Afrika Bambaataa Quotes

It's usually human drama that carries with it issues of race or class that attracts me. That was certainly the case with 'No Crossover.'

When a system of oppression has become institutionalized it is unnecessary for individuals to be oppressive.

The truly powerful feed ideology to the masses like fast food while they dine on the most rarified delicacy of all: impunity.

America is a fundamentally good country. We have good people with good values who want to do the right thing. But the structures of power that exist are working to their own ends to extend their capability at the expense of the freedom of all publics.

I've spent my career trying to help people without connections understand what's going on so that they have a chance of getting a fair shake from the connected and the powerful.

Religion is a means of exploitation employed by the strong against the weak; religion is a cloak of ambition, injustice and vice.

We call ourselves a free nation, and yet we let ourselves be told what cabs we can and can't take by a man at a hotel door, simply because he has a drum major's uniform on.

The world is run by monsters and you have to deal with them. Some of them run countries, some of them run banks, some of them run news corporations.

The margins don't get erased by simply insisting that the powers-that-be erase them.

Human beings are so made that the ones who do the crushing feel nothing; it is the person crushed who feels what is happening. Unless one has placed oneself on the side of the oppressed, to feel with them, one cannot understand.

The paradox of American democracy has been that its slogan of equal opportunity has meant, often, equal opportunity to get power over your fellows.

The masses are absolutely being manipulated by those in power.

That is the key to history. Terrific energy is expended ... civilizations are built up ... excellent institutions devised; but each time something goes wrong. Some fatal flaw always brings the selfish and cruel people to the top, and then it all slides back into misery and ruin.

By us, and not for us

The historical method is often deemed conservative, because it traces the gradual and stately growth of our venerable institutions; but it may exercise a precisely opposite influence by showing the gross injustice which was blindly perpetrated during this growth. The historical method is supposed to prove that economic changes have been the inevitable outcome of natural laws. It just as often proves them to have been brought about by the self-seeking action of dominant classes.

The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate.

Religions are manipulated in order to serve those who govern society and not the other way around.

Liberty is so much latitude as the powerful choose to accord to the weak.

… the unjust institutions which work so much misery and suffering to the masses have their root in governments, and owe their whole existence to the power derived from government.

Whenever we have sought real progress through affirmative action, the spokespersons of the advantaged have not hesitated to cry foul ….

The state, and a certain form of politics from above, take control of the Women’s Movement by bribing individual members…. The trap is to allow one woman to rise and enjoy the fruits of the struggle of many.

It is necessary to be very intelligent in the work of oppression.

People who have no stake in society are the least likely to have respect for it.

I don't know why people like being oppressed.

Social systems proceed by (usually) covering up the brutalities upon which they are based. The doctor doesn't let you get to his door and then turn you away, rather his home address is hard to find. The government handcuffs you so they don't have to shoot you trying to escape. And so on.