Quote

[...] There is none that disperses its control more complexly through the voting system, the work situation, the church, the family, the school, the mass media - none more successful in mollifying opposition with reforms, isolating people from one another, creating patriotic loyalty.

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
Another
Creating
Reforms
School
Media
Patriotic
America
Control
Voting
Work
System
Loyalty
People
Successful
Opposition
Situation
Reform
Church
None
Family
Mass
Isolating

More quotes by Howard Zinn

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Each situation has to be evaluated separately, for all are different. In general, I believe in non-violent direct action, which involve organizing large numbers of people, whereas too often violent uprisings are the product of a small group. If enough people are organized, violence can be minimized in bringing about social change.
Howard Zinn
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Throughout American history, the political leaders have always exhorted the American people to be nice and quiet and leave things to them. But when very serious evils confronted the American people, they had to go beyond the Congressmen and Senators, and they had to commit civil disobedience and they had even to break the law.
Howard Zinn
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[W]e're taught that if one person kills another person, that is murder but if a government kills a hundred thousand persons, that is patriotism.
Howard Zinn
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If there is going to be change, real change, it will have to work its way from the bottom up, from the people themselves. That's how change happens.
Howard Zinn
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People who have no respect for human life or for freedom or justice have taken over this beautiful country of ours. It will be up to the American people to take it back.
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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There is a hard core of people in the United States who will not be moved, whatever facts you present, from their conviction that this nation means only to do good, and almost always does good, in the world, that it is the beacon of liberty and freedom.
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If the gods had intended for people to vote, they would have given us candidates.
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How can you have a war on terrorism when war itself is terrorism?
Howard Zinn
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The Roman Empire came to an end, but the Roman people didn't come to an end, so I see the American Empire coming to an end just as other empires have come to an end.
Howard Zinn
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Dissent is the highest form of patriotism.
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
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I think people are dazzled by Obama's rhetoric, and that people ought to begin to understand that Obama is going to be a mediocre president — which means, in our time, a dangerous president — unless there is some national movement to push him in a better direction.
Howard Zinn
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One certain effect of war is to diminish freedom of expression.
Howard Zinn
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Sometimes it's a short step from banning to burning.
Howard Zinn
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It's not right to respond to terrorism by terrorizing other people. And furthermore, it's not going to help. Then you might say, Yes, it's terrorizing people, but it's worth doing because it will end terrorism. But how much common sense does it take to know that you cannot end terrorism by indiscriminately dropping bombs?
Howard Zinn
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There was an idea in the air, becoming clearer and stronger, an idea not just in the theories of Karl Marx but in the dreams of writers and artists through the ages: that people might cooperatively use the treasures of the earth to make life better for everyone, not just a few.
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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One of the problems with dealing with anarchism is that there are many people whose ideas are anarchist, but who do not necessarily call themselves anarchists.
Howard Zinn
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There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.
Howard Zinn