“
I myself must also say I believe it is true that in the end humanitarianism will triumph; only I fear that at the same time the world will be one big hospital and each person will be the other person's humane keeper.
”
”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Italian Journey)
“
The thing is, you cannot ask people to coexist by having one side bow their heads and rely on a solution that is only good for the other side. What you can do is stop blaming each other and engage in dialogue with one person at a time. Everyone knows that violence begets violence and breeds more hatred. We need to find our way together. I feel I cannot rely on the various spokespersons who claim they act on my behalf. Invariably they have some agenda that doesn't work for me. Instead, I talk to my patients, to my neighbors and colleagues--Jews, Arabs--and I find out they feel as I do: we are more similar than we are different, and we are all fed up with the violence.
”
”
Izzeldin Abuelaish
“
War can condition a person to be resilient, tolerant, dependable, strong, and capable of so much more than one who had experienced nothing of it; it can bring out the very best in us, but also the very worst. Where is it, I ask, the proper conduit through which a soldier should be raised from whence they would become an upstanding citizen of the world, instead of a single country?
”
”
Mike Norton
“
Behind tranquillity lies conquered unhappiness.
”
”
J. William T. Youngs (Eleanor Roosevelt: A Personal and Public Life (2nd Edition))
“
There is nothing so annoying as to be fairly rich, of a fairly good family,
pleasing presence, average education, to be "not stupid," kindhearted,
and yet to have no talent at all, no originality, not a single idea
of one's own—to be, in fact, "just like everyone else."
Of such people there are countless numbers in this world—far more
even than appear. They can be divided into two classes as all men
can—that is, those of limited intellect, and those who are much cleverer.
The former of these classes is the happier.
To a commonplace man of limited intellect, for instance, nothing is
simpler than to imagine himself an original character, and to revel in that
belief without the slightest misgiving.
Many of our young women have thought fit to cut their hair short, put
on blue spectacles, and call themselves Nihilists. By doing this they have
been able to persuade themselves, without further trouble, that they
have acquired new convictions of their own. Some men have but felt
some little qualm of kindness towards their fellow-men, and the fact has
been quite enough to persuade them that they stand alone in the van of
enlightenment and that no one has such humanitarian feelings as they.
Others have but to read an idea of somebody else's, and they can immediately
assimilate it and believe that it was a child of their own brain.
The "impudence of ignorance," if I may use the expression, is developed
to a wonderful extent in such cases;—unlikely as it appears, it is met
with at every turn.
... those belonged to the other class—to the "much cleverer"
persons, though from head to foot permeated and saturated with
the longing to be original. This class, as I have said above, is far less
happy. For the "clever commonplace" person, though he may possibly
imagine himself a man of genius and originality, none the less has within
his heart the deathless worm of suspicion and doubt; and this doubt
sometimes brings a clever man to despair. (As a rule, however, nothing
tragic happens;—his liver becomes a little damaged in the course of time,
nothing more serious. Such men do not give up their aspirations after
originality without a severe struggle,—and there have been men who,
though good fellows in themselves, and even benefactors to humanity,
have sunk to the level of base criminals for the sake of originality)
”
”
Fyodor Dostoevsky (The Idiot)
“
Live for your country, die to yourself; live for yourself, die to your country.
”
”
Anthony Liccione
“
Be the person who moves hearts - be the person who heals wounds - be the person who makes darkness disappear - be the person who makes colors reappear.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Lives to Serve Before I Sleep)
“
Tolstoy went on to observe,"This little incident proves how largely the name of Lincoln is worshipped throughout the world and how legendary his personality has become. Now, why was Lincoln so great that he overshadows all other national heroes? He really was not a great general like Napoleon or Washington; he was not such a skillful statesman as Gladstone or Frederick the Great; but his supremacy expresses itself altogether in his peculiar moral power and in the greatness of his character.
"Washington was a typical American. Naopoleon was a typical Frenchmen, but Lincoln was a humanitarian as broad as the world. He was bigger than his country--- bigger than all the Presidents t,ogether. We are still too near to his greatness, " Tolstoy concluded, "but after a few centuries more our posterity will find him considerably bigger than we do. His genius is still too strong and too powerful for the common understanding, just as the sun is too hot when it's light beams directly on us.
”
”
Doris Kearns Goodwin (Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln)
“
The only person on this ship who gets paid for what they do is you, Alix. The rest of us live off our trust funds and we use those funds for our humanitarian missions. I do what I do because I can’t stand to see innocent people bullied by a corrupt government. I don’t want to see a baby starve and die because some fat politician wants to work its parents into the ground for a mineral most of them can’t even pronounce. (Devyn)
”
”
Sherrilyn Kenyon (Born of Ice (The League: Nemesis Rising, #3; The League: Nemesis Legacy, #2))
“
One person's sacrifice makes millions wake up from their sleep of indifference.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Mad About Humans: World Maker's Almanac)
“
In lifting another person, we also lift ourselves.
”
”
Seth Adam Smith (Your Life Isn't for You: A Selfish Person's Guide to Being Selfless)
“
Agony can bring greatness out of a person, but in the process, the person has to walk barefoot on red-hot coal while bleeding from all over the being.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Fabric of Humanity)
“
Practicing a thousand yoga postures, doesn't make a person spiritual, nor does uttering "aum" or "hallelujah" a thousand times - what makes a person spiritual, is plain ordinary everyday act of kindness.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Lives to Serve Before I Sleep)
“
The modern world, which denies personal guilt and admits only social crimes, which has no place for personal repentance but only public reforms, has divorced Christ from His Cross; the Bridegroom and Bride have been pulled apart. What God hath joined together, men have torn asunder. As a result, to the left is the Cross; to the right is Christ. Each has awaited new partners who will pick them up in a kind of second and adulterous union. Communism comes along and picks up the meaningless Cross; Western post-Christian civilization chooses the unscarred Christ.
Communism has chosen the Cross in the sense that it has brought back to an egotistic world a sense of discipline, self-abnegation, surrender, hard work, study, and dedication to supra-individual goals. But the Cross without Christ is sacrifice without love. Hence, Communism has produced a society that is authoritarian, cruel, oppressive of human freedom, filled with concentration camps, firing squads, and brain-washings.
The Western post-Christian civilization has picked up the Christ without His Cross. But a Christ without a sacrifice that reconciles the world to God is a cheap, feminized, colourless, itinerant preacher who deserves to be popular for His great Sermon on the Mount, but also merits unpopularity for what He said about His Divinity on the one hand, and divorce, judgment, and hell on the other. This sentimental Christ is patched together with a thousand commonplaces, sustained sometimes by academic etymologists who cannot see the Word for the letters, or distorted beyond personal recognition by a dogmatic principle that anything which is Divine must necessarily be a myth. Without His Cross, He becomes nothing more than a sultry precursor of democracy or a humanitarian who taught brotherhood without tears.
”
”
Fulton J. Sheen (Life of Christ)
“
Talking science all the time, doesn't make a person any more human than a janitor who knows no science. A creature becomes human by helping others, regardless of his or her scientific knowledge.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar
“
For so many years, the official propaganda machinery had denounced humanitarianism as sentimental trash and advocated human relations based entirely on class allegiance. But my personal experience had shown me that most of the Chinese people remained kind, sensitive, and compassionate even though the cruel reality of the system under which they had to live compelled them to lie and pretend.
”
”
Nien Cheng (Life and Death in Shanghai)
“
He wanted to honor Shad for the sweaty shirt, the honest toil, and all the rugged virtues, but even as a Liberal American Humanitarian, Doremus found it hard always to keep up the Longfellow's-Village-Blacksmith-cum-Marx attitude consistently and not sometimes backslide into a belief that there must be some crooks and swine among the toilers as, notoriously, there were so shockingly many among persons with more than $3500 a year.
”
”
Sinclair Lewis (It Can't Happen Here)
“
The Western post-Christian civilization has picked up the Christ without His Cross. But a Christ without a sacrifice that reconciles the world to God is a cheap, colorless, itinerant preacher who deserves to be popular for His great Sermon on the Mount, but also merits unpopularity for what He said about His Divinity on the one hand, and divorce, judgment, and hell on the other. This sentimental Christ is patched together with a thousand commonplaces, sustained sometimes by academic etymologists who cannot see the Word for the letters, or distorted beyond personal recognition by a dogmatic principle that anything which is Divine must necessarily be a myth. Without His Cross, He becomes nothing more than a sultry precursor of democracy or a humanitarian who taught brotherhood without tears.
”
”
Fulton J. Sheen (Life of Christ)
“
In 1908, in a wild and remote area of the North Caucasus, Leo Tolstoy, the greatest writer of the age, was the guest of a tribal chief “living far away from civilized life in the mountains.” Gathering his family and neighbors, the chief asked Tolstoy to tell stories about the famous men of history. Tolstoy told how he entertained the eager crowd for hours with tales of Alexander, Caesar, Frederick the Great, and Napoleon. When he was winding to a close, the chief stood and said, “But you have not told us a syllable about the greatest general and greatest ruler of the world. We want to know something about him. He was a hero. He spoke with a voice of thunder; he laughed like the sunrise and his deeds were strong as the rock….His name was Lincoln and the country in which he lived is called America, which is so far away that if a youth should journey to reach it he would be an old man when he arrived. Tell us of that man.”
