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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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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
Fight
Describing
Started
Forces
Fighting
Towards
Subservient
Force
Committed
Blackness
Use
Merely
Stamp
Black
Road
Emancipation
Mark
Stamps
Seek
Marks

More quotes by Steven Biko

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A people without a positive history is like a vehicle without an engine.
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I would like to remind the black ministry and indeed all black people that God is not in the habit of coming down from heaven to solve people's problems on earth.
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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.
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Any warning normally implies, even if it is tacit, that there should be changes
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We believe in the inherent goodness of man.
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Tradition has it that whenever a group of people has tasted the lovely fruits of wealth, security and prestige it begins to find it more comfortable to believe in the obvious lie and accept that it alone is entitled to privilege.
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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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Being black is not a matter of pigmentation - being black is a reflection of a mental attitude.
Steven Biko
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Change the way people think and things will never be the same
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This is white man's integration, an integration based on exploitative values
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The oneness of community for instance is at the heart of our culture.
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.
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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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It becomes more necessary to see the truth as it is if you realize that the only vehicle for change are these people who have lost their personality.
Steven Biko
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Sure there are a few good whites just as much as there are a few bad Blacks. However what we are concerned here with is group attitudes and group politics. The exception does not make a lie or the rule - it merely substantiates it.
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
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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.
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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I am against the fact that a settler minority should impose an entire system of values on an indigenous people.
Steven Biko