Noam Chomsky Quotes About Violence

• My own concern is primarily the terror and violence carried out by my own state... It is very easy to denounce the atrocities of someone else. That has about as much ethical value as denouncing atrocities that took place in the 18th century.

  Noam Chomsky

  Atrocities, Violence, Easy

• You never need an argument against the use of violence, you need an argument for it.

  Noam Chomsky

  Peace, War, Needs

  "Viewpoint: War would be insane" by Noam Chomsky, news.bbc.co.uk. February 12, 2003.

• As soon as one identifies, challenges and overcomes illegitimate power, he or she is an anarchist. Most people are anarchists. What they call themselves doesn’t matter to me. The world is full of suffering, distress, violence and catastrophes. Students must decide: does something concern you or not? I say: look around, analyze the problems, ask yourself what you can do and set out on the work!

  Noam Chomsky

  People, Challenges, Suffering

  "Students should become anarchists". ZEIT Campus Interview translated by IndyBay, www.indybay.org. June 14, 2011.

• Jesus himself, and most of the message of the Gospels, is a message of service to the poor, a critique of the rich and the powerful, and a pacifist doctrine. And it remained that way, that's what Christianity was up... until Constantine. :Constantine shifted it so the cross, which was the symbol of persecution of somebody working for the poor, was put on the shield of the Roman Empire. It became the symbol for violence and oppression, and that's pretty much what the church has been until the present.

  Noam Chomsky

  Jesus, Powerful, Church

  "Science in the Dock". Science & Theology News Interview, chomsky.info. March 1, 2006.

• See, people with power understand exactly one thing: violence.

  Noam Chomsky

  People, Violence, One Thing

  Noam Chomsky (2013). “Understanding Power: The Indispensible Chomsky”, p.124, The New Press

• Well before September 11, it was understood that with modern technology, the rich and powerful will lose their near monopoly of the means of violence and can expect to suffer atrocities on home soil.

  Noam Chomsky

  Powerful, Home, Mean

  "Drain the swamp and there will be no more mosquitoes" by Noam Chomsky, www.theguardian.com. September 8, 2002.

• The US stole Texas from Mexico by violence, then invaded Mexico on ludicrous pretexts and conquered half of it, what is now the Southwest and Far West. That's why cities have Spanish names: San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Santa Cruz, etc. All of this is suppressed in standard American history. But the victims remember. The conquerors typically have one history, the victims a different one - and often a more accurate one.

  Noam Chomsky

  Texas, Cities, Names

  Source: thefifthcolumnnews.com

• The atrocities in Cambodia are a direct and understandable response to the violence of the imperial system.

  Noam Chomsky

  War, Atrocities, Violence

• As a tactic, violence is absurd. No one can compete with the Government in violence, and the resort to violence, which will surely fail, will simply frighten and alienate some who can be reached, and will further encourage the ideologists and administrators of forceful repression.

  Noam Chomsky

  Government, Tactics, Violence

  Noam Chomsky (2013). “The Essential Chomsky”, p.82, The New Press

• The good news from the U.S. military survey of focus groups is that Iraqis do accept the Nuremberg principles. They understand that sectarian violence and the other postwar horrors are contained within the supreme international crime committed by the invaders.

  Noam Chomsky

  Military, Focus, News

• The U.S. directed the war against South Vietnam. There was a political settlement in 1954. But in the late '50's the United States organized an internal repression in South Vietnam, not using its troops, but using the local apparatus it was constructing. This was a very significant and very effective campaign of violence and terrorism against the Vietminh - which was the communist-led nationalist force that fought the French. And the Vietminh at that time was adhering to the Geneva Accords, hoping that the political settlement would work out in South Vietnam.

  Noam Chomsky

  War, Work Out, Political

  Source: chomsky.info

• The threat and use of violence is stimulating nuclear proliferation along with jihadi terrorism.

