Political Involvement Quotes

The painter paints, the musician makes music, the novelist writes novels. But I believe that we all have some influence, not because of the fact that one is an artist, but because we are citizens. As citizens, we all have an obligation to intervene and become involved, it's the citizen who changes things. I can't imagine myself outside any kind of social or political involvement. ~ Jose Saramago

I can't imagine myself outside any kind of social or political involvement. Yes, I'm a writer, but I live in this world, and my writing doesn't exist on a separate level. And if people know who I am and read my books, well, good; that way, if I have something more to say, then everyone benefits. ~ Jose Saramago

...it is essential that we make an important distinction between issues of politics and problems in psychology. We should see this as a distinction between what we do in order to influence the political and economic relations in the society and what, in a more personal way, we do to achieve self-knowledge and identity. Now I do not think that these are hard and fast categories that totally exclude one another. A just society certainly encourages a healthy psychology, and individuals can find personal fulfillment through political involvement. But I think we must make this distinction, because in periods of great social upheaval--and we are living through such a period--there is a tendency to politicize all things, including scholarship, art, friendship, and love. The most extreme form of this total politicization is totalitarianism, a stage we have not yet reached. But even a moderate form of it can be dangerous since it can lead to a politics so preoccupied with psychological issues that the goals of political action are obscured and even rendered unobtainable. ~ Bayard Rustin

An excessive amount of my time is taken with political involvement. It's unavoidable; that's my temperament. ~ Wole Soyinka

Many outsiders clarified that they believe Christians have a right (even an obligation) to pursue political involvement, but they disagree with our methods and our attitudes. They say we seem to be pursuing an agenda that benefits only ourselves; that we expect too much out of politics; they question whether we are motivated by our economic status rather than faith perspectives when we support conservative politics; they claim we act and say things in an unchristian manner; they wonder whether Jesus would use political power as we do; and they are concerned that we overpowered the voices of other groups. ~ David Kinnaman

For several months they'd been drifting toward political involvement, but the picture was hazy and one of the most confusing elements was their geographical proximity to Berkeley, the citadel of West Coast radicalism. Berkeley is right next door to Oakland, with nothing between them but a line on the map and a few street signs, but in many ways they are as different as Manhattan and the Bronx. Berkeley is a college town and, like Manhattan, a magnet for intellectual transients. Oakland is a magnet for people who want hour-wage jobs and cheap housing, who can't afford to live in Berkeley, San Francisco or any of the middle-class Bay Area suburbs. [10] It is a noisy, ugly, mean-spirited place, with the sort of charm that Chicago had for Sandburg. It is also a natural environment for hoodlums, brawlers, teenage gangs and racial tensions.

The Hell's Angels' massive publicity -- coming hard on the heels of the widely publicized student rebellion in Berkeley -- was interpreted in liberal-radical-intellectual circles as the signal for a natural alliance. Beyond that, the Angels' aggressive, antisocial stance -- their alienation, as it were -- had a tremendous appeal for the more aesthetic Berkeley temperament. Students who could barely get up the nerve to sign a petition or to shoplift a candy bar were fascinated by tales of the Hell's Angels ripping up towns and taking whatever they wanted. Most important, the Angels had a reputation for defying police, for successfully ~ Hunter S. Thompson

The Tea Party has definitely increased political involvement, not only among Tea Party members but among people who oppose the Tea Party members. It's been a general stimulus. ~ P. J. O'Rourke

I've personally backed off from direct political involvement. ~ Pat Robertson

I felt we must separate political responsibility. The Dalai Lama should not carry that burden. So that is my selfish reason - to protect the old Dalai Lama tradition. It is safer without political involvement. ~ Dalai Lama

Politics had never been central to the Christian religious experience. Jesus had, after all, said that his Kingdom was not of this world. For centuries, the Jews of Europe had refrained from political involvement as a matter of principle. But politics was no secondary issue for Muslims. We have seen that it had been the theatre of their religious quest. Salvation did not mean redemption from sin, but the creation of a just society in which the individual could more easily make that existential surrender of his or her whole being that would bring fulfilment. The polity was therefore a matter of supreme importance, ~ Karen Armstrong

Political corruption, social greed, and Americanized quasi-socialism can ruin even the most wonderful places. California proved that. ~ Tiffany Madison

