It's amazing how people can get so excited about a rocket to the moon and not give a damn about smog, oil leaks, the devastation of the environment with pesticides, hunger, disease. When the poor share some of the power that the affluent now monopolize, we will give a damn.
Interpretation
Chavez highlights society's contradictory priorities, focusing on space exploration while neglecting pressing social and environmental issues.
Cesar Chavez critiques the fascination with technological advancements, like space travel, juxtaposed with the alarming disregard for critical issues affecting humanity and the environment. He emphasizes that true progress requires addressing these disparities and empowering the less fortunate to partake in the power held by the affluent, implying that societal change must prioritize humanitarian and ecological concerns over mere technological achievements.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about environmental activism to emphasize the need for societal change.
I became a vegetarian after realizing that animals feel afraid, cold, hungry and unhappy like we do. I feel very deeply about vegetarianism and the animal kingdom. It was my dog Boycott who led me to question the right of humans to eat other sentient beings.
I think one of the great, great problems...is confusing people to the point where they become immobile. In fact, the more things people can find out for themselves, the more vigor the organization is going to have.
In the final analysis it doesn't really matter what the political system is...We don't need perfect political systems; we need perfect participation.
There is enough love and good will in our movement to give energy to our struggle and still have plenty left over to break down and change the climate of hate and fear around us.
Our union represents a breaking away...represents sharing a power, represent questioning, represents a new force...however long it takes, we are geared for a struggle.
Every time we sit at a table at night or in the morning to enjoy the fruits and grain and vegetables from our good earth, remember that they come from the work of men and women and children who have been exploited for generations.
We will have to take risks, to chance failure, to be willing to walk away from the familiar paths that have brought us to this point.
I have been ever of opinion that revolutions are not to be evaded.
One of the triumphs of the Civil Rights Movement is that when you travel through the South today, you do not feel overwhelmed by a residue of grievance and hate.
As much as people say they love change, they love it when you change - not when you want them to change. Even when it comes to processes they don't like, they're afraid of change.
Had it not been for you, I should have remained what I was when we first met, a prejudiced, narrow-minded being, with contracted sympathies and false knowledge, wasting my life on obsolete trifles, and utterly insensible to the privilege of living in this wondrous age of change and progress.
The life you have led doesn't need to be the only life you have.
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