Speak, speak, speak, & remember that whenever anyone's liberty to speak is denied, your liberty is denied also, & your place is where the attack is.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
Anarchism, to me, means not only the denial of authority, not only a new economy, but a revision of the principles of morality. It means the development of the individual as well as the assertion of the individual. It means self-responsibility, and not leader worship.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Anarchism emphasizes individual development and self-responsibility while rejecting authority and traditional morality.
Voltairine De Cleyre's quote articulates her vision of anarchism as a comprehensive philosophy that goes beyond mere rejection of authority or establishment of alternative economic systems. It calls for a reevaluation of moral principles to promote individual growth and responsibility, free from hierarchy and the blind veneration of leaders, thus advocating for empowerment and autonomy of the self.
Themes
AnarchismIndividualitySelf-ResponsibilityMoralityAuthority
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about political philosophies, one might use this quote to illustrate the deeper implications of anarchist thought.
More from Voltairine De Cleyre
All quotes →Make no laws whatever concerning speech, and speech will be free; so soon as you make a declaration on paper that speech shall be free, you will have a hundred lawyers proving that "freedom does not mean abuse, nor liberty license," and they will define freedom out of existence.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
I think it can be shown that the law makes ten criminals where it restrains one.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
The question of souls is old—we demand our bodies, now. We are tired of promises, god is deaf, and his church is our worst enemy.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
Is it not enough that 'things are cruel and blind'? Must we also be cruel and blind?
Voltairine De CleyreRead
Government is as unreal, as intangible, as unapproachable as God. Try it, if you don't believe it. Seek through the legislative halls of America and find, if you can, the Government. In the end you will be doomed to confer with the agent, as before.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
Similar quotes
Cry, the beloved country, for the unborn child that's the inheritor of our fear. Let him not love the earth too deeply. Let him not laugh too gladly when the water runs through his fingers, nor stand too silent when the setting sun makes red the veld with fire. Let him not be too moved when the birds of his land are singing. Nor give too much of his heart to a mountain or a valley. For fear will rob him if he gives too much.
Alan PatonRead
Once someone asked me, "What do you want to be your epitaph?" So I said, "Paulo Coelho died when he was alive.
Paulo CoelhoRead
I'm going to tell you what my religion is. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Period. Terminato. Finito.
Gene WilderRead
Every day of my life I walk with the idea that I am black, no matter how successful I am. And our success is tempered by that; you're successful in this way given the fact you are black, and most blacks don't get to that point.
Danny GloverRead
We live today not in the digital, not in the physical, but in the kind of minestrone that our mind makes of the two.
Paola AntonelliRead
Memory depends mainly upon myth. Some even occurs in our minds, in actuality or in fantasy; we form it in memory, molding it like clay day after day - and soon we have made out of that event a myth. We then keep the myth in memory as a guide to future similar situations.
Rollo MayRead