218 quotes found
"Teenage girls with no life experiences and boys who call themselves punk are on my radio singing about how much pain they've endured and how hard their lives are"
"Doing GPL work is doing charity work in our current legal and economic framework."
"You're about to experience chaos. [before farting in a police officer's face, while being photographed nude after his arrest]"
"And my father and mother strengthened me in this my first impression, saying in my presence, I was intended for some great purpose, which they had always thought from certain marks on my head and breast."
"My grand mother, who was very religious, and to whom I was much attached — my master, who belonged to the church, and other religious persons who visited the house, and whom I often saw at prayers, noticing the singularity of my manners, I suppose, and my uncommon intelligence for a child, remarked I had too much sense to be raised – and if I was, I would never be of any service to any one – as a slave."
"The manner in which I learned to read and write, not only had great influence on my own mind, as I acquired it with the most perfect ease, so much so, that I have no recollection whatever of learning the alphabet(ABC)"
"Having soon discovered to be great, I must appear so, and therefore studiously avoided mixing in society, and wrapped myself in mystery, devoting my time to fasting and prayer. Fasting diet"
"I was struck with that particular passage which says: "Seek ye the kingdom of Heaven and all things shall be added unto you.""
"And about this time I had a vision — and I saw white spirits and black spirits engaged in battle, and the sun was darkened – the thunder rolled in the Heavens, and blood flowed in streams – and I heard a voice saying, "Such is your luck, such you are called to see, and let it come rough or smooth, you must surely bear it.""
"For as the blood of Christ had been shed on this earth, and had ascended to heaven for the salvation of sinners, and was now returning to earth again in the form of dew - and as the leaves on the trees bore the impression of the figures I had seen in the heavens, it was plain to me that the Saviour was about to lay down the yoke he had borne for the sins of men, and the great day of judgement was at hand."
"Several things are interesting about Nat Turner's doomed, gory rebellion. First, Turner was clearly delusional and yet his response to the madness of slavery was, from our vantage point today, the most sane and heroic of all... The fact that Nat Turner may have been schizophrenic or delusional does not disqualify the inherent political nature of his rebellion. Rather, it suggests that sometimes only someone not mentally healthy- not normal- is capable of rising up against objectively awful injustice. A normal, healthy person finds a way to accept his condition, no matter how wretched. The second most significant feature of Turner's rebellion was the white response. As always, the blame was assigned to unspeakable evil, savage Negroes, outside influences- anything but what was considered normal or inevitable at the time, namely, slavery. An account of the insurrection, "The Banditti," published in the Richmond Enquirer on August 30, 1831, reads, "What strikes us as the most remarkable thing in this matter is the horrible ferocity of these monsters. They remind one of a parcel of blood-thirsty wolves rushing down from the Alps... No black man ought to be permitted to turn a preacher in the country. The law must be enforced or the tragedy of Southampton appeals to us in vain." According to the Enquirer, Turner "was artful, impudent and vindictive, without any cause or provocation, that could be assigned.""
"Slave psychology and effective American slave management (which encourages a "cheerful disposition" and "initiative) combined to produce slaves which not only turned on their own liberators to protect their masters, but turned on them in "a fine spirit." Which helps explain why there were so few slave rebellions. Not only were they doomed, and not only were they without context, but so often fellow slaves either refused to participate or worse, exposed plots and defended their masters with arms. These actions further reinforce the notion that a rebellion was not only doomed, but even the idea of rebelling was somehow not normal and perhaps evil. You rally would have to be as crazy and schizophrenic as Nat Turner to not be affected; you'd have to have voices in your head louder than those around you to convince you that a slave rebellion was the right, sane response."
"Nat Turner and John Brown were political prisoners in their time. The acts for which they were charged and subsequently hanged, were the practical extensions of their profound commitment to the abolition of slavery."
"Numerous American heroes-such as Harriet Tubman, Nat Turner, and Henry David Thoreau-led rebellious acts to reconcile the government's actions with the country's promise of liberty for all its citizens."
"Although they confiscated horses, weapons, and brandy, they took only what was necessary to continue the struggle, and they committed no rapes. They even spared a few homesteads, one because Turner believed the poor white inhabitants "thought no better of themselves than they did of negroes.""
"What strikes us as the most remarkable thing in this matter is the horrible ferocity of these monsters."
"A fanatic preacher by the name of Nat Turner (Gen. Nat Turner) who had been taught to read and write, and permitted to go about preaching in the country, was at the bottom of this infernal brigandage. He was artful, impudent and vindicative, after having witnessed the atrocities committed against slaves and himself."
"I don’t blame you for writing of me as you have. You had to believe other stories, but then I don’t know if any one would believe anything good of me anyway."
"People thought me bad before, but if ever I should get free, I'll let them know what bad means."
"¿Quién es? ¿Quién es?"
"There was no emotion in my blood. There was no anger. There was nothing. It was dead silence in my brain."
"Dead, cold quiet, until he walked up. He looked at me... he walked past me and then I heard in my head. It said, 'Do it, do it, do it,' over and over again."
"I aimed at his back and pulled the trigger five times and all hell broke loose in my mind."
"I don't know how easy that would be but I'd try just to lead an ordinary life again. Stay out of the papers."
"There are not many places to go once you've killed someone like John Lennon."
"I just sought a way to be someone I wasn't. To be loved."
"Though movies (Taxi Driver for John Hinckley Jr., would-be assassin of Ronald Reagan), books (The Catcher in the Rye for Mark David Chapman, John Lennon’s murderer) and songs (Helter Skelter” for Tate-LaBianca murders mastermind Charles Manson) may articulate specific criminals acts, they don’t inspire the person’s desire for violence. Science has proven that in numerous studies. It’s tempting to blame movies, video games and rap music because they often express humanity’s worst impulses, but impulses are not actions for most of us. And for the mentally ill seeking violence, anything can set them off. Alek Minassian, the self-described incel (involuntary celibate) who deliberately drove his van into a crowd in Toronto in 2018, killing 10 people, said he was motivated by his resentment toward women for having sexually rejected him in favor of giving “their love and affection to obnoxious brutes.” Should we then demand that studios producing romantic comedies and publishers of romance novels be shamed into contributing to anti-incel causes? The 2017 Las Vegas shooter killed 59 and injured 851 during a country music festival. Should country music bear some responsibility?"
"The state would rather give me an uzi than a microphone."
"At the risk of quoting Mephistopheles I repeat: Welcome to hell. A hell erected and maintained by human-governments, and blessed by black robed judges. A hell that allows you to see your loved ones, but not to touch them. A hell situated in America's boondocks, hundreds of miles away from most families. A white, rural hell, where most of the captives are black and urban. It is an American way of death."
"Do you see law and order? There is nothing but disorder, and instead of law there is the illusion of security. It is an illusion because it is built on a long history of injustices: racism, criminality, and the genocide of millions. Many people say it is insane to resist the system, but actually, it is insane not to."
"The role of television is the illusion of company, noise. I call it the fifth wall and the second window: the window of illusion."
"I spend my days preparing for life, not preparing for death... They haven't stopped me from doing what I want every day. I believe in life, I believe in freedom, so my mind is not consumed with death. It's with love, life and those things. In many ways, on many days, only my body is here, because I am thinking about what's happening around the world."
"Politics is the art of making the people believe that they are in power, when in fact, they have none."
"The media, itself an arm of mega-corporate power, feeds the fear industry, so that people are primed like pumps to support wars on rumor, innuendo, legends, and lies."