Exemplary leaders lead by loyalty and not by authority". ~ Abdulazeez Henry Musa

The reduction of political discourse to sound bites is one of the worst things that's happened in American political life. ~ John Silber

So what if I don't agree with the Democrats? What's to disagree with? They believe everything. And what they don't believe, the Republicans do. Neither of them stands for anything they believe in, anyway. ~ P. J. O'Rourke

When an issue becomes a vital part of a political agenda, as is the case with climate, then the politically desired position becomes a goal rather than a consequence of scientific research. ~ Richard Lindzen

We have known for some time that the poor and ignored were the nonvoters, alienated from a political system they felt didn't care about them, and about which they could do little. Now alienation has spread upward into families above the poverty line. These are white workers, neither rich nor poor, but angry over economic insecurity, unhappy with their work, worried about their neighborhoods, hostile to government - combining elements of racism with elements of class consciousness, contempt for the lower classes along with distrust for the elite, and thus open to solutions from any direction, right or left. ~ Howard Zinn

I am no longer 'trying to dig up evidence to prove' vaccines cause autism. There is already abundant evidence. This debate is not scientific but is political ~ David Ayoub

All [zoos] actually offer to the public in return for the taxes spent upon them is a form of idle and witless amusement, compared to which a visit to a penitentiary, or even to a State legislature in session, is informing, stimulating and ennobling. ~ H.L. Mencken

To take a single step beyond the boundaries specially drawn around the powers of Congress is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible to definition. ~ Thomas Jefferson

The voting records of virtually every member of Congress reveal that the oath of office is more a ceremonial gesture than a sacred commitment. ~ Tom Coburn

The polarization of Congress; the decline of civility; and the rise of attack politics in the 1980s, the 1990s, and the early years of the new century are a blot on our political system and a disservice to the American people. ~ Edward Brooke

If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

What is called a republic, is not any particular form of government ... it is naturally opposed to the word monarchy, which means arbitrary power. ~ Thomas Paine

I felt like challenging myself and challenging my readers with something darker and heavier. I don't know how to explain it, because I'm not a political person. I have two political stories, and that's it: 'Human Diastrophism' and 'Poison River.' ~ Gilbert Hernandez

But the truth of the matter is that there is there is an opportunity for them to participate in the economic and political future of the country and certainly in the security life of the country. ~ John Abizaid

Our political and constitutional rights, so called, are but the natural and inherent rights of man, asserted, carried out, and secured by modes of human contrivance. ~ Gerrit Smith

Man is not to fight with other human races, other human individuals, but his work is to bring about reconciliation and Peace and to restore the bonds of friendship and love. We are not like fighting beasts. It is the life of self which is predominating in our life, the self which is creating the seclusion, giving rise to sufferings, to jealousy and hatred, to political and commercial competition. All these illusions will vanish, if we go down to the heart of ~ Rabindranath Tagore

What I have experienced is nothing compared to what political prisoners in prisons suffer. ~ Aung San Suu Kyi

You don't choose a party because it's the flavour of the month. I feel I will be able to work under a political system. I feel if people like me don't enter politics to bring change, who will? ~ Nandan Nilekani

I looked up--for he was half a head taller than I--into his gold-colored eyes, and though their expression was merely contemplative, and his manner mild, I felt my neck go hot. Turning away from that direct, steady gaze, I just couldn't find the words to ask him about his mother's political plans. So I said, "I came to ask a favor of you."
"Speak, then," he said, his voice just a shade deeper than usual.
I looked over my shoulder and realized then that he was laughing. Not out loud, but internally. All the signs were there; the shadows at the corners of his mouth, the sudden brightness of his gaze. He was laughing at me--at my reaction.
I sighed. "It concerns the party I must give for my brother's coming marriage," I said shortly, and stole another quick look.
His amusement was gone--superficially, anyway.
"You must forgive my obtuseness," he murmured. "But you could have requested your assistance by letter."
"I did. Oh." I realized what he meant, and then remembered belatedly one of Nee's more delicate hints about pursuit--and pursuers. "Oh!" So he hadn't guessed why I'd come; he thought I'd come courting. And, well, here we were alone.
My first reaction was alarm. I did find him attractive--I realized it just as I was standing there--but in the way I'd admire a beautifully cut diamond or a sunset above sheer cliffs. Another person, finding herself in my place, could probably embark happily into dalliance and thus speed along her true purpo ~ Sherwood Smith

