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The most potent weapon of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.

Steven Biko

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Steven Biko
Age: 30 †
Born: 1946
Born: December 18
Died: 1977
Died: September 12
Activist
Civil Rights Advocate
Politician
Trade Unionist
Writer
Amsterdam
Netherlands
Bantu Stephen Biko
Historical
Weapons
Mind
Oppressor
Potent
Oppressors
Oppressed
Weapon
Oppression

More quotes by Steven Biko

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In time, we shall be in a position to bestow on South Africa the greatest possible gift - a more human face.
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A people without a positive history is like a vehicle without an engine.
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WOMEN must be at the forefront of nation-building to bring the South African citizenry together and, therefore, develop a whole new ethos of human co-existence
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Black Consciousness is in essence the realization by the black man of the need to rally together with his brothers around the cause of their oppression.
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A community is easily divide when their perception of the same thing is different
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The basic tenet of black consciousness is that the black man must reject all value systems that seek to make him a foreigner in the country of his birth and reduce his basic human dignity.
Steven Biko
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What Black Consciousness seeks to do is to produce real black people who do not regard themselves as appendages to white society. We do not need to apologise for this because it is true that the white systems have produced through the world a number of people who are not aware that they too are people.
Steven Biko
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We believe in the inherent goodness of man.
Steven Biko
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The essence of politics is to direct oneself to the group which wields power
Steven Biko
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Change the way people think and things will never be the same
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To a large extent the evil-doers have succeeded in producing at the output end of their machine a kind of black man who is man only in form. This is the extent to which the process of dehumanization has advanced.
Steven Biko
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The oneness of community for instance is at the heart of our culture.
Steven Biko
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The system concedes nothing without demand, for it formulates its very method of operation on the basis that the ignorant will learn to know, the child will grow into an adult and therefore demands will begin to be made. It gears itself to resist demands in whatever way it sees fit.
Steven Biko
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The great powers of the world may have done wonders in giving the world an industrial and military look but the great gift still has to come from Africa - giving the world a more human face.
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Part of the approach envisaged in bringing about Black Consciousness has to be directed to the past, to seek to rewrite the history of the black man and to produce in it the heroes who form the core of the African background
Steven Biko
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This is white man's integration, an integration based on exploitative values
Steven Biko
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Any warning normally implies, even if it is tacit, that there should be changes
Steven Biko
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I'm going to be me as I am, and you can beat me or jail me or even kill me, but I'm not going to be what you want me to be.
Steven Biko
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Merely by describing yourself as black you have started on a road towards emancipation, you have committed yourself to fight against all forces that seek to use your blackness as a stamp that marks you out as a subservient being.
Steven Biko
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We are experiencing new problems every day and whatever we do adds to the richness of our cultural heritage as long as it has man as its centre
Steven Biko