The power of a bold idea uttered publicly in defiance of dominant opinion cannot be easily measured. Those special people who speak out in such a way as to shake up not only the self-assurance of their enemies, but the complacency of their friends, are precious catalysts for change.
Howard ZinnMots clés history change self-assurance opposition defiance catalyst
A jury is always a more orthodox body than any defendant brought before it; for blacks it is usually a whiter group, for poor people, a more prosperous group...
Another lesson about the justice system: the way the judge charges the jury inevitably pushes them one way or the other, limits their independent judgment.
Mots clés orthodoxy judicial-power criminal-justice-system impartiality jury jury-instructions
You can't be neutral on a moving train.
Howard ZinnMots clés history justice indifference neutrality passivity convictions
The willingness to undertake such action cannot be based on certainties, but on those possibilities glimpsed in a reading of history different from the customary painful recounting of human cruelties. In such a reading we can find not only war but resistance to war, not only injustice but rebellion against injustice, not only selfishness but self-sacrifice, not only silence in the fact of tyranny but defiance, not only callousness but compassion.
Human beings show a broad spectrum of qualities, but it is the worst of these that are usually emphasized, and the result, too often, is to dishearten us, diminish our spirit. And yet, historically, that spirit refuses to surrender.
Mots clés compassion injustice history hope spirit optimisim
I see this as the central issue of our time: how to find a substitute for war in human ingenuity, imagination, courage, sacrifice, patience...
War is not inevitable, however persistent it is, however long a history it has in human affairs. It does not come out of some instinctive human need. It is manufactured by political leaders, who then must make a tremendous effort--by enticement, by propaganda, by coercion--to mobilize a normally reluctant population to go to war.
Mots clés peace war creativity ingenuity alternatives political-propaganda
I was astonished, bewildered. This was America, a country where, whatever its faults, people could speak, write, assemble, demonstrate without fear. It was in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights. We were a democracy...
But I knew it wasn't a dream; there was a painful lump on the side of my head...
The state and its police were not neutral referees in a society of contending interests. They were on the side of the rich and powerful. Free speech? Try it and the police will be there with their horses, their clubs, their guns, to stop you.
From that moment on, I was no longer a liberal, a believer in the self-correcting character of American democracy. I was a radical, believing that something fundamental was wrong in this country--not just the existence of poverty amidst great wealth, not just the horrible treatment of black people, but something rotten at the root. The situation required not just a new president or new laws, but an uprooting of the old order, the introduction of a new kind of society--cooperative, peaceful, egalitarian.
Mots clés injustice democracy usa free-speech first-amendment authoritarianism police constitution bill-of-rights radical-politics egalitarianism american-society failed-liberalism power-interests
But human beings are not machines, and however powerful the pressure to conform, they sometimes are so moved by what they see as injustice that they dare to declare their independence. In that historical possibility lies hope.
Howard ZinnMots clés individuality confidence hope conformity self-assurance declaration-of-independence non-conformity resolves
I've always resented the smug statements of politicians, media commentators, corporate executives who talked of how, in America, if you worked hard you would become rich. The meaning of that was if you were poor it was because you hadn't worked hard enough. I knew this was a lie, about my father and millions of others, men and women who worked harder than anyone, harder than financiers and politicians, harder than anybody if you accept that when you work at an unpleasant job that makes it very hard work indeed.
Howard ZinnMots clés lies american-dream hard-work victim-blaming falsity-of-the-american-dream indignation-of-the-poor
Pessimism becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy; it reproduces itself by crippling our willingness to act.
Howard ZinnMots clés fear pessimism inaction self-fulfilling-prophecy
The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.
Howard ZinnMots clés future victory hope defiance now the-present
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