his sigh was in the whir of its machinery, and his blood and tears upon the warp and woof of its manufactures.”

“I'm offended by the is-ought fallacy, which has been used to justify slavery, women not being allowed to vote, children working in factories.”

Children Has Beens Used Ought Vote Slavery Justify Factories Offended Fallacy

Author:Moby

“For two hundred years Haiti has been swimming upstream. We were the first country in which independence was won by a group of slaves - black slaves. Across the water, the country that had just achieved independence - the U.S. - still practiced slavery.”

Years Firsts Has Beens Stills Two Country Black Water Groups Hundred Independence Slavery Slave Swimming Haiti Swimming Upstream

Author:Michele Montas

“I have been trying to create a campaign to have our country make an apology for slavery, for the way that blacks were treated before the Civil War and after the Civil War.”

Way Trying Has Beens War Country Slavery Campaigns Treated Our Country Civil War Apology

Author:Kirk Douglas

“By taking out a loan, I am committing myself to years of interest repayments, and therefore to years of wage slavery. And the UK has been borrowing like crazy since 1694, when the Bank of England was invented. This means that we are locked into high taxation to pay for 300 years of wars and other costly and generally disastrous state enterprises.”

Years Mean Has Beens War States Interest Pay Crazy England Slavery Enterprise Locked Taxation Loan Borrowing Repayment

Author:Tom Hodgkinson

“Your ancestors dragged these black people from their homes by force; and in the white man's quest for wealth and an easy life they have been ruthlessly suppressed and exploited, degraded into slavery. The modern prejudice against Negroes is the result of the desire to maintain this unworthy condition.”

Source: Out of My Later Years: The Scientist, Philosopher, and Man Portrayed Through His Own Words

“Now in regard to trades and other means of livelihood, which ones are to be considered becoming to a gentleman and which ones are vulgar, we have been taught, in general, as follows. First, those means of livelihood are rejected as undesirable which incur people's ill-will, as those of tax-gatherers and usurers. Unbecoming to a gentleman, too, and vulgar are the means of livelihood of all hired workmen whom we pay for mere manual labour, not for artistic skill; for in their case the very wage they receive is a pledge of their slavery.”

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Cicero (Illustrated)

“I have watched how steadily the general feeling, as shown at elections, has been rising against Slavery. What a proud thing for England if she is the first European nation which utterly abolishes it! I was told before leaving England that after living in slave countries all my opinions would be altered; the only alteration I am aware of is forming a much higher estimate of the negro character.”

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Charles Darwin (Illustrated)

“Liberals have been driven to the desperate expedient of attributing . . .social pathology in today's ghettos to 'a legacy of slavery' even though black children grew up with two parents more often under slavery than today.”

Children Has Beens Two Today Social Parent Black Grew Grew Up Slavery Driven Legacy Desperate Ghetto Pathology

Author:Thomas Sowell

“Whether happiness or unhappiness, freedom or slavery, in short whether good or evil results from an improved environment depends largely upon how the change has been brought about, upon the methods by which the physical results have been reached, and in what spirit and for what purpose the fruits of that change are used. Because a higher standard of living, a greater productiveness and a command over nature are not good in and of themselves does not mean that we cannot make good of them, that they cannot be a source of inner strength.”

“People can say what they want, but historically, feminism in the Dominican Republic has been extremely strong. I guess the best way of saying it is that no one could have survived what we survived - whether it was first extermination and slavery, then abandonment and erasure, then the series of gunboat two-bit dictatorships, followed by the final apotheosis of dictatorships, the Trujillato. You couldn't survive it without the resistance of this kind of woman.”

“I would've written this story [Django] if [Barack] Obama were president or if he never existed. For one, I think it's time to tell a story that deals with this subject America has avoided for so long. Most countries have been forced to deal with the atrocities of their past that still affect them to this day. But America has been pretty slippery in the way that it has avoided looking slavery in the eye. I believe that's a problem.”

“If you were against slavery in 1840 and a white person, you would have been against the law, the Bible, your church, your pastor, your parents, common sense, tradition, everything. You would have been against everything.”

Ifs Persons Has Beens Law Parent Church White Common Tradition Slavery Common Sense Pastor Your Past

Author:Bill Ayers

“The teachings of Elijah Muhammad on how black people have been brainwashed.How they've been taught to love white and hate black, how we've been robbed of our names in slavery.We were robbed of our culture, we were robbed of our true history. So it left us a walking dead man.”

People Men Has Beens Hate Culture Names Left Black White Teaching Taught Walking Slavery Black People Muhammad Dead Man Brainwashed Elijah Walking Dead Elijah Muhammad

Author:Muhammad Ali

“Maybe the same instruments and tools that have been used to keep people in slavery and ignorance could potentially be used to liberate and awaken them.”

People Has Beens Used Ignorance Tools Slavery Instruments

Author:Daniel Pinchbeck

“I truly believe that one of the things that has been lacking in the USA is a spirit of repentance about the injustices of slavery and the injustices of segregation and racism generally.”

Believe Has Beens Spirit Racism Slavery Injustice Usa Repentance Lacking Segregation

Author:David Oyelowo

“The population of African people in the United States is far in excess of six small European nations. Where we are going? We have to go back as best we can to where slavery and colonialism took us from. And they took us from a concept of nation management and nation maintenance. We have been so long away from home we unfortunately have forgotten how we ruled states before the foreigners got there.”

People Long Has Beens States Home Nations United United States Six Concepts Management Slavery Forgotten Population Excess Colonialism Foreigners Maintenance Away From Home

Author:John Henrik Clarke

“What's more important is that we talk about movements; change happens through movements. The movement to end slavery, the movement to bring justice for those who have been left out of the system, movements to include women, movements around sexual preference - all these movements brought about change.”

