Russell Simmons Quotes

The great thing about social movements is everybody gets to be a part of them.

The hospital strikers have demonstrated that you don't get a job done unless you show the Man you're not afraid...If you're not willing to pay that price, then you don't deserve the rewards or benefits that go along with it.

The essence of Ferguson is the spirit of the people, and I'm so happy to see the spirit because I haven't seen it like that since the Civil Rights Movement.

When a man or woman, young, or old, takes a place on the picket line for even a day or two, he will never be the same again.

I often tell people I don't care whether they join the NAACP or some other group, but you better join something.

If Occupy Wall Street can see their way to more collaboration with the union movement, then there will be a great deal of political action possible.

A different world cannot be built by indifferent people.

There's no problem on the planet that can't be solved without violence. That's the lesson of the civil rights movement.

I grew up with protests, marches, demonstrations, struggle. But I come from a clan of community workers.

And the spirit of revolution will not die while the hearts of these workers continue to beat.

Believe in something larger than yourself... get involved in the big ideas of your time.

You need to remind people that you vote, you matter, and that they can't succeed without your help.

When people discuss the 1960s and the great Civil Rights Era, they often speak in romantic terms as if there wasn't immense work put in, and as if there wasn't immense sacrifice that took place. But none of those battles were easily fought and won; there were sustained movements behind them.

I have known the fruits of strikes. The bitter and the sweet. Hunger and music.

You want to shut up every Negro who has the courage to stand up and fight for the rights of his people, for the rights of workers, and I have been on many a picket line for the steelworkers too.

There's always going to be a need for activism; there's always going to be a need for you and me doing the right thing, being very Lincoln-sonian in looking out for each other.

I do feel, in a sense, the rules of engagement for citizenship has changed, and we must encourage other people to speak up and to take action.

Social paralysis is strong and stands firmly in the way of change on the ground level. As allies, we have to prepare ourselves to step into the fire when necessary, even - and especially - when said fire is merely a still-lit cigarette tossed carelessly onto the street.

As a girl who was raised on the idea that we should give back to our community as much as possible, I believe that we have more power than we think when it comes to making change.

I have an activist's desire to improve people's lives.

Heed this cry that comes from the hearts of men. Organize the Unorganized.

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.

We are at the point where we can mobilize all of this righteous indignation into a powerful mass movement.

The consumer boycott is the only open door in the dark corridor of nothingness down which farm workers have had to walk for many years. It is a gate of hope through which they expect to find the sunlight of a better life for themselves and their families.

The picket line is the best place to train organizers. One day on the picket line is where a man makes his commitment. The longer on the picket line, the stronger the commitment. A lot of workers think they make their commitment by walking off the job when nobody sees them. But you get a guy to walk off the field when his boss is watching and, in front of the other guys, throw down his tools and march right to the picket line, that is the guy who makes our strike. The picket line is a beautiful thing because it makes a man more human.