"Once again, my family and I find ourselves being assaulted by the obscenity that is Mumia Abu-Jamal. On Sunday October 5th, my husband's killer will once again air his voice from what masquerades as a prison, and spew his thoughts and ideas at another college commencement. Mumia Abu-Jamal will be heard and honored as a victim and a hero by a pack of adolescent sycophants at Goddard College in Vermont. Despite the fact that 33 years ago, he loaded his gun with special high-velocity ammunition designed to kill in the most devastating fashion, then used that gun to rip my husband's freedom from him--today, Mumia Abu-Jamal will be lauded as a freedom fighter. Undoubtedly the administrators at Goddard who first accepted, then enthusiastically supported Abu-Jamal as their speaker will be moved by his "important message" when, if one distills that message to its basic meaning, it amounts to nothing more than the same worn out hatred for this country and everyone in law enforcement that Mumia Abu-Jamal has harbored his entire life. Many at Goddard College have said that this is a matter of Abu-Jamal's First Amendment right to speak and be heard. What a convenient way to dodge their responsibility to take a moral position on this situation. This is not a matter of First Amendment rights -- it's a matter of right and wrong. Across the country, people have been voicing their disgust with the wrong that the college is about to commit by allowing a convicted cop-killer to speak to them. Is this the message to be heard? How could they allow him to speak when Danny no longer has a voice? It is my opinion that all murderers should forfeit their right to free speech when they take the life of an innocent person. I have repeatedly seen college administrators deny conservative and religious speakers access to their campuses when even the tiniest minority feel their message is in some way offensive. What could be more offensive than having a person who violently took the life of another imparting his "unique perspective" on your students? Let's be honest. The instructors, administrators and graduates at Goddard College embrace having this killer as their commencement speaker not despite the fact that he brutally murdered a cop, but because he brutally murdered a cop. Otherwise, like so many other speakers that have been denied access to college campuses across the country, Goddard's administration would have lived up to their moral responsibility and pulled the plug on this travesty long ago. Shame on Goddard College and all associated with that school for choosing to honor an arrogant remorseless killer as their commencement speaker. Unfortunately, this is something that I am certain they will be proud of for the rest of their lives."
"Women-of all colors-are the fastest growing incarcerated group, two-thirds being mothers of dependent children. A growing population of lifers and people on death row. A death-penalty system tabulated strenuously to race. In the words of the death-row journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal, "the barest illusion of rehabilitation [is being] replaced by dehumanization by design" in the maximum-security, sensory-deprivation units of the penal system in the United States, and in prison policies overall."
"Let's do it."
"Death is the only inescapable unavoidable sure thing. We are sentenced to die the day we were born."
"You came to our country — you have driven us from our haunts, and disturbed us in our occupations. As we walk in our own country we are fired upon by the white men; why should the white men treat us so?"
"Do you recollect my having mentioned, some time ago, the murder of an outsettler on the Canning River by the natives? One of these, called Ya-gan, identified (on oath by a boy who escaped) as the principal actor, who took the spears from his companions and deliberately drove them one by one into the deceased (who had become entangled in a hedge while trying to escape), has been taken. The Government offered a reward for the apprehension of this Ya-gan, and some days ago he and two others, almost equally concerned, were seized by two boatmen, and brought to Perth: they had been fishing, and were enticed into the boat and there secured; they have been sent to Carnac, where they are to suffer solitary confinement and be taught our language. One of them escaped by swiming and diving across the river, where it is fully a mile in breadth."
"[T]he natives that were eating some food on Carnac Island have completely outwitted their guards; a boat was incautiously suffered to remain at the island before night, when they managed to get into it, and were miles off before their escape was discovered; and as there was no boat for pursuit, they reached the land. Their boat was found at Woodman's Point, with one oar; but no natives have been seen since. This occurrence is extremely provoking, as a knowledge of their language would soon have been acquired by us; and they were rapidly learning to make themselves intelligible. I understand they were very accurate in describing the rivers which lie to the north. Mr. Lyon, who superintended the native prisoners at Carnac, says they describe several rivers to the north; one of them large, and abounding with fish; but they could not be understood in their description of distances. It seems that the land is all parcelled out into districts among themselves, and that they rarely travel far from their own homes. The chief of this district is called "Worragonga": Ya-gan is the son of Worragonga. I write this from recollection; but it is no great matter [ 147 ]if I should have made a false heraldry in blazoning his pedigree."
"[S]ome of my letters must have gone astray, as you seem only to have heard incidentally about the spear thrown at me by the natives, and some other affairs which have been nearly forgotten by me. I must now tell you about the spear. One day (as children's tales commence) I was standing in the parlour between two windows, when I was startled by a smart heavy blow on the window frame at my left side; thinking it was a practical joke of some passing friend, I went out leisurely and was surprized to see two natives running away. On looking at the window, I found the point of a spear buried about two inches in the corner of the window frame; the spear lay under the window. I was, as you may suppose, more satisfied to see it there than sticking in my side, for which it seemed well aimed. This occurred long ago, and I have never seen a native here since; it was the celebrated Ya-gan, who so complimented me."
"Mr. Norcott we are informed had a narrow escape from that determined villian Yagan a few days ago, he happened to give him more than his share of biscuit, and endeavouring to take it away, when Yagan's ire was aroused, and his spear instantly pointed; this was done in the presence of several persons who restrained him. The reckless daring of this desperado who sets his life at a pin's fee, has been the subject of general observation, and we firmly believe for the most trivial offence even with a loaded musket at his breast, he would take the life of any man who provoked him. He is at the head and front of any mischief; it has been suggested that he should be again confined, but this we believe would only leave an opening for an equally daring successor. The chuckling style in which Yagan gives us to understand the manner in which they effected their escape from Carnac, is highly amusing; but a short time ago, he walked up to the door of the Jail at Fremantle, and after exchanging civilities with his late Keeper, marched off pointing significantly at the Jail, and then Carnac."
"I would take the liberty of suggesting to Capt. Ellis, if report speaks truly, the impropriety of allowing Yagan to distribute the bread. The propriety of allowing any of the natives to do this at present, is, perhaps questionable. But the conferring this honor upon Yagan is a gross insult to Yellowgonga, who is the leading Chief on this side of the water."
"Yagan, allowed by every one to be, of savages the most savage, wept with gratitude after I saved his life, and expressed his sense of the kindness shown to him in the strongest terms Yet this is the man who, in the midst of his guards, on a small island, where his life must have been the forfeit, could seize his spear; and, erect in all the pride of his native independence, determine to sell his life dearly, rather than submit even to an insult. Such are the men you have to deal with in the natives of Western Australia."
"We have been informed by Captain Ellis of an interesting fact, that Yagan the native we alluded to in a previous number as the daring chief of the tribe, hurried to him in the greatest anxiety during the time the fire was raging, and wished to know whether suspicion rested upon black man or white man; on its being intimated to him that the fire was purely accidental, he evinced by his expressions and gestures great delight. He made every exertion to procure water, and stimulated others by his cry for mocha, mocha. This we believe may be relied on, and is a striking trait in his character."
"On Saturday last, Yagan taking advantage of Mr. Watsons absence from home, he entered the house, and offered such violence as occasioned Mrs. Watsons hurrying in great agitation to the house of a neighbour for protection; finding his intention defeated, he endeavoured to remove her suspicions by calling her back and exclaiming "White Woman, very good! — good bye!" — but when he found his efforts unavailing, he made off in a different direction. The report of this occurrence reaching the ears of Capt. Ellis, the Superintendent of the native tribes, he, accompanied by Mr. Norcott and two soldiers took advantage of the first appearance of Yagan in the town of Perth, on the Monday, to conduct him with other natives to Mr. Watson's house, for the purpose of explaining to them the punishment which would attend a repetition of such an attempt as Yagan had been guilty of; however, on reaching the spot, Yagan, who had been entrapped once before, conscious of his offence, and apprehending danger, started into the bush followed by the others of his tribe. Ryan one of the privates of the 63d. misunderstanding Capt. Ellis's order hastily fired, but without injuring any of them;—Captain Ellis rode after them, but could not prevail upon them to return. Yagan and Migo (the man who was supposed to have been wounded), have since been in the town, and the whole affair which has been magnified into a desperate attack upon the natives, has thus ended as the mere idle gossip of the day."
