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I wanted to be a part of history and not just a recorder and teacher of history. So that kind of attitude towards history, history itself as a political act, has always informed my writing and my teaching.

Howard Zinn

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Howard Zinn
Age: 87 †
Born: 1922
Born: August 24
Died: 2010
Died: January 27
Film Director
Historian
Historian Of The Modern Age
Human Rights Activist
Journalist
Labor Historian
Pacifist
Peace Activist
Playwright
Brooklyn
New York
Part
Recorders
Wanted
Informed
Writing
Towards
Kind
Teaching
Always
Teacher
Attitude
History
Political
Recorder

More quotes by Howard Zinn

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George Orwell said, Whoever controls the past controls the future, by which he meant that history is incredibly important in shaping the world view of the next generation of people.
Howard Zinn
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I have come to believe that our lives can be turned in a different direction, our minds adopt a different way of thinking, by some significant, though small event. That belief can be frightening, or exhilarating, depending on whether you just contemplate it or do something with it.
Howard Zinn
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Are terrorists going to be deterred - are terrorists going to be scared if we react violently? No. They love it. That's what they dote on. They dote on violence. They dote on having more reasons to commit more terrorism.
Howard Zinn
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David Ray Griffin has done admirable and painstaking research in reviewing the mysteries surrounding the 9/11 attacks. It is the most persuasive argument I have seen for further investigation [into] that historic and troubling event.
Howard Zinn
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Terrorism and war have something in common. They both involve the killing of innocent people to achieve what the killers believe is a good end.
Howard Zinn
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I don't think we can depend on Congress. In the American political system - we have been brought up to believe that the American political system works beautifully it is democratic Congress represents us the President is elected, he represents us - it doesn't work that way.
Howard Zinn
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How can you have a war on terrorism when war itself is terrorism?
Howard Zinn
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You can't be neutral on a moving train.
Howard Zinn
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Perhaps the most important thing I learned was about democracy, that democracy is not our government, our constitution, our legal structure. Too often they are enemies of democracy.
Howard Zinn
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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
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I wonder how the foreign policies of the United States would look if we wiped out the national boundaries of the world, at least in our minds, and thought of all children everywhere as our own.
Howard Zinn
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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
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The mountain of history books under which we all stand leans so heavily in the other direction-so tremblingly respectful of states and statesmen and so disrespectful, by inattention, to people's movements-that we need some counterforce to avoid being crushed into submission.
Howard Zinn
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Crosses and gallows - that deadly historic juxtaposition.
Howard Zinn
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In between war and passivity, there are a thousand possibilities.
Howard Zinn
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That whole idea of threats to national security is a very interesting one. The phrase is very useful for the government to try to encompass the citizenry in the same box as the government is in. To say, We're all in this together. It threatens all of us.
Howard Zinn
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When the United States fought in Vietnam, it was organized modern technology versus organized human beings, and the human beings won.
Howard Zinn
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We are not hated because we practice democracy, value freedom, or uphold human rights. We are hated because our government denies these things to people in Third World countries whose resources are coveted by multinational corporations. That hatred we have sown has come back to haunt us in the form of terrorism....
Howard Zinn
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We must transfer our anger to the brutalities of our time.
Howard Zinn
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People should go where they are not supposed to go, say what they are not supposed to say, and stay when they are told to leave.
Howard Zinn