Howard Zinn Short Quotes

25 Sourced Quotes

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In between war and passivity, there are a thousand possibilities.

Howard Zinn
Politics is pointless if it does nothing to enhance the beauty of our lives.

Howard Zinn
It was an old lesson learned by governments: that war solves problems of control.

Howard Zinn
But I suppose the most revolutionary act one can engage in is... to tell the truth.

Howard Zinn
The fact that war belongs to the past, does not mean it has to be part of the future.

Howard Zinn
Let us in the name of the Holy Trinity go on sending all the slaves that can be sold.

Howard Zinn
Protest beyond the law is not a departure from democracy; it is absolutely essential to it.

Howard Zinn
When you fight a war against a tyrant, who do you kill? You kill the victims of the tyrant.

Howard Zinn
Before God and high heaven, is there a law for one man which is not a law for every other man?

Howard Zinn
In a two-party system, if both parties ignore public opinion, there is no place voters can turn.

Howard Zinn
Education becomes most rich and alive when it confronts the reality of moral conflict in the world.

Howard Zinn
When a nation issues ultimatums, it leaves no room for compromise and ensures that war will continue.

Howard Zinn
Pessimism becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy; it reproduces itself by crippling our willingness to act.

Howard Zinn
Capitalism has always been a failure for the lower classes. It is now beginning to fail for the middle classes.

Howard Zinn
There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people for a purpose which is unattainable.

Howard Zinn
Historically, the most terrible things - war, genocide, and slavery - have resulted not from disobedience, but from obedience.

Howard Zinn
There is civil disobedience against the military machine, protest against police brutality directed especially at people of color.

Howard Zinn
Voting is easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens.

Howard Zinn
When the United States fought in Vietnam, it was organized modern technology versus organized human beings, and the human beings won.

Howard Zinn
If racism can't be shown to be natural then it is the result of certain conditions, and we are impelled to eliminate those conditions.

Howard Zinn
Americans have been taught that their nation is civilized and humane. But, too often, U.S. actions have been uncivilized and inhumane.

Howard Zinn
When we organize with one another, when we get involved, when we stand up and speak out together, we can create a power no government can suppress.

Howard Zinn
Being fired has some of the advantages of dying without its supreme disadvantages. People say extra-nice things about you, and you get to hear them.

Howard Zinn
When in all the nations of the world the rule of law is the darling of the leaders and the plague of the people, we ought to begin to recognize this.

Howard Zinn
The memory of oppressed people is one thing that cannot be taken away, and for such people, with such memories, revolt is always an inch below the surface.

Howard Zinn
Again and again, Americans have voted for a president to keep them out of a war, only to see the "peace" candidate elected who then brings the nation into war.

Howard Zinn
I am supposing, or perhaps only hoping, that our future may be found in the past's fugitive moments of compassion rather than in its solid centuries of warfare.

Howard Zinn
Yes, we're dreamers. We want it all. We want a peaceful world. We want an egalitarian world. We don't want war. We don't want capitalism. We want a decent society.

Howard Zinn
We don't have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in the process of change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.

Howard Zinn
To ward off alienation and gloom, it is only necessary to remember the unremembered heroes of the past, and to look around us for the unnoticed heroes of the present.

Howard Zinn