“I looked at them,” Tolstoy recalled, “and saw their faces all aglow, while their eyes were burning. I saw that those rude barbarians were really interested in a man whose name and deeds had already become a legend.” He told them everything he knew about Lincoln’s “home life and youth…his habits, his influence upon the people and his physical strength.” When he finished, they were so grateful for the story that they presented him with “a wonderful Arabian horse.” The next morning, as Tolstoy prepared to leave, they asked if he could possibly acquire for them a picture of Lincoln. Thinking that he might find one at a friend’s house in the neighboring town, Tolstoy asked one of the riders to accompany him. “I was successful in getting a large photograph from my friend,” recalled Tolstoy. As he handed it to the rider, he noted that the man’s hand trembled as he took it. “He gazed for several minutes silently, like one in a reverent prayer, his eyes filled with tears.”
Tolstoy went on to observe, “This little incident proves how largely the name of Lincoln is worshipped throughout the world and how legendary his personality has become. Now, why was Lincoln so great that he overshadows all other national heroes? He really was not a great general like Napoleon or Washington; he was not such a skilful statesman as Gladstone or Frederick the Great; but his supremacy expresses itself altogether in his peculiar moral power and in the greatness of his character.
“Washington was a typical American. Napoleon was a typical Frenchman, but Lincoln was a humanitarian as broad as the world. He was bigger than his country—bigger than all the Presidents together.
“We are still too near to his greatness,” Tolstoy concluded, “but after a few centuries more our posterity will find him considerably bigger than we do. His genius is still too strong and too powerful for the common understanding, just as the sun is too hot when its light beams directly on us.
”
”
Doris Kearns Goodwin (仁者无敌:林肯的政治天才)
“
Time and time again, we've seen that one person can make a difference. There is no reason why that person can't be you.
”
”
Wayne Gerard Trotman
“
One person caring for one neighborhood, that's how we'll change the world, not with policy and policing.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Şehit Sevda Society: Even in Death I Shall Live)
“
Revolution comes from the backbone of a person, not the barrel of a gun.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Amantes Assemble: 100 Sonnets of Servant Sultans)
“
One person can end a war, if they give all to the making of peace.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Heart Force One: Need No Gun to Defend Society)
“
I want to be next to every single person on earth, because I know first hand what it is like to have no one by your side.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar
“
Lenin thought himself an idealist. He was not a monster, a sadist or vicious. In personal relationships he was invariably kind and behaved in the way he was brought up, like an upper-middle-class gentleman. He was not vain. He could laugh – even, occasionally, at himself. He was not cruel: unlike Stalin, Mao Zedong or Hitler he never asked about the details of his victims’ deaths, savouring the moment. To him, in any case, the deaths were theoretical, mere numbers. He never donned uniforms or military-style tunics as other dictators favoured. But during his years of feuding with other revolutionaries, and then maintaining his grip on power, he never showed generosity to a defeated opponent or performed a humanitarian act unless it was politically expedient.
”
”
Victor Sebestyen (Lenin: The Man, the Dictator, and the Master of Terror)
“
If the evidence did not exist right in front of him, it didn’t exist, period. And following from that would come his belief in the essential wisdom of the common person, who also knew the world only from the grassroots level in the most immediate, concrete way.
”
”
Robert D. Kaplan (The Good American: The Epic Life of Bob Gersony, the U.S. Government's Greatest Humanitarian)
“
Someone said to me the other day 'you should have some fun in life, instead of just working all the time'. I replied to the person 'you may have the luxury to have fun, but I can't even dream of having fun while my own humanity is tormented with countless forms of misery.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (When Humans Unite: Making A World Without Borders)
“
It was a rude and simple society and there were no laws to punish a starving man for expressing his need for food, such as have been established in a more humanitarian age; and the lack of any organised police permitted such persons to pester the wealthy without any great danger.
”
”
G.K. Chesterton (St. Francis of Assisi & St. Thomas Aquinas-Two Biographies)
“
Let these historic moments move you, inspire you and invigorate you for as long as the feeling lasts because, believe me, that initial adrenaline and humanitarian solidarity will wear off. Ride it as long as you can. Let it make you be a better person, and let it wake you up from the complacency in your life.
”
”
Tokyo Twilighter
“
If a person thinks only about the upliftment of the self, then no matter how many pilgrimages he visits or how strong his belief in God is, he is the least holy person on earth. On the other hand, an atheist who rushes to the aid of the neighbor in their time of distress, becomes the very definition of holiness.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Aşkanjali: The Sufi Sermon)
“
Let us suppose that such a person began by observing those Christian activities which are, in a sense, directed towards this present world. He would find that this religion had, as a mere matter of historical fact, been the agent which preserved such secular civilization as survived the fall of the Roman Empire; that to it Europe owes the salvation, in those perilous ages, of civilized agriculture, architecture, laws, and literacy itself. He would find that this same religion has always been healing the sick and caring for the poor; that it has, more than any other, blessed marriage; and that arts and philosophy tend to flourish in its neighborhood. In a word, it is always either doing, or at least repenting with shame for not having done, all the things which secular humanitarianism enjoins. If our enquirer stopped at this point he would have no difficulty in classifying Christianity—giving it its place on a map of the ‘great religions.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (God in the Dock)
“
She knows how dangerous it is to trust anyone on La Bestia. There are thugs and rapists and thieves and narcos hidden in the ranks of la policía in every town, but it’s not only the police who deserve their suspicion. It’s every single person they meet—shopkeepers, food vendors, humanitarians, children, priests, even their fellow migrants.
”
”
Jeanine Cummins (American Dirt)
“
It is interesting that for Plato, and for most Platonists, an altruistic individualism cannot exist. According to Plato, the only alternative to collectivism is egoism; he simply identifies all altruism with collectivism, and all individualism with egoism. This is not a matter of terminology, of mere words, for instead of four possibilities, Plato recognized only two. This has created considerable confusion in speculation on ehtical matters, even down to our own day.
Plato’s identification of individualism with egoism furnishes him with a powerful weapon for his defence of collectivism as well as for his attack upon individualism. In defending collectivism, he can appeal to our humanitarian feeling of unselfishness; in his attack, he can brand all individualists as selfish, as incapable of devotion to anything but themselves. This attack, although aimed by Plato against individualism in our sense, i.e. against the rights of human individuals, reaches of course only a very different target, egoism. But this difference is constantly ignored by Plato and by most Platonists...
Individualism was part of the old intuitive idea of justice. That justice is not, as Plato would have it, the health and harmony of the state, but rather a certain way of treating individuals, is emphasized by Aristotle, when he says, ‘justice is something that pertains to persons.
”
”
Karl Popper
“
The reigning belief today is that closeness between persons is a moral good. The reigning aspiration today is to develop individual personality through experiences of closeness and warmth with others. The reigning myth today is that the evils of society can all be understood as the evils of impersonality, alienation, and coldness. The sum of these three is an ideology of intimacy: social relationships of all kinds are real, believable, and authentic the closer they approach the inner psychological concerns of each person. This ideology transmutes political categories into psychological categories. This ideology of intimacy defines the humanitarian spirit of a society without gods; warmth is our god.
”
”
Richard Sennett (The Fall of Public Man)
“
The reigning belief today is that closeness between persons is a moral good. The reigning aspiration today is to develop individual personality through experiences of closeness and warmth with others. The reigning myth today is that the evils of society can all be understood as evils of impersonality, alienation, and coldness. The sum of these three is an ideology of intimacy: social relationships of all kinds are real, believable, and authentic the closer they approach the inner psychological concerns of each person. This ideology transmutes political categories into psychological categories. This ideology of intimacy defines the humanitarian spirit of a society without gods: warmth is our god. The history of the rise and fall of public culture at the very least calls this humanitarian spirit into question. The belief in closeness between persons as a moral good is in fact the product of a profound dislocation which capitalism and secular belief produced in the last century. Because of this dislocation, people sought to find personal meanings in impersonal situations, in objects, and in the objective conditions of society itself. They could not find these meanings; as the world became psychomorphic, it became mystifying. They therefore sought to flee, and find in the private realms of life, especially in the family, some principle of order in the perception of personality. Thus the past built a hidden desire for stability in the overt desire for closeness between human beings. Even as we have revolted against the stern sexual rigidities of the Victorian family, we continue to burden close relations with others with these hidden desires for security, rest, and permanence. When the relations cannot bear these burdens, we conclude there is something wrong with the relationship, rather than with the unspoken expectations. Arriving at a feeling of closeness to others is thus often after a process of testing them; the relationship is both close and closed. If it changes, if it must change, there is a feeling of trust betrayed. Closeness burdened with the expectation of stability makes emotional communication—hard enough as it is—one step more difficult. Can intimacy on these terms really be a virtue?
