Society Quotes - Page 25

• As a society, we've learned that we're all better off
  when everyone is included in the opportunities of this great nation.

  Edward Kennedy

  Opportunity, Inclusion, Better Off

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• We have moved into an era where we are called upon to raise certain basic questions about the whole society. We are still called upon to give aid to the beggar who finds himself in misery and agony on life's highway. But one day, we must ask the question of whether an edifice which produces beggars must not be restructured and refurbished.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Agony, Giving, One Day

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• Our ultimate objective in learning about anything is to try to create and develop a more just society.

  Yuri Kochiyama

  Justice, Trying, Objectives

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• Internationalism is a community theory of society which is founded on economic, spiritual, and biological facts. It maintains that respect for a healthy development of human society and of world civilization requires that mankind be organized internationally. Nationalities should form the constitutive links in a great world alliance, and must be guaranteed an independent life in the realm of the spiritual and for locally delimited tasks, while economic and political objectives must be guided internationally in a spirit of peaceful cooperation for the promotion of mankind's common interests.

  Christian Lous Lange

  Spiritual, Independent, Civilization

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• No society has fulfilled its democratic promise if people go hungry... If some go without food they have surely been deprived of all power. The existence of hunger belies the existence of democracy.

  Frances Moore Lappé

  People, Promise, Democracy

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• Making conscious choices about what we eat, based on what the earth can sustain and what our bodies need, can help remind us that our whole society must begin to balance sustainable production with human need.

  Frances Moore Lappé

  Choices, Balance, Needs

  "Frances Moore Lappe: Diet for a Small Planet". Plowboy Interview with Pat Stone, www.motherearthnews.com. March/April 1982.

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• If you want a strong society, it has to be inclusive.
  If you have to push a boulder up a hill, do you want 10 people or 100?
  If you weed out colour or gender, you get 10.

  Cyndi Lauper

  Weed, Strong, People

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• Each of us is a being in himself and a being in society,
  each of us needs to understand himself and understand others,
  take care of others and be taken care of himself.

  Haniel Long

  Taken, Kwanzaa, Community

  Haniel Long (1950). “A letter to St. Augustine: after re-reading his confessions”

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• Safety and security don't just happen, they are the result of collective consensus and public investment. We owe our children, the most vulnerable citizens in our society, a life free of violence and fear.

  Nelson Mandela

  Children, Compassion, Safety

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• Every society, all government, and every kind of civil compact therefore, is or ought to be, calculated for the general good and safety of the community.

  George Mason

  Government, Safety, Community

  George Mason's remarks on Annual Elections for the Fairfax Independent Company, circa April 1775.

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• Ensuring the access of all citizens to government information and to essential information for human development is a must for every democratic society.

  Koichiro Matsuura

  Government, Essentials, Citizens

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• A universal renunciation of violence requires the commitment of the whole of society. These are not matters of government but matters of State; not only matters for the authoirities, but for society in its entirety, including civilian, military, and religious bodies. The mobilization which is urgently needed to effect the transition within two or three years from a culture of war to a culture of peace demands co-operation from everyone. In order to change, the world needs everyone.

  Federico Mayor Zaragoza

  Religious, Military, War

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• No society that feeds its children on tales of successful violence can expect them not to believe that violence in the end is rewarded.

  Margaret Mead

  Children, Believe, Successful

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• The greatest step forward in human evolution was made when society began to help the weak and the poor, instead of oppressing and despising them.

  Maria Montessori

  Poverty, Steps, Helping

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• I always try to see things with children's eyes. Are they happy? Sad? What do they need? Everywhere I went, I realized that children are society's victims ... We have a duty to speak to political leaders, to influence people to give these children a better future.

  Nana Mouskouri

  Children, Future, Eye

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• We live in such a corporate world where everyone is passing the buck, it seems to me. Therefore I like stories where the individual takes responsibility for BEING the individual, and not just for himself, but for his comrades, his society and ultimately for his country. Ultimately, we can all learn a lesson from that and not be browbeaten by the corporate world which is taking over.

  Liam Neeson

  Country, Responsibility, Stories

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• Society may be formed so as to exist without crime, without poverty, with health greatly improved, with little, if any misery, and with intelligence and happiness increased a hundredfold; and no obstacle whatsoever intervenes at this moment except ignorance to prevent such a state of society from becoming universal.

  Robert Owen

  Health, Ignorance, Adversity

  Robert Owen (1857). “The Life of Robert Owen Written by Himself: With Selections from His Writings and Correspondence”, p.349

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• Look at situations as contingent, not as inevitable, look at them as the result of a series of historical choices made by men and women, as facts of society made by human beings, and not as natural or god-given, therefore unchangeable, permanent, irreversible.

  Edward Said

  Men, Choices Made, Historical

  Edward W. Said (2007). “The Edward Said Reader”, p.378, Vintage

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• I know what it feels like to be hurt,and I don't want to cause that pain to any other person or creature. But somehow, in society, we numb ourselves in order to make money or to feel better about ourselves, such as with cosmetics or food. We say to ourselves, I'm going to use this animal. I'm going to say it doesn't have much worth so that I can allow myself to do these cruel things. And that just isn't fair.

  Alicia Silverstone

  Hurt, Pain, Feel Better

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• Radical transformation of society requires personal and spiritual change first or at least simultaneously

  Sulak Sivaraksa

  God, Spiritual, Firsts

  Sulak Sivaraksa (1999). “Global Healing: Essays and Interviews on Structural Violence, Social Development and Spiritual Transformation”, Thai Inter-Religious Commission for Development

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• Social entrepreneurs come from all levels of society and from communities in nearly every country of the world. They all share the same underlying drive and passion to see their ideas through. Many of them have had a huge effect on the world, yet most people have not even heard of them - a trend we hope to change!

  Jeffrey Skoll

  Country, Passion, Countries Of The World

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• Can we make a better world for our children? I believe we can, if enough people are concerned and get involved in changing what is wrong with society.

  Benjamin Spock

  Children, Believe, People

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• A society is judged by the way it cares for its most vulnerable citizens. As an American, I am ashamed that we have turned out backs on millions of our children. I want to do my part to rectify this terrible situation.

  Marlo Thomas

  Children, Cancer, Health

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• I think we're creating a situation that's incredibly dangerous. There's a lot of chat at the moment about the war on terror and whilst there are many causes for acts of terrorism, what kind of society are you creating if you allow civil society in Africa to die and create millions upon millions of orphans? Where are they going to go? What kind of cults, what kind of militias, what's going to happen? The accession of violence in those countries, the possibility of that, to me is very terrifying.

  Emma Thompson

  Country, War, Thinking

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• Poverty is not something people impose on themselves for want of effort and community organisation. It is constructed by divisive and discriminatory laws, inflexible organisations, acquisitive ideologies of wealth, a deeply rooted class system and policies which serve privilege in the short term and destroy society in the long term.

  Pete Townshend

  Law, Class, Long

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