Has Beens Important Ends Happens Left Justice Movement Slavery Preference Left Out

Author:Danny Glover

“I can't say with certainty that slavery would have ended more quickly and more completely if the South had been allowed to leave and escaped former slaves had been allowed to remain free, and the North and the rest of the world had been a positive influence on the South. However, it's certainly a possibility that it would have ended sooner if the southern slave owners had agreed to a system of compensated emancipation and freed the slaves without a war and without secession, as most nations that ended slavery did. That absolutely would have been preferable to the Civil War as it happened.”

Ifs World Has Beens I Can War Nations Happened Influence Possibility Slavery Slave South Certainty Former Civil War Owners Southern Emancipation Secession Positive Influence Slave Owners

Author:David Swanson

“I truly believe that one of the things that has been lacking in America is a spirit of repentance about the injustices of slavery and the injustices of segregation and racism generally. I truly believe that we cannot come to a place of reconciliation until there is individual repentance and corporate repentance.”

Believe Has Beens America Spirit Individual Racism Slavery Injustice Corporate Repentance Lacking Segregation Reconciliation

Author:David Oyelowo

“In terms of America, I think any profound consideration is bound to return us to the notion of twins because, though you certainly can contend there are many Americas, our history has been binary from the beginning, with its hairline fracture down the country's center between what American has wanted to be and what America has been. That fracture is slavery, of course. To some extent it's still slavery, in that collectively we refuse to come to grips with the American fact of slavery.”

Thinking Has Beens Stills Country Facts Wanted America Courses Term Return Slavery Profound Notion Bounds Refuse Consideration Twins Binary Fracture

Author:Steve Erickson

“We've always had the blame-America crowd. We've always had the hate-America crowd. But we've now had at least two generations of education where this has been indoctrinated into the young skulls full of mush of young people. They've heard how horrible America was back in the days of slavery. They've heard how horrible America treated women. They've heard how horrible every minority group was treated. They've heard how mean-spirited the founders were. They've heard all kinds of literal lies.”

“Think of US slavery in 1850, or the subjection of women. Both of these injustices could have been - and were! - defended by pointing out, quite correctly, that this situation of slaves and women had been improving throughout the preceding century. Slaves, in particular, were worked less hard, beaten and raped less frequently, better fed, and less often ripped apart from their families. So would a celebration of moral progress have been appropriate in 1850? Surely not. Slavery could have been and should have been abolished - then, if not before.”

“The wealthy have never liked to pay for the labor that enriches them. Ever since slavery was eliminated, they have been trying to keep it as close to slavery as they can without violating the slave laws.”

Trying Has Beens Law Pay Labor Slavery Slave Wealthy

Author:Michael Moore

“Most Christian 'believers' tend to echo the cultural prejudices and worldviews of the dominant group in their country, with only a minority revealing any real transformation of attitudes or consciousness. It has been true of slavery and racism, classism and consumerism and issues of immigration and health care for the poor.”

“The people made worse off by slavery were those who were enslaved. Their descendants would have been worse off today if born in Africa instead of America. Put differently, the terrible fate of their ancestors benefitted them.”

People Ifs Has Beens Made Today America Born Economy Fate Terrible Slavery Ancestor Descendants

Author:Thomas Sowell

“You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress in humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or every mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say quite deliberately that the christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principle enemy of moral progress in the world.”

Source: The basic writings of Bertrand Russell, 1903-1959

“I believe that it would be almost impossible to find anywhere in America a black man who has lived further down in the mud of human society than I have; or a black man who has been any more ignorant than I have; or a black man who has suffered more anguish during his life than I have. But it is only after the deepest darkness that the greatest joy can come; it is only after slavery and prison that the sweetest appreciation of freedom can come.”

Men Believe Humans Has Beens Would Be America Joy I Believe Black Freedom Darkness Impossible Slavery Prison Appreciation Ignorant Anguish Mud Sweetest Human Society

Author:Malcolm X

“I wouldn't say that religion has promoted the social progress of mankind. I say that it has been a detriment to the progress of civilization, and I would also say this: that the emancipation of the mind from religious superstition is as essential to the progress of civilization as is emancipation from physical slavery.”

Mind Has Beens Social Religious Progress Atheism Mankind Civilization Essentials Slavery Superstitions Emancipation Social Progress

Author:Culbert Olson

“Since outright slavery has been discredited, "democracy" is the only remaining rationale for state compulsion that most people will accept.”

People Has Beens States Liberty Accepting Democracy Slavery Libertarian Libertarianism Compulsion Rationale

Author:Joseph Sobran

“Now, I confess myself as belonging to that class in the country who contemplate slavery as a moral, social and political evil, having due regard for its actual existence amongst us and the difficulties of getting rid of it in any satisfactory way, and to all the constitutional obligations which have been thrown about it; but, nevertheless, desire a policy that looks to the prevention of it as a wrong, and looks hopefully to the time when as a wrong it may come to an end.”

Source: The Complete Papers and Writings of Abraham Lincoln

“Life has been reduced to a series of long periods of boredom in the office punctuated by high-octane "experiences" which you can rack up on your list of things to do before you die. That's not really living: that is slavery with the occasional circus thrown in.”

Long Has Beens Dies Periods Office Slavery Series Lists Bored Things To Do Boredom Thrown Circus Occasional Racks Really Living

Book:Brave Old World: A Month-by-Month Guide to Husbandry, or the Fine Art of Looking After Yourself

Source: Brave Old World: A Month-by-Month Guide to Husbandry, or the Fine Art of Looking After Yourself

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