”
”
Richard Sennett (The Fall of Public Man)
“
Some people partly satisfy their need for power by identifying themselves with a powerful organization or mass movement. An individual lacking goals or power joins a movement or an organization, adopts its goals as his own, then works toward those goals. When some of the goals are attained, the individual, even though his personal efforts have played only an insignificant part in the attainment of the goals, feels as if he had gone through the power process. This phenomenon was exploited by the fascists, nazis and communists. Our society uses it too, though less crudely. We see the same phenomenon in armies, corporations, political parties, humanitarian organizations, religious or ideological movements. In particular, leftist movements tend to attract people who are seeking to satisfy their need for power.
”
”
Theodore John Kaczynski (Industrial Society and Its Future)
“
The philosopher John Stuart Mill once wrote, “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
”
”
Eric Greitens (The Heart and the Fist: The Education of a Humanitarian, the Making of a Navy SEAL)
“
People from one side of the border most proudly kill people from the other side of the border and they call it patriotism. If this is patriotism, then I'd rather be the most unpatriotic person on earth, than be a savage patriot with no more brains in the skull than a neanderthal. Whom are you fighting, who are your enemies, and on whose orders are you fighting them, and how much sure are you that the superiors and their political authorities who are giving you all those commands, are actually even capable of making decisions on matters of peace and progress! Being a politician, doesn't mean being capable of making the best decisions for a people. So, if you keep following their commands like blind dogs in the hope of some miserable medals, then they'll rip this world apart into pieces and you are going to be the ammunition in that deed. You are born a human, so act like one, not for god’s sake, but for your children’s sake.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Citizens of Peace: Beyond the Savagery of Sovereignty)
“
Public health, conduct, sanitation, agriculture, industry, transport, and a hundred other activities, all normal to community life, were supervised and directed by these officers. Their task was difficult but vastly important, not merely from a humanitarian viewpoint, but to the success of our armies. Every command needs peace and order in its rear; otherwise it must detach units to preserve signal and road communications, protect dumps and convoys, and suppress underground activity.
”
”
Dwight David Eisenhower (Crusade in Europe: A Personal Account of World War II)
“
Paul Waldman writes: As a white person, I’ll continue to enjoy this [white] privilege almost no matter who I am or what I do. In my heart I could be the most kind-hearted humanitarian or the most vile sociopath. I could be assiduously law-abiding or a serial killer. I can dress in a suit or in torn jeans and a hoodie, and no one will react to me with fear or suspicion, because if they don’t know me they will assume they know nothing. I am myself, nothing more or less. That’s privilege.
”
”
George Yancy (Backlash: What Happens When We Talk Honestly about Racism in America)
“
Where I live, being considered “good” has little to nothing to do with institutional religion. The social benchmarks for moral applause have more to do with whether one eats organic, rides his or her bike to work, and supports a humanitarian initiative in Africa. Things like these—even if good things that contribute to the flourishing of our world, in a manner similar to many traditional religious works—comprise our contemporary bars of righteousness by which one’s social capital is improved. In corporate culture, these bars may have more to do with how much money we’ve made or the size of our portfolio. In political culture, how much power we’ve attained or the heights up the ladder we’ve climbed. In popular culture, how much sex we’ve had or the number of Twitter followers who are interested in what we have to say. The cultural decline of institutional religion has simply meant the relocation, not the destruction, of social norms through which we pursue personal justification and social acceptance for our existence.
”
”
Joshua Ryan Butler (The Skeletons in God's Closet: The Mercy of Hell, the Surprise of Judgment, the Hope of Holy War)
“
Perhaps vaguely aware that his movie so completely lacks gravitas, Moore concludes with a sonorous reading of some words from George Orwell. The words are taken from 1984 and consist of a third-person analysis of a hypothetical, endless and contrived war between three superpowers. The clear intention, as clumsily excerpted like this (...), is to suggest that there is no moral distinction between the United States, the Taliban and the Ba'ath Party, and that the war against jihad is about nothing. If Moore had studied a bit more, or at all, he could have read Orwell really saying, and in his own voice, the following:
The majority of pacifists either belong to obscure religious sects or are simply humanitarians who object to taking life and prefer not to follow their thoughts beyond that point. But there is a minority of intellectual pacifists, whose real though unacknowledged motive appears to be hatred of western democracy and admiration for totalitarianism. Pacifist propaganda usually boils down to saying that one side is as bad as the other, but if one looks closely at the writing of the younger intellectual pacifists, one finds that they do not by any means express impartial disapproval but are directed almost entirely against Britain and the United States…
And that's just from Orwell's Notes on Nationalism in May 1945. A short word of advice: In general, it's highly unwise to quote Orwell if you are already way out of your depth on the question of moral equivalence. It's also incautious to remind people of Orwell if you are engaged in a sophomoric celluloid rewriting of recent history.
”
”
Christopher Hitchens (Love, Poverty, and War: Journeys and Essays)
“
Many of the haters call me mental, which, by the way, is quite true, both metaphorically and clinically. It's true clinically because I am a person on the spectrum with OCD, and metaphorically, because I refuse to accept the sanity of unaccountability as the right way of civilized life. I am not going to glorify the issues of mental illness by saying that it's a super power or that it makes a person special. On the contrary, it makes things extremely difficult for a person.
But guess what! Indifference is far more dangerous than any mental illness. Because mental illness can be managed with treatment, but there is no treatment for indifference, there is no treatment for coldness, there is no treatment for apathy. So, let everyone hear it, and hear it well - in a world where indifference is deemed as sanity what's needed is a whole lot of mentalness, a whole lot of insanity, insanity for justice, insanity for equality, insanity for establishing the fundamental rights of life and living for each and every human being, no matter who they are, what they are, or where they are.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Either Reformist or Terrorist: If You Are Terror I Am Your Grandfather)
“
Be Unrealistic (The Sonnet)
Be unrealistic and work for a world,
That the society considers nonsense.
Once upon a time taming fire was unreal,
Then arose a bunch of brave sentience.
Today's madness is tomorrow's sanity,
If we’re mad enough to stand solo on guard.
Today's sacrifice is tomorrow's civilization,
If we can give all without hoping reward.
If only one person dies for the cause,
A hundred people realize their humanity.
I may die today in the line of duty,
But the struggle continues through eternity.
So let us be brave and go beyond reality.
Let us be accountable and do the necessary.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Gente Mente Adelante: Prejudice Conquered is World Conquered)
“
But once it was conceded that Kissinger operated from a Realpolitik framework with intellectual, even moral principles of its own that were larger than himself or his personal advantage, then difficult questions about which decisions best served American interests or humanitarian ends were open to debate. Judgment calls weren’t the same as the perpetration of crimes (although some Realpolitikers were sure to recall Talleyrand’s words upon hearing of the murder of the Duc D’Enghien: “It was worse than a crime, it was a blunder”). Because Kissinger’s leftist critics didn’t accept Realism as a legitimate basis for foreign policy, they didn’t see any need to debate matters of judgment. What was more, locked in their partisan cocoons, they had trouble acknowledging that policymakers frequently made those judgment calls in a fog of ambiguity, in which outcomes could not be predicted and the ethics of a situation could point in several directions at once. “Statesmanship,” Kissinger said, “needs to be judged by the management of ambiguities, not absolutes.” But what the left craved, what they insisted on, was moral certainty in an uncertain world, or what Kissinger, in a combative mood, called “a nihilistic perfectionism.
”
”
Barry Gewen (The Inevitability of Tragedy: Henry Kissinger and His World)
“
Such are the incalculable effects of that negative passion of indifference, that hysterical and speculative resurrection of the other.
Racism, for example. Logically, it should have declined with the advance of Enlightenment and democracy. Yet the more hybrid our cultures become, and the more the theoretical and genetic bases of racism crumble away, the stronger it grows. But this is because we are dealing here with a mental object, an artificial construct, based on an erosion of the singularity of cultures and entry into the fetishistic system of difference. So long as there is otherness, strangeness and the (possibly violent) dual relation -- as we see in anthropological accounts up to the eighteenth century and into the colonial phase -- there is no racism properly so-called. Once that `natural' relation is lost, we enter into a phobic relationship with an artificial other, idealized by hatred. And because it is an ideal other, this relationship is an exponential one: nothing can stop it, since the whole trend of our culture is towards a fanatically pursued differential construction, a perpetual extrapolation of the same from the other.
Autistic culture by dint of fake altruism.
All forms of sexist, racist, ethnic or cultural discrimination arise out of the same profound disaffection and out of a collective mourning, a mourning for a dead otherness, set against a background of general indifference -- a logical product of our marvellous planet-wide conviviality.
The same indifference can give rise to exactly opposite behaviour. Racism is desperately seeking the other in the form of an evil to be combated. The humanitarian seeks the other just as desperately in the form of victims to aid. Idealization plays for better or for worse. The scapegoat is no longer the person you hound, but the one whose lot you lament. But he is still a scapegoat. And it is still the same person.
”
”
Jean Baudrillard (The Perfect Crime)
“
Beginning in the 17th century, technological advances in publishing and transportation created a Republic of Letters and a Reading Revolution in which the seeds of the Humanitarian Revolution took root (chapter 4). More people read books, including fiction that led them to inhabit the minds of other people, and satire that led them to question their society’s norms. Vivid depictions of the suffering wrought by slavery, sadistic punishments, war, and cruelty to children and animals preceded the reforms that outlawed or reduced those practices. Though chronology does not prove causation, the laboratory studies showing that hearing or reading a first-person narrative can enhance people’s sympathy for the narrator at least make it plausible (chapter 9).