"Yagan, whose portrait(by Mr. George Cruikshank) forms the frontispiece, was chief of the tribe of natives inhabiting the banks of the Swan, over whom his remarkable character had acquired an unusual ascendancy. He was strong and active, perfectly fearless, and the best spearsman of his tribe — but passionate, implacable and sullen; in short, a most complete and untameable savage. He very soon made his first essay against the settlers,by decamping with a bag of flour belonging to the commandant: the robbery was discovered, and a native, who gave information, led a party upon his trail with the quickness and sagacity of an Indian, until they found the flour, but not the thief, in a thick swamp. After leading his tribe in an unsuccessful attack upon the barracks at the Canning River — in which, it is said, he performed the romantic feat of burying the head of his spear in a tree from a distance of sixty yards — he was the principal actor in two murders, and a reward was offered by Government for his apprehension. For a considerable time he evaded pursuit, but was at length, with two other natives, enticed into a board by some fishermen, who pushed off into deep water, and, after a desperate resistance, secured him. Being removed for safety to an island off the coast, he made his escape, with his companions, and soon afterwards, accompanied by his own and another tribe, entered Fremantle in the night, and plundered the stores of a merchant, but not without the loss of one killed, and several who were wounded by the inhabitants, who fired on the marauders. To revenge this death, Yagan immediately proceeded to the Canning, and, having laid an ambuscade, killed two men who were driving a cart in advance of a party of settlers, who were moving up the river. He was now outlawed, and constantly pursued from place to place for three months. At length two brothers, shepherds, one eighteen the other fourteen, met him in the woods along with Weeip, a mountain chief, and five other natives. The boys instantly armed themselves each with a gun, and the elder, engaging Yagan in conversation until his head was in a line with the muzzle of his gun, shot him. The boys did not both escape; the elder was overtaken and speared. Yagan always shewed an inveterate hostility towards the Europeans. He certainly was a dangerous character, and decided steps were necessary to be taken, nor merely on account of his past behaviour, but also of a determination which he expressed, and would have no doubt carried into effect, of taking the lives of three "white men," in revenge for the death of his father, who had been shot by order of Government, upon being tried and convicted of murder. The justice of his death appears to have been recognised by his tribe; for after have propitiated the shade of their chief by taking — not, as had been their practice when one of their number had been killed by the Europeans, a white man's life, but — the lives of two individuals of an unoffending tribe, all hostility ceased, and a friendly feeling was soon established."
"Love is meant for husbands, but my love for Hitler is stronger. I would give my life for it."
"My God, what a lot of rubbish."
"He no longer listens to voices of reason. Those who tell him what he wants to hear are the only ones he believes."
"The Führer wants it thus, and Joseph must obey."
"I would rather have my children die, than live in disgrace, jeered at. My children stand no chance in Germany after the war."
"We will take them with us, because they are too good, too lovely for the world which lies ahead... no, no I must also take the children, I must! ...they will be given a strong sleeping draught. Afterwards, I mean when they are fast asleep, they will be given an injection of Evipan or something sufficient to...to..."
"We have demanded monstrous things from the German people, treated other nations with pitiless cruelty. For this the victors will exact their full revenge...we can't let them think we are cowards. Everybody else has the right to live. We haven't got this right—we have forfeited it. I make myself responsible. I belonged. I believed in Hitler and for long enough in Joseph Goebbels...Suppose I remain alive, I should immediately be arrested and interrogated about Joseph. If I tell the truth I must reveal what sort of man he was—must describe all that happened behind the scenes. Then any respectable person would turn from me in disgust. It would be equally impossible to do the opposite—that is to defend what he has done, to justify him to his enemies, to speak up for him out of true conviction...That would go against my conscience. So you see, Ello, it would be quite impossible for me to go on living. We will take the children with us, they are too good, too lovely for the world which lies ahead. In the days to come Joseph will be regarded as one of the greatest criminals that Germany has ever produced. His children would hear that said daily, people would torment them, despise and humiliate them. They would have to bear the burden of his sins and vengeance would be wreaked on them... It has all happened before. You know how I told you at the time quite frankly what the Führer said in the Café Anast in Munich when he saw the little Jewish boy, you remember? That he would like to squash him flat like a bug on the wall...I couldn't believe it and thought it was just provocative talk. But he really did it later. It was all so unspeakably gruesome..."
"Harald! My beloved son! By now we have been in the Führerbunker for six days already—daddy, your six little siblings and I, for the sake of giving our national socialistic lives the only possible honourable end ... You shall know that I stayed here against daddy's will, and that even on last Sunday the Führer wanted to help me to get out. You know your mother—we have the same blood, for me there was no wavering. Our glorious idea is ruined and with it everything beautiful and marvelous that I have known in my life. The world that comes after the Führer and national socialism is not any longer worth living in and therefore I took the children with me, for they are too good for the life that would follow, and a merciful God will understand me when I will give them the salvation ... The children are wonderful ... there never is a word of complaint nor crying. The impacts are shaking the bunker. The elder kids cover the younger ones, their presence is a blessing and they are making the Führer smile once in a while. May God help that I have the strength to perform the last and hardest. We only have one goal left: loyalty to the Führer even in death. Harald, my dear son—I want to give you what I learned in life: be loyal! Loyal to yourself, loyal to the people and loyal to your country ... Be proud of us and try to keep us in dear memory ..."
"We have made a solemn vow to each other: When we have conquered the Reich, we will become man and wife. I am very happy."
"My father and step-mother were left behind in Germany but, two days before the War started, they were asked to come to Gestapo Headquarters and given an exit visa. There is a story in the family which goes back to the First World War when my step-grandparents were asked to give shelter to a young woman who'd been displaced by the war in Belgium. Although she had a Jewish step-father, she eventually married Joseph Goebbels! My stepmother believes she may have acted as a sort of protecting hand and was involved with the exit visa. Certainly, the night before Kristallnacht, they got an anonymous phone call warning my father not to go home that evening but to go somewhere safe. My step-mother swore it was Magda Goebbels."
"Straight after Hitler's death, Mrs. Goebbels came down to the bunker with her children. She started preparing to kill them. She couldn't have done that above ground—there were other people there who would have stopped her. That's why she came downstairs—because no-one else was allowed in the bunker. She came down on purpose to kill them."
"Born to a premature death, a menial, subsistence-wage worker, odd-job man, the cleaner, the caught, the man under hatches, without bail-that's me, the colonial victim. Anyone who can pass the civil service examination today can kill me tomorrow. Anyone who passed the civil service examination yesterday can kill me today with complete immunity."
"Revolution within a modern industrial capitalist society can only mean the overthrow of all existing property relations and the destruction of all institutions that directly or indirectly support existing property relations. It must include the total suppression of all classes and individuals who endorse the present state of property relations or who stand to gain from it. Anything less than this is reform."
"Revolutionary change means the seizure of all that is held by the 1 percent, and the transference of these holdings into the hands of the remaining 99 percent. If the 1 percent are simply replaced by another 1 percent, revolutionary change has not taken place."
"When any election is held it will fortify rather than destroy the credibility of the power brokers. When we participate in this election to win, instead of disrupt, we're lending to its credibility."
"Prestige stands between the masses and a revolt against their class enemy. The aura of magic, glamour, luster and splendid permanence covers the fascists like a protective layer of fat. The slimy scales of majesty shield and conceal the dilapidation of the old bourgeois reign of terror."
"The prestige of power as the subjective effect of a past deed or reputation, real or fancied, then has a very definite life process."