  Noam Chomsky

  Use, Nuclear Proliferation, Violence

  Noam Chomsky (2007). “Interventions”, p.142, City Lights Publishers

• Hamas must agree to first recognize Israel, second to end all violence, third to accept past agreements. Try to find a mention of the fact that the United States and Israel reject all three of those. They obviously don't recognize Palestine, they certainly don't withdraw the use of violence or the threat of it - in fact they insist on it - and they don't accept past agreements, including the road map.

  Noam Chomsky

  Past, Israel, Agreement

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

• Popular struggles to bring about a freer and more just society have been resisted by violence and repression, and massive efforts to control opinion and attitudes. Over time, however, they have met with considerable success, even though there is a long way to go, and there is often regression.

  Noam Chomsky

  Attitude, Struggle, Long

  Noam Chomsky (2016). “Who Rules the World?”, p.85, Metropolitan Books

• Violence can succeed, as Americans know well from the conquest of the national territory. But at terrible cost. It can also provoke violence in response, and often does.

  Noam Chomsky

  Doe, Cost, Territory

  Noam Chomsky (2007). “Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance”, p.241, Macmillan

• In Kosovo, the U.S. has chosen a course of action that escalates atrocities and violence. It is also a course of action that strikes a blow against the regime of international order, but which offers the weak at least some protection from predatory states.

  Noam Chomsky

  Blow, Order, Violence

  "Now it's a free for all". www.theguardian.com. May 16, 1999.

• The level of destruction and terror and violence carried out by the powerful states far exceeds anything that can imaginably can be done by groups that are called terrorists and subnational groups.

  Noam Chomsky

  Powerful, Groups, Done

  "Civilization versus Barbarism?". Interview with M. Junaid Alam, chomsky.info. December 17, 2004.

• My speculation is that the U.S. does not want to establish the principle that it has to defer to some higher authority before carrying out the use of violence.

  Noam Chomsky

  Use, Want, Violence

• Colombia has been the leading western recipient of U.S. arms and training as violence has grown through the '90s.

  Noam Chomsky

  Training, Arms, Violence

  "Now it's a free for all". www.theguardian.com. May 16, 1999.

• Whenever there is injustice, oppression, aggression, violence, it's standard for it to be supported by those we now call "intellectuals," but typically not by all; there is typically a fringe of dissidents. With very rare exceptions - in fact, it's hard to think of any - they suffer in one or another way; how depends on the nature of the society.

  Noam Chomsky

  Thinking, Suffering, Way

  Source: chomsky.info

• Judge Afiuni has suffered enough. She has been subject to acts of violence and humiliations to undermine her human dignity. I am convinced that she must be set free.

  Noam Chomsky

  Judging, Violence, Dignity

  "Noam Chomsky criticises old friend Hugo Chávez for 'assault' on democracy" by Rory Carroll, www.theguardian.com. July 2, 2011.

• We should recall that during the Second World War and the Great Depression there was an upsurge in popular, radical democracy. In all over the world. It took different forms, but it was there, everywhere. In Greece it was in the Greek revolution, and so on. And it had to be crushed. In countries like Greece, it was crushed by violence. In countries like Italy, where the US forces entered in 1943, it was crushed by attacking and destroying the anti-German partisans and restoring the traditional order.

  Noam Chomsky

  Country, War, Order

  Source: pennpoliticalreview.org

• The former colonies, in Latin America in particular, have a better chance than ever before to overcome centuries of subjugation, violence and foreign intervention, which they have so far survived as dependencies with islands of luxury in a sea of misery.

  Noam Chomsky

  Latin, Sea, Luxury

• If the most important revolutionary part of the George W. Bush Doctrine is that states that harbor terrorists are terrorist states, what do we conclude from that? We conclude exactly what Kissinger was kind enough to say: These doctrines are unilateral. They are not intended as doctrines of international law or doctrines of international affairs. They are doctrines that grant the U.S. the right to use force and violence and to harbor terrorists, but not anyone else.

  Noam Chomsky

  Law, Important, Violence

  Source: progressive.org

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