”
”
Steven Pinker (The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined)
“
I have shaped and nourished my mind for years to hail all women on earth as my sisters and their problems as my problems. When I am engaged in a conversation with one of my sisters anywhere in the world, my eyes are not subconsciously driven to take a quick peek down her blouse. I belong to all women, all men, everywhere, as a brother. And being a brother calls for the responsibility of thinking, feeling and behaving like a brother, instead of a potential mate-hunter. Here I am by no means insinuating that all men should see all women as sisters, rather I am pointing out that all civilized men should at the very least have the decency to see women as persons, and not as objects of sexual gratification or as potential mating partners, because only then we shall succeed as a conscientious species to give a safe and non-predatory environment to our children.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Lives to Serve Before I Sleep)
“
Although my own position is, I believe, clearly enough implied in the text, I may perhaps briefly formulate what seems to me the most important principles of humanitarian and equalitarian ethics.
(1) Tolerance towards all who are not intolerant and who do not propagate intolerance. This implies, especially, that the moral decisions of others should be treated with respect, as long as such decisions do not conflict with the principle of tolerance.
(2) The recognition that all moral urgency has its basis in the urgency of suffering or pain. I suggest, for this reason, to replace the utilitarian formula 'Aim at the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number', or briefly, 'Maximize happiness' by the formula 'The least amount of avoidable suffering for all', or briefly, 'Minimize suffering'. Such a simple formula can, I believe, be made one of the fundamental principles (admittedly not the only one) of public policy. (The principle 'Maximize happiness', in contrast, seems to be apt to produce a benevolent dictatorship.) We should realize that from the moral point of view suffering and happiness must not be treated as symmetrical; that is to say, the promotion of happiness is in any case much less urgent than the rendering of help to those who suffer, and the attempt to prevent suffering. (The latter task has little to do with 'matters of taste', the former much.)
(3) The fight against tyranny; or in other words, the attempt to safeguard the other principles by the institutional means of a legislation rather than by the benevolence of persons in power.
”
”
Karl Popper (The Open Society and Its Enemies)
“
Letter to the tech giants:
When fame and abundance kiss somebody’s feet before that person is wise enough, he or she is very likely to lose track of what’s necessity and what’s luxury. And modern society is filled with examples of such intelligent stupidity – stupidity that is carried out by apparently smart humans. Because being smart is not the same as being wise. The world has enough smartness, but not enough wisdom to bring that smartness into proper productive practice – and I mean productive practice not sophisticated practice – there is a difference. A person smart enough to visualize a Falcon rocket engine can easily pinpoint the locations of various organizations that spread terrorism, yet the person chooses to explore the space further instead of prioritizing the technological advantages to first fix real issues of the human society that inflict harm to the humans every walk of the way.
The world is a miserable place not because we have lack of resources, but because those who have an abundance of resources do not have the slightest idea of true human need. The resources needed for colonizing Mars if put to proper practice can fix the world’s global warming issues – it can fix the world’s climate change issues – it can fix the world’s terrorism issues, yet people are more interested in the pompous idea of living in Mars for whatever reason, instead of paying attention to improving human condition on earth. I am not against technological advancement, for I am a scientist, but my soul aches when I see smart people are dumb enough to chase after illusory glory of doing something different and innovative instead of focusing the powers of their soul on cleaning up the misery business on earth. You can, yet you don’t. Why?
Smartness without wisdom is stupidity. You are smart – yes indeed – but I am sorry – you are stupid at the same time. How can you dream of having a cheese burger on Mars when your own kind on Earth is suffering! How can you think of taking rich kids into the orbit just so they can admire the beauty of earth from the heavens, when that very earth is infested with the primordial evils of human character! Awaken the human within you my friend, and pay attention. Awaken the human within and let it consume all the miseries from the world that you live in. Say a member of your family falls ill, would you ignore his or her misery completely just because you want to make life more comfortable for others than it already is, or would you first try everything in your capacity in order to heal your loved one!
Be wise my friend, for it is not enough to be smart. You are smart – there is no doubt about that – so utilize that smartness for humanity and heal your own kind. Heal your kind with your capacity my friend. It is wailing for healers – not some delusional faith healers, but real tangible healers. Would you not do anything! Would you not give your soul to fix the broken soul of this world! Arise my friend, Awake my friend and work for humanity, not to make it sophisticated, but to make it peaceful first. Remember, humanity first, then everything else. Peace first, sophistication later. Harmony first, luxury later.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar
“
Then there were those who were thrilling to Senator Sanders, who believed that Bernie would be the one to give them free college, to solve climate change, and even to bring peace to the Middle East, though that was not an issue most people associated with him. On a trip to Michigan, I met with a group of young Muslims, most of them college students, for whom this was the first election in which they planned to participate. I was excited that they had come to hear more about HRC's campaign. One young woman, speaking for her peers, said she really wanted to be excited about the first woman president, but she had to support Bernie because she believed he would be more effective at finally brokering a peace treaty in the Middle East. Everyone around her nodded. I asked the group why they doubted Hillary Clinton's ability to do the same.
"Well, she has done nothing to help the Palestinians."
Taking a deep breath, I asked them if they knew that she was the first U.S. official to ever call the territories "Palestine" in the nineties, that she advocated for Palestinian sovereignty back when no other official would. They did not. I then asked them if they were aware that she brought together the last round of direct talks between the Israelis and Palestinians? That she personally negotiated a cease-fire to stop the latest war in Gaza when she was secretary of state? They shook their heads. Had they known that she announced $600 million in assistance to the Palestinian Authority and $300 million in humanitarian aid to Gaza in her first year at State? They began to steal glances at one another. Did they know that she pushed Israel to invest in the West Bank and announced an education program to make college more affordable for Palestinian students? More head shaking. They simply had no idea.
"So," I continued, "respectfully, what is it about Senator Sander's twenty-seven-year record in Congress that suggests to you that the Middle East is a priority for him?"
The young woman's response encapsulated some what we were up against.
"I don't know," she replied. "I just feel it.
”
”
Huma Abedin (Both/And: A Memoir)
“
One government policy that libertarians accept is provisions of national defense, since no private solution is likely to prove satisfactory. A private group that attempted to field an army and defend the country would find it difficult to exclude any individual person from the benefits of its protection, since any activities that deterred potential attacks or warded off actual attacks would defend everyone within the country. Thus, most people would not voluntarily pay for national defense provided by a private group, so it is hard for such an activity to be profitable enough to induce adequate private provision. That is, national defenses is what economists refer to as public good.
The conclusion that government should provide some national defense applies to narrow self-defense activities, such as fielding an army that deters enemy attacks and responds to attacks that do occur. In practice, however, nations perform many inappropriate actions under the mantle self-defense, most of them harmful.
On action that goes beyond strict self-defense is preemptive attacks on other countries, as in the invasion of Iraq. In rare instances preemptive strikes might be legitimate self-defense, and by moving first and preventing extended conflict, a government might save lives and property both at home and in the threatening country...In most instances of preemptive attack, however, the threat is not obvious, undeniable, or imminent. The justification for military action is therefor readily misused whenever leaders have other agendas but wish to hide behind the guise of self defense. Thus, preemptive national defense deserves extreme suspicion, and most such actions are not wise uses of government resources.
Another problematic use of a country's self defense capabilities is humanitarian or national-building efforts that purport to help other countries. One objection to such actions might be that the helping country pays the costs while foreigners receive the benefits, but this is not the right criticism. The compassion argument for redistributing income holds that government should be willing to impose costs on society generally to raise the welfare of the least fortunate members. It is hard to see how logic would apply only to people who already residents of a given country.
”
”
Jeffrey A. Miron (Libertarianism, from A to Z)
“
1. You most want your friends and family to see you as someone who … a. Is willing to make sacrifices and help anyone in need. b. Is liked by everyone. c. Is trustworthy. d. Will protect them no matter what happens. e. Offers wise advice. 2. When you are faced with a difficult problem, you react by … a. Doing whatever will be the best thing for the greatest number of people. b. Creating a work of art that expresses your feelings about the situation. c. Debating the issue with your friends. d. Facing it head-on. What else would you do? e. Making a list of pros and cons, and then choosing the option that the evidence best supports. 3. What activity would you most likely find yourself doing on the weekend or on an unexpected day off? a. Volunteering b. Painting, dancing, or writing poetry c. Sharing opinions with your friends d. Rock-climbing or skydiving! e. Catching up on your homework or reading for pleasure 4. If you had to select one of the following options as a profession, which would you choose? a. Humanitarian b. Farmer c. Judge d. Firefighter e. Scientist 5. When choosing your outfit for the day, you select … a. Whatever will attract the least amount of attention. b. Something comfortable, but interesting to look at. c. Something that’s simple, but still expresses your personality. d. Whatever will attract the most attention. e. Something that will not distract or inhibit you from what you have to do that day. 6. If you discovered that a friend’s significant other was being unfaithful, you would … a. Tell your friend because you feel that it would be unhealthy for him or her to continue in a relationship where such selfish behavior is present. b. Sit them both down so that you can act as a mediator when they talk it over. c. Tell your friend as soon as possible. You can’t imagine keeping that knowledge a secret. d. Confront the cheater! You might also take action by slashing the cheater’s tires or egging his or her house—all in the name of protecting your friend, of course. e. Keep it to yourself. Statistics prove that your friend will find out eventually. 7. What would you say is your highest priority in life right now? a. Serving those around you b. Finding peace and happiness for yourself c. Seeking truth in all things d. Developing your strength of character e. Success in work or school
”
”
Veronica Roth (The Divergent Series: Complete Collection)
“
... the primary duty of charity does not lie in the toleration of false ideas, however sincere they may be, nor in the theoretical or practical indifference towards the errors and vices in which we see our brethren plunged but in the zeal for their intellectual and moral improvement as well as for their material well-being ...
