Anton Pannekoek Quotes

We are on the threshold of a significant breakthrough, and the greatest weapon is the mass demonstration.

Rallies, marches on Washington, protests, et al. are pointless if there is no action to make them mean something.

We are bound first to imform ourselves concerning so great a matter as the revolt of millions of people- what they are struggling for, what they are struggling against, and how the struggle stands- from day to day...as best you can; and second, to spread this knowledge among others, and endeavor to do what little you can to awaken the consciousness and sympathy of others.

Any protester knows that the only way activism works is to get the people on your side.

Occupy is anything but a protest movement. That's why it has been so hard for news agencies to express or even discern the 'demands' of the growing legions of Occupy participants around the nation, and even the world.

In the '60s, when I was growing up, one of the great elements of American culture was the protest song. There were songs about the civil rights movement, the women's rights movement, the antiwar movement. It wasn't just Bob Dylan, it was everybody at the time.

Agitate, Agitate, Agitate. But only for a good cause and in a proper manner.

The protest is part of the American way of life.

People don't stay mobilized.

Never Tire of Protesting

If you athletes boycott the Olympics, it will be like a rock dropping in the water. The ripples and waves will be felt all over. You can be that rock. No one will die and that is the way to fight.

Not one of us will have to raise a sword. Not one gun would we need to fire. The great cannon that will be fired is our unity.

Nothing could be less intelligent than to assume, as many respectable persons still manage to do, that the forms of agitation which are popularly summed up in the terms socialism, anarchism, feminism, and pacifism are mere eccentricities of unbalanced minds, seeking to cloak their hatred of restraint and their cowardice under theories of social regeneration.

The signs and banners of protesters are the zoom lenses by which we can focus on the difficult issues of a society.

The March on Washington was not a climax but a new beginning.

Protest is when I say this does not please me. Resistance is when I ensure what does not please me occurs no more.

I need to get a tiny bit more 'woke.'

Some people are diplomatic, some people are outspoken, but the next generation is very clear. People are speaking their mind out. People are worried about other things besides their own careers. It's not accurate to say that they don't speak out.

We should be aware and constantly having conversations about the world because that's how you change it from the bigger standpoint rather than acutely trying to change things.

When I think about protest, I worry so much that people think about it only as standing in the streets. And I say that as someone who has been standing in the streets of cities across the country - but at the root of it is this idea of telling the truth in public.

If we don't pay attention to [nonviolent protests], they are invisible, and it's as if they never happened. But I have seen first hand that if we do, they will multiply.

AIM in essence is a movement rather than just an organization. It is a manifestation of the desperation of our people.

If the government or the parties won't address our needs, we will. It's about direct action, even civil disobedience.

If you go to one demonstration and then go home, that's something, but the people in power can live with that. What they can't live with is sustained pressure that keeps building, organisations that keep doing things, people that keep learning lessons from the last time and doing it better the next time.

I think it's very important for us to start to build a culture of resistance, because what we're doing isn't working, clearly.