"Prestige bars any serious attack on power. Do people attack a thing they consider with awe?"
"The debate ends, the action begins. It is not a question of the necessity of violence, but how to organize it to fit our unique situation, to tie it with flawless exactitude to our political activity, and to organize it immediately."
"The government of the U.S.A. and all that it stands for, all that it represents, must be destroyed. This is the starting point, and the end. We have the means to this end; the problem is to develop acceptance of their use."
"Top-heavy establishment organizations that exist openly are always a reflection of the men who staff them."
"Waiting for power to move to its inevitable collapse is suicidal for all concerned. Blacks and other Third World peoples have the very imminent prospect of genocidal tactics to contend with, and we can now all see that the modern industrial state, motivated by exclusive groups of capitalist masters, cannot regulate itself to make possible an inclusive production and distribution of goods, or production without a massive waste of resources and destruction of all that stands about. The debate ends, the action begins. It is not question of the necessity of violence, but of how to organize it."
"Our aim is to stop the life cycle of the enemy culture and replace it with our own revolutionary culture. This can be done only by creating perfect disorder within the cycle of the enemy culture's life process and leaving a power vacuum to be filled by our building revolutionary culture."
"An electoral choice of ten different fascists is like choosing which way one wishes to die. The holder of so-called high public office is always merely an extension of the hated ruling corporate class."
"This is a huge nation dominated by the most reactionary and violent ruling class in the history of the world, where the majority of the people just simply cannot understand that they are existing on the misery and discomfort of the world."
"How can the establishment protect an electrical supply line and the thousands of transformers, etc.? Effective positioning of the guards is militarily impossible. ... We must call strikes to enforce our demands on capital. To enforce the strike we must stop the plant's power source. Standing in the gateway with a placard and a pamphlet alone will not dull a worker's short-term interest in wage slavery."
"There are no good aspects of monopoly capital, so no reservations need be recognized in its destruction. Monopoly capital is the enemy. It crushes the life force of all of the people. It must be completely destroyed, as quickly as possible, utterly, totally, ruthlessly, relentlessly destroyed."
"The mass psycho-social national cohesiveness has trembled on the brink of disruption and disintegration repeatedly over the last fifty years, threatening to fly apart from its own concentric inner dynamics. But at each crisis it was allowed to reform itself; with each reform, revolution became more remote."
"After the fascists have succeeded in crushing the vanguard elements and the threat they pose is removed, the ruling class goes on about the business of making profits as usual. The significance of the “new fascist arrangement" lies in the fact that this business-as-usual is accompanied by concessions to the degenerate segment of the working class, with the aim of creating a buffer zone between the ruling class and the still potentially revolutionary segments of the lower classes."
"Intellectuals still argue whether Amerika is a fascist country. This concern is typical of the Amerikan left’s flight from reality. ... This is actually a manifestation of the authoritarian process seeping into its own psyche."
"The revolution has failed. Fascism has temporarily succeeded under the guise of reform. The only way we can destroy it is to refuse to compromise with the enemy state and its ruling class."
"From its inception, the fascist arrangement has attempted to create the illusion of a mass society in which the traditional capitalist ruling class would continue to play its leading role."
"Hierarchy has had six thousand years of trial. It will never succeed for long in any form. ... My opinion is that we are at the historical climax (the flash point) of the totalitarian period."
"Fascism must be seen as an episodically logical stage in the socio-economic development of capitalism in a state of crisis. It is the result of a revolutionary thrust that was weak and miscarried — a consciousness that was compromised."
"The fascist arrangement tolerates the existence of no valid revolutionary activity. It has programmed into its very nature a massive, complex and automatic defense mechanism for all our old methods for raising the consciousness of a potentially revolutionary class of people. The essence of a U.S.A. totalitarian socio-political capitalism is concealed behind the illusion of a mass participatory society. We must rip away its mask. Then the debate can end, and we can enter a new phase of struggle based on the development of an armed revolutionary culture that will triumph."
"Democratic Centralism is the only way to deal effectively with the Amerikan ordeal. The central committee of the people's vanguard party must make its presence felt through the various levels of the overall movement."
"I deny the existence of black racism outright, by fiat I deny it. Too much black blood has flowed between the chasm that separates the races. It's fundamentally unfair to expect the black man to differentiate at a glance between the various kinds of white racism."
"All levels of struggle must be conceived as inclined planes leading inexorably to a point where armed conflict will engulf two or more sections of the people."
"The theory of an existing and benevolent god simply doesn't make sense to anyone who is rational. A benevolent and omnipotent god would never allow such imbalances as I see to exist for one second. If by chance I am wrong, however I must then assume that being born black called for some automatic punishment for sins I know nothing about, and being innocent it behooves me to defy god."
"M.L.K. organized his thoughts much in the same manner as your have organized yours. If you really knew and fully understood his platform you would never have expressed sch sentiments as you did in your last letter. I am sure you are acquainted with the fact that he was opposed to violence and war; he was indeed a devout pacifist. It is very odd, almost unbelievable,that so violent and tumultuous a setting as this can still produce such men. He was out of place, out of season, too naive, too innocent, too cultured, too civil for these times. That is why his end was so predictable."
"I'm convinced that it is the psychopathic personality that searches out a uniform. There's little doubt of what's going on in that man's head who will voluntarily don any uniform."
"Fortune must soon smile on me because sincere effort is always rewarded. Nature allows no such imbalances.. I am assured and completely self-possessed in he knowledge that all contradictions and conflicts must one day be resolved."
"If children being blown out of this existence while attending church services, men being lunched for a gesture, colonialism, the inquisition, and H-bombs haven't affected you, nothing I say h ere can help you. If you could live my life one week and see the things I see, feel the pain I feel, and die a little bit each day as I do all your illusions and apparitions would vanish."
"Do you know who I blame for what has happened to me the last 25 years, and before to my ancestors? I would be narrow-minded indeed if I blamed any of you, my folks. I don't blame you for not teaching me how to get what i wanted without getting put in jail, nor do I blame myself. I was born knowing nothing and am a product of my total surroundings. I blame the capitalistic dog, the imperialistic, cave-dwelling brute that kidnapped us, pulled the rug from under us, made us a caste within his society with no vertical economic mobility. As soon as all this became clear to me and I developed the nerve to admit it to myself, that we were defeated in war and are now captives, slaves or actually that we inherited a neoslave existence, I immediately become relaxed, always expecting the worst, and started working on the remedy. Can you play chess? it relaxes, builds foresight, alertness, concentration, and judgement. Learn, so we can play next year."
"It is difficult, very difficult to get any facts concerning our history and our way of life. The lies, half-truths, and propaganda have won total sway over the facts. We have no knowledge of our heritage. Our economic status has reduced knowledge of our heritage. Our economic status has reduced our minds to a state of complete oblivion. The young black who comes out of college of the university is as ignorant and unlearned as the white laborer. For all practical purposes he is worse of than when he went in, for he has learned only the attitudes and ways of the snake, and a few well-worded lies. The ruling culture refuses to let us know how much we did to advance civilization in our lands long ago. It refuses to recognize and appreciate our craft and strength an allow us some of the fruits of our labor. All this has left an emptiness in our lives, a void, a vacuum that must soon be filled by hostilities, I am most certainly committed, until the day I'm sent to the warrior's rest. By the ruling culture's acts of greed and barbarism the uncommitted will soon learn that compromise with such an enemy is impossible. Our two fortunes move along a collision course."
"Patience has its limits. Take it too far and it's cowardice."
