Frantz Fanon Quotes

When people get this consciousness of the way things are supposed to be in America - that the locus of agency is in them, that they are supposed to be the ones setting the agenda - if people believe this, they get very energized. Yeah, it's annoying to have this extra burden of saving the country.

Our culture is at a critical cusp - a time that requires that we define what it means to be a citizen in a democracy. Within our nation we need to foster a greater sense of collective responsibility.

If people take the film and screen it whenever possible for their social and professional networks, we can continue to make a difference. It is one more element we have to use in the ongoing effort to take back our country.

To rebuild confidence in the power of people working together to create something better, we must give people the power to do precisely that for themselves.

Every American at some point has got to make the connection between their own hopes and dreams and who is elected to office. It's essential. It's very easy to pull the covers up over your head and say, "I can't handle it. Too much." But we just have to handle it and we have to accept that it's our job. Each of us. Nobody is going to take care of it.

We should go to the masses and learn from them, synthesize their experience into better, articulated principles and methods, then do propaganda among the masses, and call upon them to put these principles and methods into practice so as to solve their problems and help them achieve liberation and happiness.

Each of us, as citizens, has a role to play in creating a better world for our children

If you young people who today belong to the first generation of the 21st century make an effort now, you may be able to create a happier, more peaceful world. But you can't take for granted that it will happen by itself, you'll need to take action.

The greatest mistake of the movement has been trying to organize a sleeping people around specific goals. You have to wake the people up first, then you'll get action.

When people generally are aware of a problem, it can be said to have entered the public consciousness. When people get on their hind legs and holler, the problem has not only entered the public consciousness -- it has also become a part of the public conscience. At that point, things in our democracy begin to hum.

It is time to stop waiting for someone to save us. It is time to face the truth of our situation - that we're all in this together, that we all have a voice - and figure out how to mobilize the hearts and minds of everyone in our workplaces and communities.

It went beyond idealism and that ridiculous term "activism," which basically means talking about something but doing nothing. . . . We made giving exciting.

I think it's very important for everyone in America to realize right now the state of our country, not just on this issue but on a lot of issues, that it is time to get active again. People have just sat back and just sort of said, oh, let somebody else do it for a long time, and we're seeing what's happening to the country, even freedom of speech. It's not going well. So I think this is a real opportunity for people to see, yes, if you do get out and you do get active, there are other people there. You just have to seek them out.

I for one believe that if you give people a thorough understanding of what confronts them and the basic causes that produce it, they'll create their own program, and when the people create a program, you get action.

Sometimes we feel that one individual's action is very insignificant. Then we think, of course, that effects should come from channeling or from a unifying movement. But the movement of the society, community or group of people means joining individuals. Society means a collection of individuals, so that initiative must come from individuals. Unless each individual develops a sense of responsibility, the whole community cannot move. So therefore, it is very essential that we should not feel that individual effort is meaningless- you should not feel that way. We should make an effort.

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

Being a philanthropist doesn't mean necessarily writing a huge check. It can mean mobilizing your community to start asking questions.

For we put the power in the people.

Without restoring an ethos of social responsibility, there can be no meaningful and sustained economic recovery.

We need a strategy. And the goal is to bring millions of people together.

The point is change can come about, but it only comes about when millions of people are actively involved in political struggle, the billionaires may have the money, but we have the people.

Rebellions tend to be negative, to denounce and expose the enemy without providing a positive vision of a new future...A revolution is not just for the purpose of correcting past injustices, a revolution involves a projection of man/woman into the future...It begins with projecting the notion of a more human human being, i.e. a human being who is more advanced in the specific qualities which only human beings have - creativity, consciousness and self-consciousness, a sense of political and social responsibility.

Most of the time we do nothing, myself included, I think the lesson I learned from [playing humanitarian Tessa in The Constant Gardner] is that a lot of drops make up an ocean. If people would stand up and say what they believe in maybe we can make a difference. Helping one person is better than nothing. Just do something.

Can we make a better world for our children? I believe we can, if enough people are concerned and get involved in changing what is wrong with society.

If our hopes of building a better and safer world are to become more than wishful thinking, we will need the engagement of volunteers more than ever.