I do not have much confidence in the political system and never did. My goal has always been to change people's minds because as long as people demand more government, they will get it. ~ Ron Paul

Today's political climate does not allow the luxury of apathy. ~ Trent Reznor

Political Freedom without economic equality is a pretense, a fraud, a lie; and the workers want no lying. ~ Mikhail Bakunin

political consequences of economic inequality ~ Anonymous

Since the songs were written over a five-year period, I think these are little snapshots. Some people call it political or topical, but I think each song is self-contained. I think it fits together as a picture of the last half-decade of time. ~ Conor Oberst

An influential member of parliament has not only to pay much money to become such, and to give time and labour, he has also to sacrifice his mind too - at least all the characteristics part of it that which is original and most his own. ~ Walter Bagehot

There is a crisis that is not political - an epidemic of loneliness, of sadness - and we're completely unequal to dealing with it. ~ Richard Flanagan

But my knowledge of Marxism was limited to knowing that Marx was a Jew, and that he had a long white beard. I said to Lunatcharsky (the political communist commissar for Education, 1918, fh) 'Whatever you do, don't ask me why I painted in blue or green, and why you can see a calf inside the cow's belly, etc. On the other hand you're welcome: if Marx is so wise, let him come back to life and explain it himself'. I showed him my canvases. ~ Marc Chagall

In our own time, academic history has grown unbelievably diverse,
even to the point of ridicule by conservatives, who may not appreciate that
it is a sign of a culture's strength, and not its weakness, that it can devote
resources to the study of early American midwives, or transgender people
in the nineteenth century, or the emergence of new forms of urban slang.
In part, these new types of history are just good, if sophisticated, fun. It
can be fascinating and deeply rewarding to read about other human beings
who have had lives radically different from (or similar to) one's own. But
these new histories also tell stories that have long gone untold, and perhaps
not for any good reason. Perhaps these histories may rouse political
theory from its slumbers, and show it that there are more things in heaven
and earth than are dreamt of in its philosophy. ~ Jason Kuznicki

Where you stand should not depend on where you sit. ~ Jane Bryant Quinn

Leonid Brezhnev did not understand the enormous political importance of the decision to produce and afterwards deploy the SS-20s. ~ Helmut Schmidt

There are various forms of weaponry, intellectual weaponry, spiritual weaponry, political weaponry, economic weaponry. Because we are on the battlefield, and there are bullets flying, some symbolic, some literal and the life of the mind is a crucial place where the battle goes on. ~ Cornel West

President Obama has called for economic and political empowerment of women globally. The Equal Futures Partnership promotes removal of policy, legal, and regulatory barriers that hold women back at local, state and national levels. ~ Lael Brainard

You see, Dad, Professor McLuhan says that the environment that man creates becomes his medium for defining his role in it. The invention of type created linear, or sequential thought, separating thought from action. Now, with TV and folk singing, thought and action are closer and social involvement is greater. We again live in a village. Get it? ~ Marshall McLuhan

Political [or individual] rights do not exist because they have been legally set down on a piece of paper, but only when they have become the ingrown habit of a people, and when any attempt to impair them will be meet with the violent resistance of the populace ... One compels respect from others when he knows how to defend his dignity as a human being ... The people owe all the political rights and privileges which we enjoy today, in greater or lesser measure, not to the good will of their governments, but to their own strength ~ Rudolf Rocker

The white economic and political elite often failed to recognize blacks as American, just as blacks often failed to recognize their potential for advancement outside of the limited opportunities afforded them by whites. ~ W.E.B. Du Bois

My administration has been calling upon all the leaders in the - in the Middle East to do everything they can to stop the violence, to tell the different parties involved that peace will never happen. ~ George W. Bush

In these pages, it is my intention to make many people - not only Muslims but also Western apologists for Islam - uncomfortable. I am not going to do this by drawing cartoons. Rather, I intend to challenge centuries of religious orthodoxy with ideas and arguments that I am certain will be denounced as heretical. My argument is for nothing less than a Muslim Reformation. Without fundamental alterations to some of Islam's core concepts, I believe, we shall not solve the burning and increasingly global problem of political violence carried out in the name of religion. I intend to speak freely, in the hope that others will debate equally freely with me on what needs to change in Islamic doctrine, rather than seeking to stifle discussion. ~ Ayaan Hirsi Ali

I would not want to live in a country that would have me as a leader in any sort of political bent. ~ Tom Hanks