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As an organizer I start from where the world is, as it is, not as I would like it to be.

Saul Alinsky

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Saul Alinsky
Age: 63 †
Born: 1909
Born: January 30
Died: 1972
Died: June 12
Activist
Human Rights Activist
Sociologist
Trade Unionist
Writer
Chicago
Illinois
Saul David Alinsky
Would
Like
World
Organizer
Start
Reality

More quotes by Saul Alinsky

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As an organizer I start from where the world is, as it is, not as I would like it to be. That we accept the world as it is does not in any sense weaken our desire to change it into what we believe it should be - it is necessary to begin where the world is if we are going to change it to what we think it should be.
Saul Alinsky
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Change means movement. Movement means friction.
Saul Alinsky
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The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.
Saul Alinsky
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The only people who become disillusioned are people who have illusions.
Saul Alinsky
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In this world laws are written for the lofty aim of the common good and then acted out in life on the basis of the common greed.
Saul Alinsky
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The only nonpartisan people are those who are dead.
Saul Alinsky
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Democracy is alive, and like any other living thing it either flourishes and grows or withers and dies. There is no in-between. It is freedom and life or dictatorship and death.
Saul Alinsky
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They have the guns and therefore we are for peace and for reformation through the ballot. When we have the guns then it will be through the bullet.
Saul Alinsky
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The classic statement on polarization comes from Christ: 'He that is not with me is against me.' (Luke 11:23) He allowed no middle ground to the moneychangers in the Temple. One acts decisively only in the conviction that all the angels are on one side and all the devils on the other.
Saul Alinsky
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The preferred world can be seen any evening on television in the succession of programs where the good always wins
Saul Alinsky
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The end is what you want and the means is how you get it.
Saul Alinsky
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Our world has always had two kinds of changers, the social changers and the money changers.
Saul Alinsky
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The most unethical of all means is the non-use of any means.
Saul Alinsky
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I prize my own independence too much. And philosophically, I could never accept any rigid dogma or ideology, whether it's Christianity or Marxism…The greatest crimes in history have been perpetrated by such religious and political and racial fanatics, from the persecutions of the Inquisition on down to Communist purges and Nazi genocide.
Saul Alinsky
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Once you accept your own death, all of a sudden you're free to live. You no longer care about your reputation. You no longer care except so far as your life can be used tactically to promote a cause you believe in.
Saul Alinsky
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A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag.
Saul Alinsky
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Human beings do not like to look squarely into the face of tragedy. Gloom is unpopular.
Saul Alinsky
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The enemy properly goaded and guided in his reaction will be your major strength.
Saul Alinsky
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My only fixed truth is a belief in people, a conviction that if people have the opportunity to act freely and the power to control their own destinies, they'll generally reach the right decisions.
Saul Alinsky
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The despair is there now it's up to us to go in and rub raw the sores of discontent, galvanize them for radical social change.
Saul Alinsky