"Change does come, but not when or in the ways we want it to come. George Jackson, Malcolm X-now people all over the world were changed by them. Because they told the secret; now, the secret was out. (“And the secret?”) Put it this way. In 1968, along with Lord Caradon (British Delegate to the United Nations then), I addressed an assembly of the World Council of Churches in Switzerland on "white racism or world community?" When Lord Caradon was asked why the West couldn't break relations with South Africa, he brought out charts and figures that showed that the West would be bankrupt if they did that: the prosperity of the West is standing on the back of the South African miner. When he stands up, the whole thing will be over."
"George Jackson was murdered by mindless, carbine-toting San Quentin guards because he refused, he resisted, and he helped to teach his fellow prisoners that there was hope through struggle."
"George grew into manhood in prison, educated himself, and became a revolutionary. The publication of his prison letters in 1971 would make him famous because of his keen intelligence and gift for self-expression."
"Reading Blood In My Eye, I discovered that capitalist-private property relations are the source of class inequalities, which is the primary factor in my being a member of a class that bears all the burdens of society without enjoying its advantages. Under the influence of illegitimate-capitalist values, I was pursuing the alleviation of social-economic hardship through individual advancement. This is a wholly inadequate remedy to social problems because it doesn’t challenge the fundamental injustice of class-exploitation and class-oppression, which are responsible for creating the socio-economic ills in the first place. Unaware of my class interest, I was perpetuating my own oppression by engaging in competitive capitalist practices that ensure the smooth functioning of the system as the exploiting minority profits in more ways than one off the division and disunity engendered by competition, so prevalent amongst the exploited. Look around: competition, euphemistically called “individuality,” permeates and is systematically promoted to the masses of people while the corporate conglomerations and Fortune 500 are busy “merging and monopolizing.”"
"Our nation is far from what it was and what it should be. I have seen so many depressing changes made in my time that I cannot imagine what it must be like for you. There is so much wrong and on so many levels only passing through the crucible of another revolution can get us back the liberties we once had... I do not pretend to know what that revolution will look like or even if it would be successful..."
"If I am dead I would like to be buried in a wood coffin (no lead lined casket!) So that my remains can return to where they came from. I understand that this might not be possible though, laws and what not, so don't sweat it."
"Also, light a candle for me at the Russian or Greek Orthodox Church in Stroudsburg from time to time. It doesn't need to be during a liturgy, just whenever they are open. I am sure you can figure it out..."
"If I am still alive and free know that I will do my best to remain as such. And as time goes by, if circumstances change, if my spark hit good tinder, then I may be able to return one day..."
"I squandered so much opportunity and support and rarely tried my best at anything. God knows I do not deserve the things I had, maybe because he knew I would be sacrificing all of it in the end, or maybe this is just the final squander. Who knows."
"Had to run. Jeep stuck. Ditched the (rifle.) Went on foot, heading southwest to stream under (Interstate) 84."
"Slept all day in abandoned camper. Crossed 84. No (police) activity. Started campfire."
"Set up shelter and cleaned up... to let them know I’m still alive. Got text saying I’m a suspect. Saw patrol. Not spotted. They stuck to the trails. Listened to radio. News media calling me a ‘survivalist.’ Ha! Catchy phrase I guess. Shelter-in-place (ordered) by spooked cops."
"Found two packages of crackers. Broke into a place. … Took rice, Ramen and oil. Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy."
"I love him with all of my heart. I don't want my son on death row. He was a sweet person."
"I failed Eric as a father."
"He made me feel like someone actually loved me."
"He was my big brother, he was somebody that I looked up to. He was my protector."
"I had the opportunity to fish as a kid, I just follow through with it. I'm not the best fisherman in the world, but I have a lot more fun than a lot of my other fishing friends in this world, who think they're supposedly experts. Sometimes the fish cooperate, sometimes they don't."
"Please, see to it that mercy is not imposed on me. I want to show that through me, Gandhiji’s non-violence is being hanged."
"Born in a devotional Brahmin family, I instinctively came to revere Hindu religion, Hindu history and Hindu culture. I had, therefore, been intensely proud of Hinduism as a whole. As I grew up I developed a tendency to free thinking unfettered by any superstitious allegiance to any isms, political or religious. That is why I worked actively for the eradication of untouchability and the caste system based on birth alone. I openly joined RSS wing of anti-caste movements and maintained that all Hindus were of equal status as to rights, social and religious and should be considered high or low on merit alone and not through the accident of birth in a particular caste or profession."
"I used publicly to take part in organized anti-caste dinners in which thousands of Hindus, Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, Chamars and Bhangis participated. We broke the caste rules and dined in the company of each other. I have read the speeches and writings of Ravana, Chanakiya, Dadabhai Naoroji, Vivekanand, Gokhale, Tilak, along with the books of ancient and modern history of India and some prominent countries like England, France, America and Russia. Moreover I studied the tenets of Socialism and Marxism. But above all I studied very closely whatever Veer Savarkar and Gandhiji had written and spoken, as to my mind these two ideologies have contributed more to the moulding of the thought and action of the Indian people during the last thirty years or so, than any other single factor has done."
"All this reading and thinking led me to believe it was my first duty to serve Hindudom and Hindus both as a patriot and as a world citizen. To secure the freedom and to safeguard the just interests of some thirty crores (300 million) of Hindus would automatically constitute the freedom and the well-being of all India, one fifth of human race."
"‘15. I have never made a secret about the fact that I supported the ideology, which was opposed to that of Gandhiji. I firmly believed that the teachings of absolute Ahimsa as advocated by Gandhiji would ultimately result in the emasculation of the Hindu community incapable of resisting the aggression of other communities especially the Muslims. To counter this evil I decided to enter public life and as a part of the propaganda started a daily newspaper Agrani. I might mention that is not so much Gandhi’s Ahimsa that we were opposed to but his bias for Muslims, prejudicial and detrimental to the Hindu Community and its interests. I have fully described my point of view and have quoted instances when how Gandhi became responsible for a number of calamities which the Hindu community had to suffer and undergo.’"
"‘16. On 13th of January 1948. I learnt that Gandhiji had decided to go on fast unto death. The reason given for such fast was that he wanted an assurance of Hindu-Muslim unity in Indian Dominion. But I and many others could easily see that the real motive behind the fast was not merely the so-called Hindu-Muslim Unity, but to compel the Dominion Government to pay the sum of Rs. 55 crores to Pakistan, the payment of which was emphatically refused by the Government.’"
"25. Having reached Delhi in great despair, I visited the refugee camps at Delhi. While moving in the camps my thoughts took a definite and final turn. Chancely I came across a refugee who was dealing in arms and he showed me the pistol. I was tempted to have it and I bought it from him. It is the pistol which I later used in the shots I fired. On coming to the Delhi Railway station I spent the night of 29th thinking and re-thinking about my resolve to end the present chaos and further destruction of the Hindus."
"‘49. The territory bounded by the North Western Frontier in the North and Cape Comorin in the South and the areas between Karachi and Assam, that is the whole of pre-partition India, has always been to me my motherland. In this vast area live people of various faiths and I hold that these creeds should have full and equal freedom for following their ideals and beliefs. In this area the Hindus are the most numerous. They have no place which they can call their own beyond or outside this country. Hindusthan is thus both motherland and the holy land for the Hindus from times immemorial. To the Hindus largely this country owes its fame and glory, its culture and art, knowledge, science and philosophy. Next to the Hindus, the Muslims are numerically predominant. They made systematic inroads into this country since the 10th century and gradually succeeded in establishing Muslim rule over the greater part of India."
