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Noam Chomsky Quotes - Page 17

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In the 1960s, various parts of the population became energized and began to enter the public arena to call for the rights of women, students, young people, old people, farmers and workers. What are called special

In the 1960s, various parts of the population became energized and began to enter the public arena to call for the rights of women, students, young people, old people, farmers and workers. What are called "special interests" - meaning the whole population - they began to press to enter the public arena. And they said that puts too much pressure on the state and therefore we have to have more moderation in democracy and they should go back and be quiet and obedient.

Rights, People, Democracy

Source: www.truth-out.org

The Pashtuns in particular are kind of trapped. They've never accepted the Durand Line nor has any Afghan government historically accepted it.

Government, Lines, Kind

Source: www.dawn.com

There have, for years, been comparative studies of religious fanaticism and factors that correlate with it. By and large, it tends to decline with increasing industrialization and education. The US, however, is off the chart, ranking near devastated peasant societies. About 1/2 the population believe the world was created a few thousand years ago: the justification for the belief is that that is what they were ordered to believe by authority figures to whom they were taught one must subordinate oneself. And on, and on.

Religious, Believe, Years

Source: chomsky.info

Anti-union propaganda has been considerably more successful here [ in the U.S.] than in Europe, even among working people who would benefit [from] unions.

Successful, Europe, People

Source: www.iww.org

It's only terrorism if they do it to us. When we do much worse to them, it's not terrorism.

Terrorism, Ifs

Noam Chomsky (2011). “Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda”, p.93, Seven Stories Press

Anarchism, in my view, is an expression of the idea that the burden of proof is always on those who argue that authority and domination are necessary. They have to demonstrate, with powerful argument, that that conclusion is correct. If they cannot, then the institutions they defend should be considered illegitimate. How one should react to illegitimate authority depends on circumstances and conditions: there are no formulas.

Powerful, Views, Expression

The Bush administration has created an unimaginable catastrophe in Iraq. This should've been one of the easiest military occupations in history and they succeeded in turning it into one of the worst military disasters in history. They can't control it and it's almost impossible for them to get out for reasons you can't discuss in the United States because to discuss the reasons why they can't get out would be to concede the reasons why they invaded.

Military, Iraq, United States

Source: www.counterpunch.org

[Antonio] Gramsci's words and actions explain their assessment, though I think we should refrain from using the term "model intellectual" for him or others.

Thinking, Assessment, Intellectual

Source: www.publicanthropology.org

I think it only makes sense to seek out and identify structures of authority, hierarchy, and domination in every aspect of life, and to challenge them; unless a justification for them can be given, they are illegitimate, and should be dismantled, to increase the scope of human freedom.

Thinking, Challenges, Hierarchy

Noam Chomsky (2004). “Language and Politics”, p.775, AK Press

Resistance is feasible even for those who are not heroes by nature, and it is an obligation, I believe, for those who fear the consequences and detest the reality of the attempt to impose American hegemony.

Nature, Believe, Hero

Institute Professor Department of Linguistics and Philosophy Noam Chomsky, Noam Chomsky (2010). “American Power and the New Mandarins”, p.502, ReadHowYouWant.com

The most striking aspect of linguistic competence is what we may call the 'creativity of language,' that is, the speaker's ability to produce new sentences, sentences that are immediately UNDERSTOOD by other speakers although they bear no physical resemblance to sentences which are 'familiar.

Creativity, May, Bears

Noam Chomsky (2012). “Selected Readings on Transformational Theory”, p.8, Courier Corporation

The Democrats have pretty much given up on the white working class. That would require a commitment to economic issues and that's not their concern.

Commitment, Issues, Class

"Noam Chomsky on America's Economic Suicide". Interview with Laura Flanders / GRITtv, www.alternet.org. May 4, 2012.

I've often been struck by the extensive knowledge that people have of sports, and particularly, their self-confidence in discussing it with experts. . . . In contrast, when discussing matters of concern to human lives - their own and others - people tend to defer to experts.

Sports, Self Confidence, People

If you go back a century in Europe, all over the place people were speaking different languages. There were dozens of languages in France and Italy, and they're all called French [and Italian], but they were not mutually comprehensible. They were different languages. And they have mostly disappeared in the last century or so. Some are being preserved, like Welsh, some are being revived, like Basque or Catelan to some extent. There are plenty of people in Europe who can't talk to their grandmother because they talk a different language.

Grandmother, Italian, Europe

Source: brightestyoungthings.com

Labor #‎ Unions are the leading force for #‎ democratization and #‎ progress .

Progress, Unions, Force

The only justification for repressive institutions is material and cultural deficit. But such institutions, at certain stages of history, perpetuate and produce such a deficit, and even threaten human survival.

History, Survival, Institutions

Noam Chomsky (2003). “For Reasons Of State”, p.404, Penguin Books India

Bolivia is a striking example. The mostly white, Europeanized elite, which is a minority, happens to be sitting on most of the hydrocarbon reserves. For the first time Bolivia is becoming democratic. So it's therefore bitterly hated by the West, which despises democracy, because it's much too dangerous.

White, Democracy, Example

The death penalty can be tolerated only by extreme statist reactionaries who demand a state that is so powerful that it has the right to kill.

Powerful, Demand, Death Penalty

Anarchists try to identify power structures. They urge those exercising power to justify themselves. This justification does not succeed most of the time.

Exercise, Trying, Doe

"Students Should Become Anarchists". ZEIT Campus Interview, www.indybay.org. June 27, 2011.

The one state/two state debate is irrelevant as Israel and the US consolidate Greater Israel.

Israel, Two, Debate

Now, the Libertarian Party, is a *capitalist* party. It's in favor of what *I* would regard a *particular form* of authoritarian control. Namely, the kind that comes through private ownership and control, which is an *extremely* rigid system of domination - people have to... people can survive, by renting themselves to it, and basically in no other way... I do disagree with them *very* sharply, and I think that they are not..understanding the *fundamental* doctrine, that you should be free from domination and control, including the control of the manager and the owner.

Party, Thinking, People

"Donahue/Pozner", February 14, 1992.

American society is now remarkably atomized. Political organizations have collapsed. In fact, it seems like even bowling leagues are collapsing. The left has a lot to answer for here. There's been a drift toward very fragmenting tendencies among left groups, toward this sort of identity politics.

Organization, Identity Politics, League

"What’s Left". www.motherjones.com. January/February 1996.

The first step is to penetrate the clouds of deceit and distortion and learn the truth about the world, then to organize and act to change it. That's never been impossible and never been easy.

Clouds, Political, Deceit

Noam Chomsky (1996). “Powers and Prospects: Reflections on Human Nature and the Social Order”, p.131, South End Press

But, that’s the whole point of corporatization - to try to remove the public from making decisions over their own fate, to limit the public arena, to control opinion, to make sure that the fundamental decisions that determine how the world is going to be run - which includes production, commerce, distribution, thought, social policy, foreign policy, everything - are not in the hands of the public, but rather in the hands of highly concentrated private power. In effect, tyranny unaccountable to the public.

Running, Fate, Hands

"On Microsoft and Corporate Control of the Internet". Interview with Anna Couey, chomsky.info. May 6, 1998.

Everything depends very much on who you are, what your values are, what your commitments are, what circumstances you live in and what options you're willing to undertake, and that determines what you ought to be doing.

Commitment, Circumstances, Determine

Source: www.iww.org

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