Howard Zinn
Howard Zinn
Howard Zinnwas an American historian, playwright, and social activist. He was a political science professor at Boston University. Zinn wrote more than twenty books, including his best-selling and influential A People's History of the United States. In 2007, he published a version of it for younger readers, A Young People′s History of the United States...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionHistorian
Date of Birth24 August 1922
CountryUnited States of America
addiction far greater leaders political scale ugly weapons
The weapons addiction of all our political leaders ... has the same characteristics as drug addiction. It is enormously costly, very dangerous, provokes ugly violence, and is self-perpetuating -- all on a scale far greater than drug addicton.
democracy doe realms
Civil disobedience is not something outside the realm of democracy. Democracy requires civil disobedience. Without civil disobedience democracy does not exist.
speaks-out together-we-can government
When we organize with one another, when we get involved, when we stand up and speak out together, we can create a power no government can suppress.
direct-action government asking
Strike is always a form of direct action. With the strike, too, you are not asking government to make things easier for you by passing legislation, you are taking a direct action against the employer.
direct-action voting democracy
Voting is easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens.
position-of-power yesterday important
History is important. If you don't know history it is as if you were born yesterday. And if you were born yesterday, anybody up there in a position of power can tell you anything, and you have no way of checking up on it.
steps burning sometimes
Sometimes it's a short step from banning to burning.
democracy citizens movement
If democracy were to be given any meaning, if it were to go beyond the limits of capitalism and nationalism, this would not come, if history were any guide, from the top. It would come through citizen's movements, educating, organizing, agitating, striking, boycotting, demonstrating, threatening those in power with disruption of the stability they needed.