"‘50. Before the advent of the British, both Hindus and Muslims as a result of centuries of experience had come to realise that the Muslims could not remain as masters in India; nor could they be driven away. Both had clearly understood that both had come to stay. Owing to the rise of the Mahrattas, the revolt of the Rajputs and the uprise of the Sikhs, the Muslim hold on the country had become very feeble and although some of them continued to aspire for supremacy in India, practical people could see clearly that such hopes were futile. On the other hand, the British had proved more powerful in battle and in intrigue than either the Hindus or Mussalmans, and by their adoption of improved methods of administration and the assurance of the security of the life and property without any discrimination both the Hindus and the Muslims accepted them as inevitable. ‘50 (continued). Differences between the Hindus and the Muslims did exist even before the British came. Nevertheless it is a fact that the British made the most unscrupulous use of these differences and created more differences in order to maintain their power and authority. The Indian National Congress which was started with the object of winning power for the people in the governance of the country had from the beginning kept before it the ideal of complete nationalism which implies that all Indians should enjoy equal rights and complete equality on the basis of democracy. This ideal of removing the foreign rule and replacing it by the democratic power and authority of the people appealed to me most from the very start of my public career.’"
"‘51. In my writings and speeches, I have always advocated that the religious and communal consideration should be entirely eschewed in the public affairs of the country, at elections, inside and outside the legislatures and in the making and unmaking of Cabinets. I have throughout stood for a secular State with joint electorates and to my mind this is the only sensible thing to do. (…)’ ‘51 (continued). Under the influence of the Congress, this ideal was steadily making headway amongst the Hindus. But the Muslims as a community first stood aloof and later on under the corroding influence of the Divide and Rule Policy of foreign masters were encouraged to cherish the ambition of dominating the Hindus. The first indication of this outlook was the demand for separate electorates instigated by the then Viceroy Lord Minto in 1906. The British Government accepted this demand under the excuse of minority protection. While the Congress party offered a verbal opposition, it progressively supported separatism by ultimately adopting the notorious formula of “neither accepting nor rejecting” in 1934.’"
"‘52. Thus had originated and intensified the demand for the disintegration of this country. What was the thin end of the wedge in the beginning became Pakistan in the end. The mistake however was begun with the laudable object of bringing out a united front amongst all classes in India in order to drive out the foreigner and it was hoped that separatism would eventually disappear.’ 53. In spite of my advocacy of joint electorates, in principle I reconciled myself with the temporary introduction of separate electorates since the Muslims were keen on them. I however insisted that representation should be granted in strict proportion to the number of every community and no more. I have uniformly maintained this stand.’"
"Since the year 1920, that is, after the demise of Lokmanya Tilak, Gandhiji’s influence in the Congress first increased and then became supreme. His activities for public awakening were phenomenal in their intensity and were reinforced by the slogan of truth and non-violence which he paraded ostentatiously before the country. No sensible or enlightened person could object to those slogans. In fact there is nothing new or original in them.. They are implicit in every constitutional public movement. But it is nothing but a mere dream if you imagine that the bulk of mankind is, or can ever become, capable of scrupulous adherence to these lofty principles in its normal life from day to day."
"In fact, honour, duty and love of one’s own kith and kin and country might often compel us to disregard non-violence and to use force. I could never conceive that an armed resistance to an aggression is unjust. I would consider it a religious and moral duty to resist and, if possible, to overpower such an enemy by use of force. Rama killed Ravana in a tumultuous fight and relieved Sita.. Krishna killed Kansa to end his wickedness; and Arjuna had to fight and slay quite a number of his friends and relations including the revered Bhishma because the latter was on the side of the aggressor. It is my firm belief that in dubbing Rama, Krishna and Arjuna as guilty of violence, the Mahatma betrayed a total ignorance of the springs of human action. In more recent history, it was the heroic fight put up by Chhatrapati Shivaji that first checked and eventually destroyed the Muslim tyranny in India. It was absolutely essentially for Shivaji to overpower and kill an aggressive Afzal Khan, failing which he would have lost his own life. In condemning history’s towering warriors like Shivaji, Rana Pratap and Guru Gobind Singh as misguided patriots, Gandhiji has merely exposed his self-conceit."
"‘57. Each of the heroes in his time resisted aggression on our country, protected the people against the atrocities and outrages by alien fanatics and won back the motherland from the invader. On the other hand, during more than thirty years of the undisputed leadership of the Mahatma, there were more desecrations of temples, more forcible and fraudulent conversions, more outrages on women and finally the loss of one third of the country. It is therefore astounding that his followers cannot see what is clear even to the blind, viz. that the Mahatma was a mere pygmy before Shivaji, Rana Pratap and Guru Govind. His condemnation of these illustrious heroes was to say the least, most presumptuous. ‘58. The clique which has got into power with the patronage of British imperialism by a cowardly surrender to the Partition of India at the point of Muslim violence is now trying to exploit Gandhiji’s death in hundred hectic ways for its own selfish aims. But history will give to them their proper place in the niche of fame. Gandhiji was, paradoxical as it may appear, a violent pacifist who brought untold calamities on the country in the name of truth and non-violence, while Rana Pratap, Shivaji and the Guru will remain enshrined in the hearts of their countrymen for ever and for the freedom they brought to them.’"
"‘65. ...The Muslims ran the Khilafat Committee as a distinct political religious organisation and throughout maintained it as a separate entity from the Congress; and very soon the Moplah Rebellion showed that the Muslims had not the slightest idea of national unity on which Gandhiji had set his heart and had staked so much. There followed, as usual in such cases, a huge slaughter of the Hindus, numerous forcible conversions, rape and arson. The British Government, entirely unmoved by the rebellion, suppressed it in a few months and left to Gandhiji the joy of his Hindu-Muslim unity. The Khilafat agitation had failed and let down Gandhiji. British Imperialism emerged stronger, the Muslims became more fanatical and the consequences were visited on the Hindus. (…) ‘65 (continued). The services began to be distributed on communal basis and the Muslims obtained high jobs from our British Masters not on merit, but by remaining aloof from the struggle for freedom and because of their being the followers of Islam. Government patronage to Muslims in the name of minority protection penetrated throughout the body-politic of the Indian State and the Mahatma’s meaningless slogans were no match against this wholesale corruption of the Muslim mind. But Gandhiji did not relent. He still lived in the hope of being the common leader both of the Hindus and Muslims and the more he was defeated, the more he indulged in encouraging the Muslims by extravagant methods. The position continued to deteriorate and by 1925, it became patent to all that the Government had won all along the line; but like the proverbial gambler, Gandhiji increased his stake. He agreed to the separation of Sindh [from the Bombay Presidency] and to the creation of a separate province in the N.W. Frontier. He also went on conceding one undemocratic demand after another to the Muslim League in the vain hope of enlisting its support in the national struggle. (…)’"
"66 ‘Indeed in the subsequent years the Congress policy can be quite correctly described as “Peace at any Price” and “Congress in Office at all costs”. The Congress compromised with the British who placed it in office and in return, the Congress surrendered to the violence of Mr. Jinnah, carved out one-third of India to him, an explicitly racial and theological State, and destroyed two million human beings in the process. Pandit Nehru now professes again and again that the Congress stands for a secular State and violently denounces those who remind him that only last year he agreed to a communal and theological State; his vociferous adherence to a “Secular State” is nothing but a case of “my lady protests too much”.’"
