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We must complain. Yes, plain, blunt complaint, ceaseless agitation, unfailing exposure of dishonesty and wrong - this is the ancient, unerring way to liberty and we must follow it.

W. E. B. Du Bois

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W. E. B. Du Bois
Age: 95 †
Born: 1868
Born: January 1
Died: 1963
Died: August 27
Autobiographer
Historian
Human Rights Activist
Journalist
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Philosopher
Photographer
Poet
Social Worker
Great Barrington
Massachusetts
William Edward Burghardt Du Bois
WEB Du Bois
W. E. B. Du Bois
Follow
Blunt
Liberty
Dishonesty
Wrong
Complaints
Must
Exposure
Unerring
Way
Complain
Unfailing
Plain
Ceaseless
Complaining
Complaint
Ancient
Agitation

More quotes by W. E. B. Du Bois

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There may often be excuse for doing things poorly in this world, but there is never any excuse for calling a poorly done thing, well done.
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Here is the chance for young women and young men of devotion to lift again the banner of humanity and to walk toward a civilization which will be free and intelligent which will be healthy and unafraid and build in the world a culture led by black folk and joined by peoples of all colors and all races - without poverty, ignorance and disease!
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America is not another word for Opportunity to all her sons.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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For education among all kinds of men always has had, and always will have, an element of danger and revolution, of dissatisfaction and discontent.
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The theory of democratic government is not that the will of the people is always right, but rather that normal human beings of average intelligence will, if given a chance, learn the right and best course by bitter experience.
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We cannot escape the clear fact that what is going to win in this world is reason, if this ever becomes a reasonable world.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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Oppression costs the oppressor too much if the oppressed stands up and protests. The protest need not be merely physical-the throwing of stones and bullets-if it is mental, spiritual if it expresses itself in silent, persistent dissatisfaction, the cost to the oppressor is terrific.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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Either America will destroy ignorance or ignorance will destroy the United States.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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The Negro cannot stand the present reactionary tendencies and unreasoning drawing of the color line indefinitely without discouragement and retrogression. And the condition of the Negro is ever the cause for further discrimination.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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Strive for that greatness of spirit that measures life not by its disappointments but by its possibilities.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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Education must not simply teach work-it must teach life.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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The favorite device of the devil, ancient and modern, is to force a human being into a more or less artificial class, accuse the class of unnamed and unnameable sin, and then damn any individual in the alleged class, however innocent he may be.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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All art is propaganda...I do not care a damn, for any art that is not used for propaganda.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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In 1956, I shall not go to the polls. I have not registered. I believe that democracy has so far disappeared in the United States that no 'two evils' exist. There is but one evil party with two names, and it will be elected despite all I can do or say.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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The merchant must be no more pessimist than optimist, since pessimism induces him to hold back his capital but optimism induces him to take such risks that he has more to tear than to hope. Abu al'Fadl Ja'far al-Dimishqi (c. 9th century) Arab writer. The Beauties of Commerce Business pays ... philanthropy begs.
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Histories of the world omitted China if a Chinaman invented compass or movable type or gunpowder we promptly forgot it and named their European inventors. In short, we regarded China as a sort of different and quite inconsequential planet.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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Lord, make us mindful of the little things that grow and blossom in these days to make the world beautiful for us.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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In the treatment of the child the world foreshadows its own future and faith. All words and all thinking lead to the child, - to that vast immortality and wide sweep of infinite possibility which the child represents.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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Whiteness is ownership of the earth.
W. E. B. Du Bois
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The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression.
W. E. B. Du Bois