Never to forget where we came from and always praise the bridges that carried us over.
Fannie Lou HamerRead
Sometimes it seem like to tell the truth today is to run the risk of being killed. But if I fall, I'll fall five feet four inches forward in the fight for freedom. I'm not backing off.
Interpretation
Speaking the truth can be dangerous, but standing up for one's beliefs is crucial.
This quote highlights the peril involved in expressing honest opinions, particularly in oppressive environments. Fannie Lou Hamer emphasizes that despite the risks, she is committed to pushing forward in the struggle for freedom and justice, signifying the importance of courage and resilience in the face of adversity.
In practice
This quote was mentioned during a rally advocating for civil rights.
Never to forget where we came from and always praise the bridges that carried us over.
You can pray until you faint, but unless you get up and try to do something, God is not going to put it in your lap.
People have got to get together and work together. I'm tired of the kind of oppression that white people have inflicted on us and are still trying to inflict.
One day, I know the struggle will change. There's got to be a change - not only for Mississippi, not only for the people in the United States, but people all over the world.
Is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave, where we have to sleep with our telephones off the hooks because our lives be threatened daily, because we want to live as decent human beings in America?
I was forced away from the plantation because I wouldn't go back and withdraw, you know, my literacy test after I had tried to take it. I wouldn't go back.
The struggle for democracy and human rights in Burma is a struggle for life and dignity. It is a struggle that encompasses our political, social and economic aspirations.
I've always felt that if you back down from a fear, the ghost of that fear never goes away. It diminishes people. So I've always said 'yes' to the thing I'm most scared about. The fear of letting myself down - of saying 'no' to something that I was afraid of and then sitting in my room later going, 'I wish I'd had the guts to say this or that' - that galvanizes me more than anything.
One of the speakers asked how many women had been harassed or abused sexually in their life? There were thousands of women in the audience, and almost every one of them raised her hand.
My feelings of revulsion and foreboding about nuclear weapons had not changed an iota since 1945, and they have never left me. Since I was 14, the overriding objective of my life has been to prevent the occurrence of nuclear war.
Thanks to every gay person in public and non-public life who has come out.
I don't even call it violence when it's in self defense; I call it intelligence.
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