True, Jesus has loved us with an immense, infinite love, and He came on earth to suffer and die so that, gathered around Him in justice and love, motivated by the same sentiments of mutual charity, all men might live in peace and happiness. But for the realization of this temporal and eternal happiness, He has laid down with supreme authority the condition that we must belong to His Flock, that we must accept His doctrine, that we must practice virtue, and that we must accept the teaching and guidance of Peter and his successors.
Further, whilst Jesus was kind to sinners and to those who went astray, He did not respect their false ideas, however sincere they might have appeared. He loved them all, but He instructed them in order to convert them and save them. Whilst He called to Himself in order to comfort them, those who toiled and suffered, it was not to preach to them the jealousy of a chimerical equality. Whilst He lifted up the lowly, it was not to instill in them the sentiment of a dignity independent from, and rebellious against, the duty of obedience. Whilst His heart overflowed with gentleness for the souls of good-will, He could also arm Himself with holy indignation against the profaners of the House of God, against the wretched men who scandalized the little ones, against the authorities who crush the people with the weight of heavy burdens without putting out a hand to lift them.
He was as strong as he was gentle. He reproved, threatened, chastised, knowing, and teaching us that fear is the beginning of wisdom, and that it is sometimes proper for a man to cut off an offending limb to save his body. Finally, He did not announce for future society the reign of an ideal happiness from which suffering would be banished; but, by His lessons and by His example, He traced the path of the happiness which is possible on earth and of the perfect happiness in Heaven: the royal way of the Cross. These are teachings that it would be wrong to apply only to one's personal life in order to win eternal salvation; these are eminently social teachings, and they show in Our Lord Jesus Christ something quite different from an inconsistent and impotent humanitarianism.
”
”
St. Pius X
“
Every Monday and Friday night, leaving us with awful suppers to reheat, our mum didn’t work late shifts at the printworks. She went to an office in Shoreditch. And from there, by radio, by note, by telephone and letters, she exchanged messages with Miss Carter and Mrs. Henderson and Queenie and others like them on what she called ‘humanitarian war work’. She’d never met any of them in person.
‘I can’t tell you any more details. It’s secret work. How you know even this much is really quite beyond me,’ she admitted.
‘I worked most of it out myself,’ I told her. She might’ve hidden it from me all this time, but I wasn’t stupid. ‘Sounds like Sukie did too.’
‘Your sister spied on me,’ Mum replied bitterly. ‘She stole paperwork, listened in to private conversations. She was very foolish to get caught up in something she knew nothing about.’
‘She did know about it, though. What Hitler’s doing really got to her. She was desperate to do something about it. All that post from Devon? It wasn’t from Queenie. Those were letters from the lighthouse, written by Ephraim, who feels the same about the Jewish people as Sukie does.’
‘It was stupid, impulsive behaviour,’ Mum argued, ‘of the sort your sister’s very good at.’
Yet to me she had missed a vital point.
‘You know Sukie wanted to help you, don’t you? She saw how ill you’d got over Dad. By standing in for you on this job, she was making sure you’d get some rest, like the doctor said you should.’
‘I might’ve known you’d stick up for your sister,’ Mum remarked. ‘But it didn’t help me – it worried me sick!’
‘It did help thirty-two refugees, though,’ I reminded her.
‘She was lucky she didn’t get arrested straight away.’ Mum went on as if she hadn’t heard me. ‘When I found out that night what she’d done, I was all for going after her, hauling her back and locking her in her bedroom, till this frightful war was over if I had to. But it was too late by then. She was already halfway to France.’
‘You knew the night she disappeared?’ I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘And admit that I do undercover work and Sukie was doing it too?’ Mum cried. ‘Good grief, Olive, it’s secret business. It was too dangerous to tell you. There’s a war on, remember!’
‘People always use that excuse,’ I muttered.
It stunned me that Mum had known all this time. But then, hadn’t there been signs? The looks in our kitchen between her and Gloria, the refusal to talk about Sukie, the bundling us off out of the way – to here, the very place Sukie might, with any luck, show up. It was a clever way of making sure we knew the moment she set foot on British soil again.
”
”
Emma Carroll (Letters from the Lighthouse)
“
Another dangerous neoliberal word circulating everywhere that is worth zooming in on is the word ‘resilience’. On the surface, I think many people won’t object to the idea that it is good and beneficial for us to be resilient to withstand the difficulties and challenges of life. As a person who lived through the atrocities of wars and sanctions in Iraq, I’ve learnt that life is not about being happy or sad, not about laughing or crying, leaving or staying. Life is about endurance. Since most feelings, moods, and states of being are fleeting, endurance, for me, is the common denominator that helps me go through the darkest and most beautiful moments of life knowing that they are fleeing. In that sense, I believe it is good for us to master the art of resilience and endurance. Yet, how should we think about the meaning of ‘resilience’ when used by ruling classes that push for wars and occupations, and that contribute to producing millions of deaths and refugees to profit from plundering the planet? What does it mean when these same warmongers fund humanitarian organizations asking them to go to war-torn countries to teach people the value of ‘resilience’? What happens to the meaning of ‘resilience’ when they create frighteningly precarious economic structures, uncertain employment, and lay off people without accountability? All this while also asking us to be ‘resilient’…
As such, we must not let the word ‘resilience’ circulate or get planted in the heads of our youth uncritically. Instead, we should raise questions about what it really means. Does it mean the same thing for a poor young man or woman from Ghana, Ecuador, Afghanistan vs a privileged member from the upper management of a U.S. corporation? Resilience towards what? What is the root of the challenges for which we are expected to be resilient? Does our resilience solve the cause or the root of the problem or does it maintain the status quo while we wait for the next disaster? Are individuals always to blame if their resilience doesn’t yield any results, or should we equally examine the social contract and the entire structure in which individuals live that might be designed in such a way that one’s resilience may not prevail no matter how much perseverance and sacrifice one demonstrates? There is no doubt that resilience, according to its neoliberal corporate meaning, is used in a way that places the sole responsibility of failure on the shoulders of individuals rather than equally holding accountable the structure in which these individuals exist, and the precarious circumstances that require work and commitment way beyond individual capabilities and resources. I find it more effective not to simply aspire to be resilient, but to distinguish between situations in which individual resilience can do, and those for which the depth, awareness, and work of an entire community or society is needed for any real and sustainable change to occur. But none of this can happen if we don’t first agree upon what each of us mean when we say ‘resilience,’ and if we have different definitions of what it means, then we should ask: how shall we merge and reconcile our definitions of the word so that we complement not undermine what we do individually and collectively as people. Resilience should not become a synonym for surrender. It is great to be resilient when facing a flood or an earthquake, but that is not the same when having to endure wars and economic crises caused by the ruling class and warmongers.
[From “On the Great Resignation” published on CounterPunch on February 24, 2023]
”
”
Louis Yako
“
The twanging of life
Thirteenth part : The essence of the beauty is unity in variety
We are only able to contempt and treat people in a bad way, when we forget that the other person belongs to us and to the society as well as we too, when we only forget that in the form of doing the action, there is a strong relationship between the subject and the object so avarice, violence, egoism, sadness and looking at others as pawns of market's chess to get money arise from losing their unity, from forgetting their spirit of cooperation and collaboration and then starting perceiving others in terms of their individual differences.
A humanitarian action that isn't intended to be done can make a huge storm of humanity, a single word can give people the feeling of unity, just like every time when a person passes by you and you say for him "السلام عليكم" both of you start to feel like there is a candle within both of you turning into clemency, the more love, the more mercy and the more salaam you show on your face the more light is reflected form that candle, you should start thinking that, greeting the people is proclamations of peace, every time you say "السلام عليكم" to a stranger your heart admits over and over again that we are all united, what I am trying to say is, in your heart's deepest place where the onus of your ego are fallen to pieces and the enigma of your soul is infiltrated, you find the awareness isn't different in any way from what all others may find, the mutuality of Sudanese people is appeared as the sun in the morning but only when our own humanness is surpassed our own dishumanness by accepting that we are all one in the fact that we are all made of diversified differences.
