Empathy may be the single most important quality that must be nurtured to give peace a fighting chance.
ARUNDHATI ROYStates have invested themselves with the right to legitimise violence – so who gets criminalised and delegitimised? Only – or well that’s excessive – usually, the resistance.
More Arundhati Roy Quotes
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Things can change in a day.
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NGOs have a complicated space in neoliberal politics. They are supposed to mop up the anger. Even when they are doing good work, they are supposed to maintain the status quo. They are the missionaries of the corporate world.
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Terrorism is the symptom, not the disease.
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Flags are bits of colored cloth used first to shrinkwrap people’s brains and then as ceremonial shrouds to bury the dead.
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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.
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Excitement always leads to tears.
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Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.
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I am a woman who is a granddaughter of a lady who used to be beaten on the head by her husband, of a mother who went through hell because she was divorced and had to bring up these kids. And I can take 10 men out to lunch and pay the bill, and nobody even thinks twice about it. So don’t mess with me.
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The world’s ‘freeest’ country has the highest number in prison.
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Some things come with their own punishments.
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The American way of life is not sustainable. It doesn’t acknowledge that there is a world beyond America.
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It was a time when the unthinkable became the thinkable and the impossible really happened.
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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.
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Money need not be our only reward.
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Literature is the opposite of a nuclear bomb.
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