We have come to the point of believing complacency to be a virtue. Yet complacency is the biggest form of cowardice. The worst thing we can do to our… - Helene Ahrweiler

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We have come to the point of believing complacency to be a virtue. Yet complacency is the biggest form of cowardice. The worst thing we can do to our children is to teach them to remain quiet. In ancient Greece, during periods of crisis and division, citizens who would not take a position were fined. We tell our young people to be irresponsible, to stay off the pitch, instead of teaching them that we all need to be on the pitch and to fight. When you deny yourself the right of participation and choice, you’re denying your freedom.

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About Helene Ahrweiler

Helene Glykatzi-Ahrweiler (born 29 August 1926) is a Greek-French academic Byzantinologist. She is also a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador for Greece.

Also Known As

Native Name: Ελένη Γλύκατζη Ελένη Γλύκατζη-Αρβελέρ
Alternative Names: Hélène Ahrweiler-Glykatzi Hélène Glykatzi Helene Glykatzi-Ahrweiler

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Additional quotes by Helene Ahrweiler

The French, you know, have a good quality: They don’t tolerate arrogance. I’m the same way. I voted for him, but when I heard him tell an unemployed man asking for a job to “go across the street” and get one, and especially after the cover-up of the Benalla scandal – when Macron’s security officer beat up a protester – he was finished as far as I was concerned.

Europe has always been mixed-race, it has never had such a thing as biological purity. The crucial question today is how the migrants and refugees will be assimilated. Unfortunately, we continue making the same huge mistake – in Europe and in Greece. We treat foreign nationals like a separate community that cannot be assimilated. By doing so, we create a foreign territory within our own. The Arabs say that the land of Islam is wherever there is a single Muslim. The people coming to Greece, therefore, need to learn our language and customs, to be assimilated into Greek institutions in a manner that is not just restricted to the islands of the eastern Aegean and the hot spots, but which includes the entire country. We’re afraid of losing our culture by sharing it. But without contact with others, culture ceases being a culture.

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