We are all equal in the fact that our own society is made by different tribes, we are all the same in the fact that we will never have the same colour, life, thinking, dreams, feelings and luxury, we are united by the reality that Sudan is able to combine all colours, all cultures, all tribes and all of us in the fact that every one believes his tribe and culture are distinguished and individual, we are compatible in the reality that we are all recaptured to this country by the same history, the same conditions of living and the longest river in the world that all of them together give us a light to shine the darkness that covers the sky to allow for us to walk as one hand in the right direction, we don't share the colours but we share the blood, we aren't equal in existence of happiness but we drink River Nile's water that keeps us alive, we are different in existence of tribes but we share the same air that is blended by our breath, so I am you as much as I am me and you are me as much as I am you.
Finally swingeing internal ructions and overmuch narcissism of a society devastate the tissue of its unity, not the differences of that society, Lord Robin said that unity begins at home within family is the strength to survive and win the fight of life.
”
”
Omer Mohamed
“
I am not a person but a sentience beyond time. Rise I will always in crisis to fortify my humankind.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (When Call The People: My World My Responsibility)
“
I prefer to sit on the sidewalk and share a hotdog with a homeless person than sit at a fancy restaurant and have dinner with a billionaire.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Martyr Meets World: To Solve The Hard Problem of Inhumanity)
“
I am not a person, prison or path, for I am vicdan,
I'm saadet, my friend, I am the spirit of unification.
Call the sun as you like, it still brightens the world,
In the domain of realization, to label is desecration.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Ingan Impossible: Handbook of Hatebusting)
“
Doomscrolling is nothing new, people used to do the same with tv remote, switching channel after channel, rarely settling on any one program. And heads buried in social media news feed is nothing new either - before smartphone and internet heads used to be buried in actual physical newspapers. Only the means have changed, not the habit. This is not advancement, it's recurring derangement. I'll call it progress when you put down your phone or remote and actually listen to another person. Sure, phones can be a supplement to organic conversation, but never a replacement.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Rowdy Scientist: Handbook of Humanitarian Science (Caretaker Diaries))
“
Only love can bring full freedom, all else brings half freedom. What is half freedom you ask? When in the name of freedom you imprison yourself to one side or sect, everything outside that sect seems evil. For example, fundamentalists choose the side of blind faith, and every act of reason seems like blasphemy - just like cold, sharp-tongue intellectuals choose the side of rationality even at the expense of humanity, and everything illogical seems outdated - or wait, I got a better one - so-called social activists often get so attached to their self-imposed identity of victimhood, that every person with a political, corporate, legal or bureaucratic background seems to appear as devil incarnate. This, my friend, is what I call "half freedom", which by the way, is far worse than the lack of freedom. And even though it manifests as an act of willful choice, when you get down to it, it's just plain old rigidity. And if we want to build a truly just, inclusive and progressive society, this hypocritical half-freedom won't do - what's needed is whole freedom - a kind of freedom that liberates the mind of all superstition as well as ignorant suspiciousness. It's time we realize, yelling about justice without using common sense is just as useless as keeping quiet. What this means is that, we gotta come together regardless of our background - the teacher, the scientist, the student, the copper, the politician, the civil servant, the entrepreneur, the economist, the janitor, the construction worker - every single person from every single walk of life must come forward surpassing all suspicious conspiracy, and contribute the best of their capacity in the making of a real civilized world.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Insan Himalayanoğlu: It's Time to Defect)
“
Person is the ailment,
Person is the treatment.
Person alive in act of love,
is ointment to all derangement.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Iman Insaniyat, Mazhab Muhabbat: Pani, Agua, Water, It's All One (Caretaker Diaries))
“
If only one person dies for the cause, a hundred people realize their humanity.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Gente Mente Adelante: Prejudice Conquered is World Conquered)
“
Giants in Jeans Sonnet 64
Let us be oblivious to security and comfort,
In our pursuit and practice of humanity.
Let us be oblivious to personal happiness,
In our endeavors into the impossibility.
Let us throw all fear and anxiety overboard,
For the dreams that’ll determine our destiny.
Let us trample every foul desire for luxury,
And treat the hard problem of inhumanity.
Let us pay no heed to gain and pain,
In our course of constructing a whole society.
Let us not sit around praying for a messiah,
And stand up ourselves to carry out that duty.
Let others be oblivious to humanity if they want.
Even if it's doomsday, sapling of service we'll plant.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Giants in Jeans: 100 Sonnets of United Earth)
“
Instead of pushing the engines of concern argument any further, Buckley revived his attack on Baldwin's radicalism. Before describing the next phase in his assault, it is worth noting what is revealed by this rhetorical choice. As he had demonstrated time and time again throughout his career, he was far more comfortable on the attack than he was when he attempted to build an affirmative case for his views. If he had chosen to defend his claim that the United States was providing a world historical model of how to treat minority groups, he would have had to confront many uncomfortable questions. Was it true that the United States was showing "dramatic concern" for "the Negro problem"? If so, what did the policy of concern entail, and what problem, precisely, was being addressed? Was the American example really unprecedented in the history of the world? And perhaps most interestingly—assuming for a moment that Buckley was right about these matters—it would be worth asking why and how this policy of concern was activated and sustained. Was it primarily because of the enlightened humanitarianism of those in power or because of the radicalism of freedom fighters?
As a conservative who had been dragging his feet on civil rights for more than a decade, serious attention to these questions would have put Buckley in an awkward position. To the extent that the United States was giving "the problems of a minority" exceptional concern, it was in spite of the intransigence of Buckley, writers he commissioned to write for The National Review, and political candidates he supported. He likely surmised that he had better not dwell too long on what was animating "dramatic concern" for the Negro problem or whether he was personally devoted to this "primary policy of concern." If the engines of concern had been working in the United States, it was no thanks to Buckley and his allies.
”
”
Nicholas Buccola (The Fire Is upon Us: James Baldwin, William F. Buckley Jr., and the Debate over Race in America)
“
Humanity is and must remain unconditional in the face of political, financial and personal gain.
”
”
Aysha Taryam
“
Make it a habit to feed at least one hungry person in your neighborhood every day, and there won't be any need for soup-kitchens in the world.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Hometown Human: To Live for Soil and Society)
“
The Naskarean Sonnet
It ain't easy to get Naskar,
For Naskar is no being binary.
In a world full of dualities,
Naskar is an emblem of inclusivity.
Think not it to be a person,
For the person perished in line of duty.
What lives today is the idea,
The idea of struggle for undivided amity.
Every human who helps a human,
Is a manifestation Naskarean.
Wherever there is prejudice and inequality,
They appear as a living revolution.
When one Naskar dies a thousand will rise.
The dream of unity will never face demise.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Heart Force One: Need No Gun to Defend Society)
“
Giants in Jeans Sonnet 75
Nonduality comes from wholeness,
Wholeness rises when sectarianism is slashed.
Sectarianism fails when we fall in love,
Not with one person but the whole world.
When the stranger becomes family,
Politicians will lose their job.
When love overwhelms all rigidity,
Arms dealers will mourn and sob.
When diplomacy keeps the world divided,
Reliance on institutions goes through the roof.
The best way to sustain profits of war,
Is to keep people infected with the nationalist flu.
Enough with this barbarianism of sovereignty!
Step up and shout, the whole world is my family!
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Giants in Jeans: 100 Sonnets of United Earth)
“
This is a story of personal fascism as opposed to organized fascism. [It] indicates how it is possible for us to have a Gestapo, if the country should go fascist. A character like Monty would qualify brilliantly for the leadership of the Belsen concentration camp. Fascism hates weakness in people; minorities. Monty hates fairies, Negroes, Jews, and foreigners. In the book, Monty murders a fairy. He could have murdered a Negro, a foreigner, or a Jew.” Despite the message being thickly ladled at times, Crossfire’s story was deftly told. Robert Young’s earnest homilies about brotherhood don’t carry half the weight of Robert Mitchum explaining how ugly realities released by the war can’t be neatly tucked away. “The snakes are loose,” he says, like a man who knows how bad it’s going to get. Crossfire shocked everyone, including Schary and Scott, by being a box-office hit. Whether its success was due to a timely message or taut storytelling, no one was sure (although surveys prior to the film’s release suggested little public interest in ethnically themed stories). As the picture reaped humanitarian awards, anti-Communist crusaders moved in on Scott and Dmytryk. Both were branded Red and sent to jail, members of the infamous Hollywood Ten.
”
”
Eddie Muller (Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir (Turner Classic Movies))
“
Sonnet 1154
Hate only keeps traveling round the world,
Until one person chooses to break the cycle.
War only keeps migrating border to border,
Until one nation chooses to break the cycle.
Our ancestors handed us hate as heritage,
Like good little apes we embraced it as honor.
Never for a moment we paused to ponder,
How one stupid prejudice leads to another!
We have the capacity to conquer the stars,
Yet we've chained ourselves to the graveyard.
In the guise of prehistoric patriotism,
Apes made a paradigm out of hate and hurt.
Such paradigm belongs in bin -
it's time, the cycle breaks.
