16 Quotes Tagged: wars

Individual killings and wars on the largest scale are, he said, two ends of a continuum, an unbroken curve. It follows, not only in a trivial sense but also I believe in a very deep psychological sense, that war is murder writ large. When our well-being is threatened, when our illusions about ourselves are challenged, we tend - some of us at least - to fly into murderous rages. And when the same provocations are applied to nation states, they, too, sometimes fly into murderous rages, egged on often enough by those seeking personal power or profit.

We cannot control the way people interpret our ideas or thoughts, but we can control the words and tones we choose to convey them. Peace is built on understanding, and wars are built on misunderstandings. Never underestimate the power of a single word, and never recklessly throw around words. One wrong word, or misinterpreted word, can change the meaning of an entire sentence and start a war. And one right word, or one kind word, can grant you the heavens and open doors.

The past was alterable. The past never had been altered. Oceania was at war with Eastasia. Oceania had always been at war with Eastasia.

WHO AM I?

I have seven heavenly panels
Leading up to a pointed sphere
I’m multidimensional like a crystal
And my center is never clear.

I’m an inventor and pioneer.
A mentor to my peers.
But I'm not as sound as my shell reveals,
Because I’m tormented by my fears -
That may appear to be grounded
But my insides are filled with tears.
And the sadness is well-founded,
From years and years
Of traumatic experiences
Compounded
In the most demented
Atmospheres.

I talk but feel like nobody hears.

Has reason disappeared?
And, God, are you near?

This is Giza’s 7th light force
And I'm asking you to interfere.
I can no longer walk amongst the blind and dead
With open eyes and ears.
I’m trying to maintain my sanity
And to straighten up my veneer
As I roll amongst the growing calamities
Flowing on Earth’s severely trashed
Frontier.

Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun (2010)

...the consciousness of being at war, and therefore in danger, makes the handing-over of all power to a small caste seem the natural, unavoidable condition of survival.

There is more for us to gain through love than hate.

The clothes you're wearing, the room, the house, the city that you're in. Everything in it started out in the human imagination. Your lives, your personalities, your whole world. All invented. All made up. All the wars, the romances. The masterpieces and the machines. And there's nothing here but a funny little twist of amino acids, playing a marvelous game of pretend.

Never trust the translation or interpretation of something without first trusting its interpreter. One word absent from a sentence can drastically change the true intended meaning of the entire sentence. For instance, if the word love is intentionally or accidentally replaced with hate in a sentence, its effect could trigger a war or false dogma.

It is true we have won all our wars, but we have paid for them.

"It is sad and shocking to think that victory and the lives of thousands of men are pawns to the "fear of They," and the writings of a group of unprincipled reporters, and weak-kneed congressmen."

Wars are never fought for altruistic reasons.

O Heavenly Children, the stories you have concocted in God's name have angered Him; for he would never instigate war between brothers, or encourage tribes to harbor resentment towards one another. He prefers the man who loves over the one who hates. And the man who spreads kindness, peace and knowledge, over the one who spreads lies, fear and terror — and misuses His name.

"Patriotism is a kind of religion; it is the egg from which wars are hatched."

[My Uncle Sosthenes]

The idea of humanity becomes more and more of a power in the civilized world, and, owing to the expansion and increasing speed of means of communication, and also owing to the influence, still more material than moral, of civilization upon barbarous peoples, this idea of humanity begins to take hold even of the minds of uncivilized nations. This idea is the invisible power of our century, with which the present powers — the States — must reckon. They cannot submit to it of their own free will because such submission on their part would be equivalent to suicide, since the triumph of humanity can be realized only through the destruction of the States. But the States can no longer deny this idea nor openly rebel against it, for having now grown too strong, it may finally destroy them.

In the face of this fainful alternative there remains only one way out: and that is hypocrisy. The States pay their outward respects to this idea of humanity; they speak and apparently act only in the name of it, but they violate it every day. This, however, should not be held against the States. They cannot act otherwise, their position having become such that they can hold their own only by lying. Diplomacy has no other mission.

Therefore what do we see? Every time a State wants to declare war upon another State, it starts off by launching a manifesto addressed not only to its own subjects but to the whole world. In this manifesto it declares that right and justice are on its side, and it endeavors to prove that it is actuated only by love of peace and humanity and that, imbued with generous and peaceful sentiments, it suffered for a long time in silence until the mounting iniquity of its enemy forced it to bare its sword. At the same time it vows that, disdainful of all material conquest and not seeking any increase in territory, it will put and end to this war as soon as justice is reestablished. And its antagonist answers with a similar manifesto, in which naturally right, justice,

FLIES IN DISGUISE

Tell me,
Have you
Really seen
Flies in a child's eyes
Or heard their hungry cries
In the middle
Of the night?

Don't lie.

You can protest all you want
About peace
And genocide,
But unless you are willing
To take beatings for your fights,
Your display of trendy showmanship
Simply ain't right.

Go on,
Carry your useless signs
About an issue the world
Already abhors,
But it's TRUE
Heartfelt actions
That will prevent
Suits and
Senators
From creating
Any more wars.