"‘68. This section summarises the background of the agony of India’s Partition and the tragedy of Gandhiji’s assassination. Neither the one nor the other gives me any pleasure to record or to remember, but the Indian people and the world at large ought to know the history of the last thirty years during which India has been torn into pieces by the Imperialist policy of the British and under a mistaken policy of communal unity. ‘(…) virtually the non-Muslim minority in Western Pakistan have been liquidated either by the most brutal murders or by a forced tragic removal from their moorings of centuries; the same process is furiously at work in Eastern Pakistan. One hundred and ten millions [lakhs, i.e. eleven million] of people have become torn from their homes, of which not less than four millions are Muslims, and when I found that even after such terrible results, Gandhiji continued to pursue the same policy of appeasement, my blood boiled, and I could not tolerate him any longer. (…)’ ‘69. The accumulating provocation of 32 years culminating in his last pro-Muslim fast goaded me to the conclusion that the existence of Gandhiji should be brought to an end immediately. On coming back to India [from South Africa], he developed a subjective mentality under which he alone was to be the final judge of what was right and wrong. If the country wanted his leadership it had to accept his infallibility; if it did not, he would stand aloof from the Congress and carry on in his own way. Against such an attitude there can be no half way house; either the Congress had to surrender its will to his and had to be content with playing the second fiddle to all his eccentricity, whimsicality, metaphysics and primitive vision, or it had to carry on without him. He alone was the Judge of everyone and every thing; he was the master brain guiding the civil disobedience movement; no other could know the technique of that movement. He alone knew when to begin and when to withdraw it. The movement might succeed or fail, it might bring untold disaster and political reverses but that could make no difference to the Mahatma’s infallibility. ‘A Satyagrahi can never fail’ was his formula for declaring his own infallibility and nobody except himself knew what a Satyagrahi is. Thus, the Mahatma became the judge and jury in his own cause. These childish insanities and obstinacies, coupled with a most severe austerity of life, ceaseless work and lofty character made Gandhi formidable and irresistible. Many people thought that his politics were irrational but they had either to withdraw from the Congress or place their intelligence at his feet to do with as he liked. In a position of such absolute irresponsibility Gandhi was guilty of blunder after blunder, failure after failure, disaster after disaster.’"
"‘70 (b). Moplah Rebellion. Malabar, Punjab, Bengal and N.W. Frontier Province were the scene of repeated outrages on the Hindus. The Moplah rebellion, as it was called, was the most prolonged and concentrated attack on the Hindu religion, Hindu honour, Hindu life and Hindu property (…). The Mahatma, who had brought about all this calamity on India by his communal policy, kept mum. He never uttered a single word of reproach against the aggressors nor did he allow the Congress to take any active steps whereby repetition of such outrages could be prevented. On the other hand, he went to the length of denying the numerous cases of forcible conversions in Malabar and actually published in his paper, “Young India” that there was only one case of forcible conversion. His own Muslim friends informed him that he was wrong and that the forcible conversions were numerous in Malabar. He never corrected his misstatements, but went to the absurd length of starting a relief fund for the Moplahs instead of their victims; but the promised land of Hindu-Muslim unity was not yet in sight.’ ‘70 (c). Afghan Amir Intrigue. When the Khilafat Movement failed, the Ali Brothers decided to do something which might keep alive the Khilafat sentiments. Their slogan was that whoever was the enemy of the Khilafat was also the enemy of Islam, and as the British were chiefly responsible for the defeat and the dethronement of the Sultan of Turkey, every faithful Muslim was in solemn duty bound to be a bitter enemy of Britain. With that object, they secretly intrigued to invite the Amir of Afghanistan to invade India and promised every support. There is a long history behind this intrigue; the Ali Brothers never denied their share in the conspiracy. The Mahatma pursued his tactics of getting Hindu-Muslim unity by supporting the Ali Brothers through thick and through thin. (…) ‘70 (c) (continued). Even with regard to the invasion of India by the Amir, the Mahatma directly and indirectly supported the Ali Brothers. This is proved beyond the shadow of doubt. The late Mr. [Srinivasa] Shastri, Mr. C.Y. Chintamani the editor of The Leader of Allahabad and even the Mahatma’s life-long friend, the late Rev. C.F. Andrews, told him quite clearly that his speeches and writings amounted to a definite support to the Ali Brothers in their invitation to the Amir of Afghanistan to invade India. The following quotations from the Mahatma’s writing in those days should make it clear that he had forgotten his own country in his one consuming desire to please the Muslims and had become a party to the invasion of his motherland by a foreign ruler. The Mahatma supported the invasion in the following words: I cannot understand why the Ali Brothers are going to be arrested as the rumours go, and why I am to remain free. They have done nothing which I would not do. If they had sent a message to the Amir, I also would send one to inform the Amir that if he came, no Indian so long as I can help it, would help the Government to drive him back. ‘70 (d.) (i). Attack on Arya Samaj. Gandhiji ostentatiously displayed his love for Muslims by a most unworthy and unprovoked attack on the Arya Samaj in 1924. He publicly denounced the Samaj for its supposed sins of omission and commission; it was an utterly unwarranted, reckless and discreditable attack, but whatever would please the Mohammedans was the heart’s desire of Gandhiji. The Arya Samaj made a powerful but polite retort and for some time Gandhiji was silenced, but the growing political influence of Gandhiji weakened the Arya Samaj. (…)"
"‘70 (d.) (ii). Gandhiji’s attack did not improve his popularity with the Muslims but it provoked a Muslim youth to murder Swami Shraddhanandaji within a few months. The charge against the Samaj that it was a reactionary body was manifestly false. Everybody knew that far from being a reactionary body, the Samaj had been the vanguard of social reforms among the Hindus. The Samaj had for a hundred years stood for the abolition of untouchability long before the birth of Gandhiji. The Samaj had popularised widow remarriage. The Samaj had denounced the caste system and preached the oneness of not merely the Hindus, but of all those who were prepared to follow its tenets. Gandhiji was completely silenced for some time, but his leadership made the people forget his baseless attack on the Arya Samaj and even weakened the Samaj to a large extent. (…)’ ‘70 (e). Separation of Sindh. By 1928, Mr. Jinnah’s stock had risen very high and the Mahatma had already conceded many unfair and improper demands of Mr. Jinnah at the expense of Indian democracy and the Indian nation and the Hindus. The Mahatma even supported the separation of Sindh from the Bombay Presidency and threw the Hindus of Sind to the communal wolves. Numerous riots took place in Sindh-Karachi, Sukkur, Shikarpur and other places in which the Hindus were the only sufferers and the Hindu-Muslim unity receded further from the horizon.’ ‘70 (f). League’s Good Bye to Congress. With each defeat, Gandhiji became even more keen on his method of achieving Hindu-Muslim unity. Like the gambler who had lost heavily, he became more desperate increasing his stakes each time and indulged in the most irrational concessions if only they could placate Mr. Jinnah and enlist his support under the Mahatma’s leadership in the fight for freedom. But the aloofness of the Muslims from the Congress increased with the advance of years and the Muslim League refused to have anything to do with the Congress after 1928. (…)’"
"‘70 (j). Cripps’ Partition Proposal Accepted. The Congress did not know its own mind as to whether it should support the war, oppose or remain neutral. All these attitudes were expressed in turn one after the other; (…) The war was carried on without let or hindrance till 1942. The Government could get all the men, all the money, and all the material which their war efforts needed. Every Government loan was fully subscribed... ‘In 1942, came the Cripps Mission (…) with a clear hint of partition of India in the background. Naturally the Mission failed, but the Congress even while opposing the Mission’s proposals yielded to the principle of partition (…) At a meeting of the All India Congress Committee held in April 1942 at Allahabad, the principle of partition was repudiated by an overwhelming majority (…) but Maulana Azad, the so-called nationalist Muslim, was then the President of the Congress. He gave a ruling a few months later that the Allahabad Resolution had no effect on the earlier resolution of the Working Committee which conceded the principle of Pakistan however remotely. The Congress was entirely at the end of its wits. (…)’"
"‘70 (l). Hindi versus Hindustani. Absurdly pro-Muslim policy of Gandhiji is nowhere more blatantly illustrated than in his perverse attitude on the question of the National Language of India. By all the tests of a scientific language, Hindi has the most prior claim to be accepted as the National Language of this country. In the beginning of his career in India, Gandhiji gave a great impetus to Hindi, but as he found that the Muslims did not like it, he became a turncoat and blossomed forth as the champion of what is called Hindustani. Every body in India knows that there is no language called Hindustani; it has no grammar; it has no vocabulary; it is a mere dialect; it is spoken but not written. It is a bastard tongue and a crossbreed between Hindi and Urdu and not even the Mahatma’s sophistry could make it popular; but in his desire to please the Muslims, he insisted that Hindustani alone should be the national language of India. (…) ‘All his experiments were at the expense of the Hindus. His was a one-way traffic in his search of Hindu-Muslim unity. The charm and the purity of the Hindi language was to be prostituted to please the Muslims, but even Congressmen, apart from the rest of India, refused to digest this nostrum. For practical purpose, Hindustani is only Urdu under a different name, but Gandhiji could not have the courage to advocate the adoption of Urdu as against Hindi, hence the subterfuge to smuggle Urdu under the garb of Hindustani. Urdu is not banned by any nationalist Hindu, but to smuggle it under the garb of Hindustani is a fraud and a crime. (…) The bulk of the Hindus however proved to be stronger and more loyal to their culture and to their mother tongue and refused to bow down to the Mahatmic fiat. The result was that Gandhiji did not prevail in the Hindi Parishad and had to resign from that body; his pernicious influence however remains and the Congress Governments in India still hesitate whether to select Hindi or Hindustani as the National Language of India.’"