Bomb the world with music,
pizza and poetry you idiots,
not Semtex, C4 and RDX.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Visvavictor: Kanima Akiyor Kainat)
“
I’m a dangerous person. Somebody ought to warn you against me,” he said to people, in the tone of uttering the most preposterous thing in the world. Of all the many titles bestowed upon him, he preferred one: Ellsworth Toohey, the Humanitarian.
”
”
Ayn Rand (The Fountainhead)
“
Visvabiotic (The Sonnet)
Human is bandaid to human burn,
Human is ointment to human yearn.
Human is morning to human mourn,
Human is cure born of human churn.
Human is Altair to human Vega,
Human is aloe to human vera.
Human is pilgrim to human mecca,
Human, Poly-B to social septicemia.
There is no fancy heaven,
only a good fervent human.
There is no book of god,
only a brave godly person.
Human is piety to prejudice barbaric.
To all inhuman hate, Human Visvabiotic.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations)
“
With every breath you take, a tiny particle of water is present in the heart, the female and male characters in the body are within 50 to 85 percent of the water! There is a lot of water with all the elements in this whole vast universe! Men and women who are afraid of disease and death will be involved in regular recitation of mantras as a result of this. There is an opportunity to associate with wise Guru. As a result, religion means work, salvation, health, life, and many paths of life. Wise Guru should keep on doing virtuous, religious deeds. The life of fire is also Shreeom, and the seed of water breath is also Shreeom. The living creatures life is also Shreeom, religious, spiritual, ascetic saint, Pandit, Guru, female and male personality's soul is also Shreeom and Karma Yogis's soul is also Shreeom. Shreeom's dearest love or natures are Mahalakshmi, Pratipriti Vaishnavi Kamala and Bhavani. Those who think that the soul is the killer of the soul and those who think that the soul dies with the body not understand life properly because the soul is immortal and the soul does not kill anyone and the soul is immortal in every Era because the soul is the embodiment of the Lord, teacher of God and his power and the Sun, the Guru, the Divine God. The sweet fragrance of the earth is Shreeom, the happiness, peace, prosperity, joy, success is Shreeom. Shreeom love the most to the social workers, donation givers, knowledgeable Sadhus, Sant, Pandits, helpful ladies and gentlemen, simultaneously positive approach humanitarian and protector of Dharma.:- Shreeom
”
”
Shreeom
“
Law of Sacrifice (The Sonnet)
The more you give life,
The more you'll have life.
The more you give light,
The more you'll have light.
The more the I gets lost in others,
The more you'll end all bigoted strife.
The more you take pain for those around,
The more you'll know the joy of life.
Worst of all superstitions is selfishness,
It keeps an animal from becoming human.
Let the mind be cleansed of all self,
So our heart becomes a mirror for every person.
Reject all selfishness that makes you cold and blind.
Sacrifice is the law behind all love and light.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Şehit Sevda Society: Even in Death I Shall Live)
“
Wipe Out The I (The Sonnet)
Once a person gives up all for others,
They'll achieve everything worth achieving.
The art of self-discovery is in self-annihilation,
Whereas self-obsession only causes suffering.
Once a person is insane with the sacrificial spirit,
They'll know the meaning of civilized sanity.
Once a person feels the joy of selflessness,
All worldly pleasures will turn into foul vanity.
Once a person hones the power of simplicity,
They'll trash all trace of pomposity from life.
Once a person senses the valor of humility,
They'll discard all arrogant divide.
Life is simple, but we mess it up with selfishness.
Wipe out the I, and you will taste its sweetness.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Şehit Sevda Society: Even in Death I Shall Live)
“
Your biology doesn't want you to be inclusive - your biology doesn't want you to be global - your biology doesn't want you to be civilized - or to put it simply, your biology doesn't want you to be human - because to be human requires to be unselfish, which is deemed by your biology as a threat to your personal survival. Hence, it pulls all its savage strings in every walk of your life, so that you act as much selfish and primitive as possible, because as far as your biology is concerned, being selfish and primitive is what kept your ancestors alive in the jungle.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Şehit Sevda Society: Even in Death I Shall Live)
“
Honor He Wrote Sonnet 39
The more I write the more I realize,
The inane limitations of language.
Never be a stickler for terminology,
It only impedes your humanness.
If anything, try to set humanity free,
From the bounds of words 'n speech.
Let the world know who you are,
But without being a linguistic leech.
Behavior alone defines a person,
Make behavior your background.
Neither culture, nor geography,
It's only in action that identity is found.
Unfold your today beyond your yesterday,
Or else, there'll be no tomorrow, only decay.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Honor He Wrote: 100 Sonnets For Humans Not Vegetables)
“
Honor He Wrote Sonnet 93
Citizen lover is citizen justice,
All others are citizens of malice.
Love begets justice, whereas,
Judgment produces more malice.
All think, justice is an independent force,
But, justice is simply a descendant of love.
Where there is love, justice prevails,
Otherwise, there's just talk of justice 'n love.
Pledge allegiance to no judgment by intellect,
But only to love and love alone, my friend.
Where there is a place for love,
There is place for everything else.
Once a person has realized love untaintable,
They've achieved everything celebratable.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Honor He Wrote: 100 Sonnets For Humans Not Vegetables)
“
The Gentalist Sonnet
I only ask one thing of my soldier – everything!
Give up all, so that those with nothing receive life.
What can I give to thee, except for this life of mine,
Says the brave gentalist across all personal strife.
Gente means people, and people are the music of life.
Love the people, lift the people, people are the way.
Not your people, not my people, it's all one people.
Once you feel it in your bones, uplift is on its way.
I don't believe in a messiah, I don't believe in a god,
‘Cause I’m far too accountable for my society, my world.
Thus speaks the gentalist, burning with a sense of duty,
Thus speaks the living aid, who ain’t no mythical lord.
If a chunk of alum can purify a bucket of putrid water,
Your heart can purify the world with its gentalist power.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Honor He Wrote: 100 Sonnets For Humans Not Vegetables)
“
Martyr's Dilemma
(An Existential Sonnet, 1349)
Abhijit Naskar are two, not one.
Abhijit the person, Naskar the mission.
Abhijit has dreams like an ordinary man,
While Naskar is the dream of world union.
Abhijit put his hopes and dreams away,
So that Naskar could engulf the world.
Abhijit even got dumped by the girl,
Because Naskar couldn't dump the world.
The question is, do I regret all this!
With all honesty - yes, I do on occasion.
All the vastness of Naskar isn't enough,
to make up for the things I missed out on.
The point is, it's okay to have regrets,
You ain't alive till you have regrets.
Yet I never abandoned my duty to the world,
For my mission is bigger than my regrets.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets (Sonnet Centuries))
“
Buddhas, Christs and Mevlanas don't live in caves, they walk amongst you. You know why? Because we cannot change the world from the sidelines. You may play the make believe of nonattachment all you want - and it may bring you personal comfort for the time being, but it doesn't alleviate human suffering from the world one bit.
The enlightenment bit is a small part of the equation. How you live afterwards determines the true worth of that enlightenment. If your idea of enlightenment revolves around some prehistoric routine of sitting and chanting, or crouching and praying, then such enlightenment is no enlightenment, but derangement.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Iman Insaniyat, Mazhab Muhabbat: Pani, Agua, Water, It's All One (Caretaker Diaries))
“
Thousand Naskars (The Sonnet)
When one Naskar dies in body,
Thousand Naskars will take his place.
Cowards seek comfort in reincarnation,
While the brave step in to fill the void.
Don't you dare make a cult of me,
Waiting for yet another second coming!
Reclaim your life from the land of myths,
Wishful inaction is most unbecoming.
Charge up your mind with facts and reason,
Charge up your heart with love and vision.
Backbone alive repels cowardly inaction,
Even if peddled by thousand year tradition.
When one Naskar dies in body,
Thousand Naskars will take his place.
Naskar the person died a long time ago,
What speaks to you is Naskar the oneness.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch)
“
Naskar is made by Naskar alone, not an industry or benefactor - or more importantly, by family wealth. I had a roof over my head, food on the table, and clothes on my back - that was more than enough.
I started writing with literally zero dollar in my pocket. Let me tell you how it began, because for some reason, I completely forgot a crucial event of my life when I wrote my memoir Love, God & Neurons.
I once met an American tourist at a local train in Calcutta. The first thing he asked me was, had I lived in the States? I said, no. Then how come you have an American accent - he asked. Watching movies - I said. We got chatting and he told me about a book he had recently published, a memoir. I believe, this was the cosmic event that planted the thought of writing my own books in my head - I had already started my self-education in Neurology and Psychology, and I was all determined to publish research papers on my ideas, but not books. Meeting the person somehow subconsciously shifted my focus from research papers to books.
So the journey began. And for the first few years, I made no real money from my books. Occasionally some of my books would climb the bestsellers list on amazon, like my very first book did, and that would keep the bills paid for several months. Then the invitations for talks started coming, but they too were not paid in the beginning. The organizers made all the travel arrangements, and I gave the talks for free. It's ironic and super confusing really - I remember flying business class, but I didn't have enough money to even afford a one way flight ticket, because I had already used up my royalties on other expenses.
