At Kobe, whither I fled from Hong Kong, I took a step of great importance. I cut off my cue, which had been growing all my life.
Sun Yat-SenRead
The goal of the revolution is to achieve the people's rights, but during the course of the revolution, we must stress military power - and the two are mutually contradictory.
Interpretation
Revolution aims to secure rights for the people, yet requires military strength, creating a conflict between ideals and means.
This quote by Sun Yat-Sen highlights the inherent contradiction in revolutionary movements, where the pursuit of liberating the rights of the populace often necessitates the use of military force. While the ultimate goal is the emancipation of the people, the means employed can undermine the very principles of freedom and justice that the revolution seeks to establish.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the complexities of social movements.
At Kobe, whither I fled from Hong Kong, I took a step of great importance. I cut off my cue, which had been growing all my life.
After the Manchu government had carried on wars with foreign nations and had been defeated, China was forced to sign many unequal treaties. Foreign nations are still using these treaties to bind China, and as a result, China fails at whatever she attempts.
What problem does Pan-Asianism attempt to solve? The problem is how to terminate the sufferings of the Asiatic peoples and how to resist the aggression of the powerful European countries. In a word, Pan-Asianism represents the cause of the oppressed Asiatic peoples.
How can human rights be ever developed for the majority of Chinese people? The only way is to organize. To organize workers, peasants, merchants, industrialists, and students at the grassroots level.
At thirteen, I accompanied my mother to the Hawaiian Islands. There, for the first time, I saw the wonder of a steamship and the vastness of the ocean. From that time on, I was eager to acquire the knowledge of the West and to fathom the mysteries of nature.
Because of poverty, we must adopt the capitalist means of production to develop our resources to get rich. However, if we ignore the issue of social justice at the beginning of China's industrialization, we will sow the seeds of class warfare in the future.
Yup, the whole birther movement was racist.
I sent American troops to Iraq to make its people free, not to make them American. Iraqis will write their own history and find their own way.
It is always a disappointment to turn from forthright consideration of some subject - whether from the Left or the Right, a poet or a plumber - to the Beltway version, in which the only aspects of the issue that matter are the effects it will have on the fortunes of the two parties and the various men in power.
The very essence of a free government consists in considering offices as public trusts, bestowed for the good of the country, and not for the benefit of an individual or a party.
Money powers prey upon the nation in times of peace & conspire against it in times of adversity.
What is it but a cunningly devised scheme to take from one State and to give to another - to replenish the treasury of some of the States from the pockets of the people of the others; in reality, to make them support the governments and pay the debts of other States as well as their own?
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