Noam Chomsky Quotes

I don't believe in charity. I believe in solidarity. Charity is so vertical. It goes from the top to the bottom. Solidarity is horizontal. It respects the other person. I have a lot to learn from other people.

We have to deal with where we are. We have to create cooperatives, we have to create intentional communities, we have to work for local cooperation where we are.

When you are a people's movement, you have one thing. Your only asset is people. And you have to deal with real people. Not the people of your imagination. Not the people you wish people would be. But people as they exist actually out there in the real world.

Every social justice movement that I know of has come out of people sitting in small groups, telling their life stories, and discovering that other people have shared similar experiences.

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

There's a lot of activism that doesn't deal with empowerment, and you have to empower yourself in order to be relevant to any type of struggle.

We anarchists do not want to emancipate the people; we want the people to emancipate themselves.

It's sad to me we can't be in a place where we can acknowledge we're all doing our best and respect the decisions other women make and even offer to help out.

The capitalist system is out of control. Everybody should be their own leader. In our own lives and families and neighbourhoods, we can find solutions to live together in a more soulful way. Everybody can do it. That's what I try to do in my neighbourhood.

People have got to form some kind of unified fronts where you know who your allies are, you know who your friends are, and really begin to work together to create different kinds of infrastructures to protect one another and to help one another thrive.

Believing in the good of humanity is a revolutionary act - it means that we don't need all those managers and CEO's, kings and generals. That we can trust people to govern themselves and make their own decisions.

Solidarity and interdependence, a sense of worth, a pride and hope in the future: these are positive gains for those who believe in progressive politics and the beneficial role of government, rather than a detriment.

The work of community, love, reconciliation, restoration is the work we cannot leave up to politicians. This is the work we are all called to do.

For me, socialism has always been about liberty and solidarity, but also about responsibility.

I much preferred the approach at the anarchist camp, with its shared tasks and collective responsibilities. Everyone played their part. There was no division between workers and consumers.

I must firmly adhere to the views I have held and practice, that Socialism to succeed must be practical, tolerant, cohesive and consciously compromising with Progressive forces running, if not so far, in parallel lines towards its own goal.

It's an old anarchist dream that people can take care of their own lives.

For most women, Greenham was a place of principle, growth and song. Often joyful, sometimes terrifying, and almost always cold. As it got harder, with constant evictions and mounting violence from a frustrated and humiliated police force, the women got more determined. It was a community with a shared purpose - to live in peace.

We are nothing if we walk alone; we are everything when we walk together in step with other dignified feet.

Power doesn't back up in the face of a smile, or in the face of a threat of some kind of nonviolent loving action. It's not the nature of power to back up in the face of anything but some more power.

When we empower our communities, we are all better off.

From the depth of need and despair, people can work together, can organize themselves to solve their own problems and fill their own needs with dignity and strength.

When we choose for ourselves, we also choose for others.

People are seeking more power in the individual and less in government and institutions; they want more cooperation and less competition.

Those who wish to promote the welfare of the people should advance in solidarity with them and select the path most suitable for them. Since the history of our people is different from that of the people of the West, the steps that the two peoples choose to take in order to advance must also be different.