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When people can't use you, they ridicule what you represent. I was lucky that I understood that, because when one does not understand that, it is very easy to be broken and to be subdued.

Wangari Maathai

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Wangari Maathai
Age: 71 †
Born: 1940
Born: April 1
Died: 2011
Died: September 25
Biologist
Environmentalist
Political Activist
Politician
Teacher
Veterinarian
Wangari Maathaï
Maathai
Wangari Maathai
Use
Easy
Subdued
Doe
Ridicule
People
Represent
Understood
Lucky
Broken
Understand

More quotes by Wangari Maathai

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We think that diamonds are very important, gold is very important, all these minerals are very important. We call them precious minerals, but they are all forms of the soil. But that part of this mineral that is on top, like it is the skin of the earth, that is the most precious of the commons.
Wangari Maathai
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We can love ourselves by loving the earth.
Wangari Maathai
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I think what the Nobel committee is doing is going beyond war and looking at what humanity can do to prevent war. Sustainable management of our natural resources will promote peace.
Wangari Maathai
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If you make mistakes that is alright because we all make mistakes and we learn from those mistakes. You gain confidence from learning, failing and rising again.
Wangari Maathai
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No matter who or where we are, or what our capabilities, we are called to do the best we can.
Wangari Maathai
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Culture defines who we are and how we see ourselves. A new attitude toward nature provides space for a new attitude toward culture and the role it plays in sustainable development
Wangari Maathai
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You cannot enslave a mind that knows itself. That values itself. That understands itself.
Wangari Maathai
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Women are responsible for their children, they cannot sit back, waste time and see them starve.
Wangari Maathai
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When you know who you are you are free.
Wangari Maathai
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We tend to put the environment last because we think the first thing we have to do is eliminate poverty and send children to school and provide health.
Wangari Maathai
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When we plant trees, we plant the seeds of peace and seeds of hope.
Wangari Maathai
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I’m very conscious of the fact that you can’t do it alone. It’s teamwork. When you do it alone you run the risk that when you are no longer there nobody else will do it.
Wangari Maathai
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The issue of carbon is one area where we really need to work together and if people don't have the technology they need, that technology needs to be made available and affordable.
Wangari Maathai
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The essential role of the environment is still marginal in discussions about poverty. While we continue to debate these initiatives, environmental degradation, including the loss of biodiversity and topsoil, accelerates, causing development efforts to falter.
Wangari Maathai
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We see that the environment is something to exploit, because we see the environment in terms of minerals for example, or forests, or even raw materials that we produce on our land, or even land itself. We see it in terms of what we can exploit rather than the medium in which all of these activities have to take place.
Wangari Maathai
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Resources on the planet are limited, and limited resources can come to an end. But there are also a lot of resources that are renewable. A lot of land, for example, can be reclaimed from the encroaching deserts.
Wangari Maathai
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We’re constantly being bombarded by problems that we face and sometimes we can get completely overwhelmed. [But] we should always feel like a hummingbird. I may feel insignificant, but I don’t want to be like the other animals watching the planet go down the drain. I’ll be a hummingbird, I’ll do the best I can.
Wangari Maathai
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People are dynamic. They change, and soon as there are enough of you, things change [for a whole society].
Wangari Maathai
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I knew that I was not doing anything wrong, and I knew in my mind I was doing the right thing. I knew that the people who were going against me were not going against me for a good purpose. I knew that they were trying to justify their corruption and misgovernance.
Wangari Maathai
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Human rights are not things that are put on the table for people to enjoy. These are things you fight for and then you protect.
Wangari Maathai