When full of despair, remember that HOPE is HISTORY
Howard Zinn penned words to help us in times like these:
"To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the
fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of
compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.
What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our
lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If
we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people
have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the
possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.
And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some
grand utopian future. 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 Zinn
“Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our
problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of
leaders…and millions have been killed because of this obedience…Our
problem is that people are obedient allover the world in the face of poverty
and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that
people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves… (and) the grand
thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
-- Howard Zinn
“The challenge remains. On the other side are formidable forces: money,
political power, the major media. On our side are the people of the world
and a power greater than money or weapons: the truth.
Truth has a power of its own. Art has a power of its own. That age-old
lesson – that everything we do matters – is the meaning of the people’s
struggle here in the United States and everywhere. A poem can inspire a
movement. A pamphlet can spark a revolution. Civil disobedience can
arouse people and provoke us to think, when we organize with one another,
when we get involved, when we stand up and speak out together, we can
create a power no government can suppress."
"We live in a beautiful country. But people who have no respect for human
life, freedom, or justice have taken it over. It is now up to all of us to take it
back.”
-- Howard Zinn
= new reply since forum marked as read
.......pure and simple.
(Read and REREAD..... when discouragement nibbles at the edges.)
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