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Railing against the past will not heal us. History has happened. It’s over and done with. All we can do is to change its course by encouraging what we love instead of destroying what we don’t.

Arundhati Roy

NGOs are dangerous. They do what the missionaries used to do in Colonial times. They are Trojan Horses. The worse the situation, the more the NGOs.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Dangerous Time Worst
States have invested themselves with the right to legitimise violence – so who gets criminalised and delegitimised? Only – or well that’s excessive – usually, the resistance.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Investment Legal Resistence Right Violence
Violating human rights is integral to the project of neoliberalism and global hegemony.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Human Integrity Project Right
Sometimes there’s truth in old cliches. There can be no real peace without justice. And without resistance there will be no justice.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Justice Old Peace Reality Resistance Truth
When people say “the people” or “the public” as though it’s the final repository of all morality, I sometimes flinch.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Moral Myself People Reaction
A political struggle that does not have women at the heart of it, above it, below it, and within it is no struggle at all.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Heart Politics Struggle Woman
Human rights are fundamental rights, they are the minimum, the very least we demand. Too often, they become the goal itself. What should be the minimum becomes the maximum – all we are supposed to expect – but human rights aren’t enough. The goal is, and must always be, justice.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Demand Enough Expectation Fundamental Human Justice Right
But remember that if the struggle were to resort to violence, it will lose vision, beauty and imagination. Most dangerous of all, it will marginalize and eventually victimize women. And a political struggle that does not have women at the heart of it, above it, below it, and within it is no struggle at all.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Heart Lose Politics Remember Struggle Violence Vision Woman
Nationalism of one kind or another was the cause of most of the genocide of the twentieth century.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Death Kind Nation Reason War
Every people, every society, needs a culture of resistance, a culture of being difficult and disobedient, that is the only way they will ever be able to stand up to the inevitable abuse of power by whoever runs the state apparatus, the capitalists, the communists, the socialists, the Gandhians, whoever.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Culture Difficult Injustice Need People Power Resistance Society
I could weep for a river-valley, and I have. But for a country? Oh man, I don’t know.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Country Cry Myself River Tears
Power is fortified not just by what it destroys, but also by what it creates. Not just by what it takes, but also by what it gives. And powerlessness reaffirmed not just by the helplessness of those who have lost, but also by the gratitude of those who have (or think they have) gained.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Creation Destroy Gratitude Help Lost Power Thinking
The trouble is that once you see it, you can’t unsee it. And once you’ve seen it, keeping quiet, saying nothing, becomes as political an act as speaking out. There’s no innocence. Either way, you’re accountable.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Innocent Politics Quiet Responsibility See Trouble Yourself
Wars are never fought for altruistic reasons. They’re usually fought for hegemony, for business. And then of course there’s the business of war.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Business Reason War
People rarely win wars, governments rarely lose them. People get killed. Governments moult and regroup, hydra-headed. They use flags first to shrink-wrap people’s minds and smother thought, and then as ceremonial shrouds to bury their willing dead.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Death Kill Lose Mindset People War Willing Win
I feel ashamed that the new, nuclear, neo-liberal India thinks of itself as a ‘natural ally’ of Israel. Ever since India began to call itself an emerging superpower, it has become a slavish, groveling satellite state of the US.
ARUNDHATI ROY

Feeling Shame Slave Thinking

Railing against the past will not heal us. History has happened. It’s over and done with. All we can do is to change its course by encouraging what we love instead of destroying what we don’t.

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Railing against the past will not heal us. History has happened. It’s over and done with. All we can do is to change its course by encouraging what we love instead of destroying what we don’t.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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