Today I can pick and choose which speaking invitations to accept, but back then I didn't have that luxury - I was grateful for any speaking gig and interview request I received, paid or not. One time, I gave an interview to this moderately popular journalist for her personal youtube channel, only to find out, she never released the video publicly - she posted an interview with a dog owner instead - whose dog videos had gained quite a following on social media. You could say, this was the first time I realized first hand, what white privilege was.
Anyway, the point is this.
Did I doubt myself? Often. Did I consider quitting? Occasionally. But did I actually quit? Never. And because I didn't quit, the world received a vast never-before seen multicultural humanitarian legacy, that you know me for today.
There is no such thing as overnight success. If you have a dream, you gotta work at it day in, day out - night after night - spoiling sleep, ruining rest, forgetting fun. Persist, persist, and persist, that's the only secret - there is no other. Remember this - the size of your pocket does not determine your destiny, the size of your dedication does.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch)
“
As long as Israel, therefore, continues its blockade of the general Gaza population, it is no less in contravention of the United Nations Security Council instructions than Saddam Hussein was with regard to his weapons programs in the early 1990s. While gathering the details of how some humanitarian aid activists were killed and dozens were wounded by Israeli soldiers is important, above all for the sake of justice toward the idealistic persons mown down, it is far more important that the episode produce an end to the lockdown of the 1.5 million Gazans, who have been placed by the Israeli government in a sort of open-air penitentiary.
”
”
Juan Cole (Gaza Yet Stands)
“
There's a difference between an educated brain and an educated being. Educated brain succumbs to egotism, educated being submits to nothing.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (The Humanitarian Dictator)
“
One person's bullshit is another person's redbull.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (The Humanitarian Dictator)
“
Indeed, in agreeing to be Christians, we must constantly act without thinking about petty objectives of prestige or ambition or about ends that may appear nobler, such as philanthropy or humanitarian kindness. The Christian is a person who unceasingly reflects on the ultimate and radical end of love, which Jesus Christ manifested to us by dying for us on the Cross. Hence holiness consists of living exactly as God wants us to live, by being conformed more and more to his Son, Jesus Christ.
”
”
Robert Sarah (God or Nothing: A Conversation on Faith)
“
for purposes of discussion, let’s just say it is time for the mainline church to start looking for the “next big thing” that will unite us in purpose and divide us in debate. What will it be? As I said, I have some ideas. Caring for the environment is on the top of the list. Responding to growing numbers of refugees and to other humanitarian crises is too. So is interfaith understanding. And I don’t think it will be too long until the church seriously begins to discuss economic inequalities. There are a lot of possibilities. I was thinking about that recently. I was sitting with other clergy from my denomination, talking about my views on why it’s important for progressive ministers to be able to talk about our faith, and about what Christ means to us. I was talking about discipleship, and why it matters for our progressive church, and about how we’ve lost so much of our theological heritage, and our language of faith. That’s when the question came, part curious, part suspect: “But what about social justice? Doesn’t that matter to you?” The person who asked that question didn’t know me. They didn’t know that for more than twenty now years I have been openly gay. They didn’t know about the times when anonymous, antigay hate letters showed up in my church’s mailbox during my last call, or about how I’d grown up in a place where being gay could literally get you blown up, or about how my wife, Heidi, and I had needed to file separate federal tax returns even after we were married. They also didn’t know about the times my faith had compelled me to take action. I could have told them about how a group of us had stood in the New York State Capitol building for the better part of a week as right-wing Christians rallying against equal marriage had yelled at us that we were going to hell. I’ve gone a few rounds in the social justice arena.
”
”
Emily C. Heath (Glorify: Reclaiming the Heart of Progressive Christianity)
“
The philosopher John Stuart Mill once wrote, “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.”8
”
”
Eric Greitens (The Heart and the Fist: The Education of a Humanitarian, the Making of a Navy SEAL)
“
There is an important difference between being an Adventist, one who believes in the imminent return of Jesus, and being an escapist. Any eschatology which discourages social activism or blinds itself to human need by focusing only on evangelism and personal salvation is not the eschatology of Jesus Christ. Adventist eschatology does not deny the importance of ministering to the whole person nor does it base its hope on the belief that the humanitarian activities of God’s people will in some way usher in the millennial Kingdom of Christ. Adventists believe that they are to live in constant anticipation of the Lord’s return, but to await Christ’s coming by being responsible stewards in this world.[
”
”
Steve Daily (ADVENTISM FOR A NEW GENERATION)
“
I do not give a damn whether a person is a scientist, a philosopher or a theologian If that person cannot recognize the basic needs of human existence, and cannot recognize the misery that life in this world is infested with, then to me such a person is as idiot as the religious fundamentalists who cause violence driven by their supremacist urges.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Lord is My Sheep: Gospel of Human)
“
A smart person speaks out the truth. A wise person doesn't care about speaking it out, as much as he or she cares about utilizing that truth in the society, in a way that brings most progress, in a way that brings most human development. And that's the purpose atheism should have.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar
“
Issues that China Convoy nurses confronted remain relevant today: the struggle to build healthcare facilities that are sustainable and tailored to local needs; the battle against agendas driven by political or economic rather than healthcare needs; the dogged leadership and personal resilience required to provide compassionate care and high standards of nursing service in difficult and dangerous circumstances; and the recognition that health and human security are inextricably interwoven.
”
”
Susan Armstrong-Reid (China Gadabouts: New Frontiers of Humanitarian Nursing, 1941–51)
“
Joan's openness to God, in other words, had practical consequences that could be understood only with the passing of time - precisely the way every person discovers a meaning and purpose in life. In Joan's case fidelity to God's summon came to mean a commitment to alleviate human suffering by lifting the siege of Orleans. For now that was the essential meaning of "saving France" - not a political act but a humanitarian one. As for the crowning of Charles at Reims, it seems that this goal became clear only later, as a sort of coda after the successes at Orleans and elsewhere in the Loire Valley.
”
”
Donald Spoto (Joan: The Mysterious Life of the Heretic Who Became a Saint)
“
So effective has their propaganda been that an American official was moved to describe the Brotherhood as “a loose network of secular groups.”27 This kind of ignorance in the West about Egypt presents the Brotherhood with a tremendous opportunity for media manipulation. Scratch the surface, however, and you find a detailed political platform published in 2006. The president cannot be a woman because the post’s religious and military duties “conflict with her nature, social and other humanitarian roles.” A board of Muslim clerics would oversee the government. The freedom of association guaranteed civil organizations in the West would, in an Islamist Egypt, also be conditional, once again on their adherence to the strictures of Islamic law. Egypt would have a shura (consultative assembly) system, whereby a body of compliant old men nod through whatever the leader, who is assured “veneration,” sees fit, while a Supreme Guide presides benevolently over the personal morality of the masses.28 In Saudi Arabia and Iran, that system exists now.
”
”
John R. Bradley (After the Arab Spring: How Islamists Hijacked the Middle East Revolts)
“
The whole world is very eager to satisfy the dormant propensity of love for others, but the various invented methods like socialism, communism, altruism, humanitarianism and nationalism, along with whatever else may be manufactured for the peace and prosperity of the world, are all useless and frustrating because of our gross ignorance of the art of loving Kṛṣṇa. Generally people think that by advancing the cause of moral principles and religious rites they will be happy. Others may think that happiness can be achieved by economic development, and yet others think that simply by sense gratification they will be happy. But the real fact is that people can be happy only by loving Kṛṣṇa.
”
”
A.C. Bhaktivedanta (Krsna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead)
“
At the heart of the English character lay a fund of kindliness. Though in the mass rough and often cruel, and passionately addicted to barbarous sports like bull-baiting and cock-fighting, they led the world in humanitarian endeavour. It was an Englishman who in the 'seventies and 'eighties, at extreme risk and personal inconvenience, travelled 50,000 miles visiting the putrid, typhus-ridden jails of Europe; and it was Englishmen who at the close of the century first instituted organised opposition to cruelty to children and animals. But nothing so well illustrates the slow but persistent national impulse to mitigate inhumanity as the popular condemnation of the slave trade. This movement ran directly counter to the immediate material interests of the country; it none the less steadily gained strength from its inception by a handful of Quakers in the 'sixties until at the end of the century it was espoused by the Prime Minister himself and the overwhelming majority of thinking Englishmen.
”
”
Arthur Bryant (The Years of Endurance, 1793-1802)
“
People keep asking me what they can do to help Japan. And while I am all about donations, spreading the word, organizing charity events and the like, I realize not everyone has money to give—and no one seems to have the power to stop the media from sensationalizing the stories while ignoring the victims. To support Japan, what I would say is this: Simply do what you do every day, but do it better. Go to school or to work but with passion and energy. Engage your neighbors or community but with more sympathy and compassion than you ever have. Let these historic moments move you, inspire you and invigorate you for as long as the feeling lasts because, believe me, that initial adrenaline and humanitarian solidarity will wear off. Ride it as long as you can. Let it make you be a better person, and let it wake you up from the complacency in your life.
”
”
Jake Adelstein (2:46: Aftershocks: Stories from the Japan Earthquake)