"‘70 (m). Vande Mataram Not to Be Sung. The infatuation of Gandhiji for the Muslims and his incorrigible craving for Muslim leadership without any regard for right and wrong, for truth or justice, and in utter contempt for the sentiments of the Hindus as a whole was the high watermark of the Mahatmic benevolence. It is notorious that some Muslims disliked the celebrated song of Vande Mataram and the Mahatma forthwith stopped its singing or recital wherever he could. This song has been honored for a century as the most inspiring exhortation to the Bengalees to stand up like one man for their nation. In the anti-partition agitation of 1905 in Bengal the song came to a special prominence and popularity. The Bengalees swore by it and dedicated themselves to the Motherland at countless meetings where this song was sung. The British Administrator did not understand the true meaning of the song ‘which simply meant ‘Hail Motherland’ Government therefore banned its singing forty years ago for some time. That only led to its increased popularity all over the country. It continued to be sung at all Congress and other national gatherings but as soon as one Muslim objected to it Gandhiji utterly disregarded the national sentiment behind it and persuaded the Congress also not to insist upon singing as the national song. (…) The right way to proceed would have been to enlighten the ignorant and remove the prejudice, but that is a policy which during the thirty years of unbounded popularity and leadership Gandhiji could not muster courage to try. (…)’ ‘70 (n). Shiva Bavani Banned. Gandhiji banned the public recital or perusal of Shiva Bavani, a beautiful collection of 52 verses by a Hindu poet in which he had extolled the great power of Shivaji and the protection which he brought to the Hindu community and the Hindu religion. The refrain of that collection says: “If there were no Shivaji, the entire country would have been converted to Islam.” (…)’"
"‘70 (o). On the 16th of August 1946 (…) there broke out in Calcutta an open massacre of the Hindus which continued for three days unchecked. (…) At the time, it was considered that the Government which could permit such outrages on its citizens must be thrown out (…). Gandhiji, however, went to Calcutta and contracted a strange friendship with the author of these massacres; in fact he intervened on behalf of Suhrawardy and the Muslim League [and] publicly described Suhrawardy as a martyr.’ ... ‘70 (o). Suhrawardy Patronised. (…) On the 16th of August 1946 (…) there broke out in Calcutta an open massacre of the Hindus which continued for three days unchecked. (…) At the time, it was considered that the Government which could permit such outrages on its citizens must be thrown out (…). Gandhiji, however, went to Calcutta and contracted a strange friendship with the author of these massacres; in fact he intervened on behalf of Suhrawardy and the Muslim League [and] publicly described Suhrawardy as a martyr.’ (…) Attitude towards Hindu and Muslim Princes. Gandhiji’s followers successfully humiliated the Jaipur, Bhavnagar and Rajkot States. They enthusiastically supported even a rebellion in Kashmir State against the Hindu Prince. This attitude strangely enough contrasts with what Gandhiji did about the affairs in Muslim States. There was a Muslim League intrigue in Gwalior States as a result of which the Maharaja was compelled to abandon the celebrations of the second millennium of the Vikram Calendar four years ago: the Muslim agitation was based on pure communalism. The Maharaja is the liberal and impartial ruler with a far sighted outlook. In a recent casual Hindu-Muslim clash in Gwalior because the Musalmans suffered some casualties, Gandhiji came down upon the Maharaja with a vitriolic attack wholly undeserved."
"‘70 (q). Gandhiji on Fast to Capacity. In 1943, while Gandhiji was on fast to capacity (…) Mr. C. Rajagopalachari smuggled himself into Gandhiji’s room and hatched a plot of conceding Pakistan, which Gandhiji allowed him to negotiate with Jinnah. Gandhiji later on discussed this matter with Mr. Jinnah in the latter part of 1944 and offered Mr. Jinnah virtually what is now called Pakistan. (…) ‘70 (r). Desai-Liaqat Agreement. In 1945 came the notorious Desai-Liaqat Agreement. (…) Under that agreement, the late Bhulabhai Desai, the then leader of the Congress Party in the Central Legislative Assembly at Delhi, entered into an agreement with Mr. Liaqat Ali Khan, the League leader in the Assembly, jointly to demand a Conference from the British Government for the solution of the stalemate in Indian politics (…) Mr. Desai offered equal representation to the Muslims with Congress at the said Conference (…) The proposal had, it was then revealed, the blessings of the Mahatma and was in fact made with his previous knowledge and consent. With the full agreement of the Congress Party, 25% of the people of India were treated as if they were 50% and the 75% were brought down to the level of 50%.’ ... ‘But his retirement was followed by the appointment of Lord Mountbatten. King Log was followed by King Stork. The Congress which had boasted of its nationalism and socialism secretly accepted Pakistan literally at the point of the bayonet and abjectly surrendered to Jinnah. India was vivisected and one-third of the Indian territory became foreign land to us from August 15, 1947. (…) Rivers of blood flowed under his very nose. (…) This is what Gandhiji had achieved after thirty years of undisputed dictatorship (…) Never in the history of the world has such a slaughter been officially connived at or the result described as freedom and 'peaceful transfer of power'. If what happened in India in 1946, 1947 and 1948 is called peaceful, one wonders what would be the violent. Hindu-Muslim unity bubble was finally burst and a theocratic and communal state dissociated from everything that smacked of united India was established with the consent of Nehru and his crowd, and they have called it “Freedom won by them at sacrifice”—whose sacrifice? When top leaders of Congress, with the consent of Gandhi, divided and tore the country–which we consider a deity of worship–my mind was filled with direful anger."
"Gandhi exploited the feelings of tolerant Hindus with one-sided practices. Gandhi's recent prayer meetings in Hindu temples had started the practice of reading passages from the Quran, despite Hindus protesting this practice. However, Gandhi dared not read the Gita in a mosque in the teeth of Muslim opposition. Gandhi knew what a terrible Muslim reaction would have been if he had done so. Gandhi knew it is safe to trample on the tolerant Hindu. To belie this belief, I wanted to prove that a Hindu too could be intolerant when his honour was insulted."
"One of the conditions imposed by Gandhi for his breaking of the fast unto death related to the mosques in Delhi occupied by the Hindu refugees. This condition was to the effect that all the mosques in Delhi, which were occupied by the Refugees, should be vacated and made over to the Muslims. Gandhiji got this condition accepted by the Government and a number of leaders by sheer coercion by his fast. On that day I happened to be in Delhi and I have personally seen some of the events that have occurred in getting this condition carried out to its full. Those were the days of bitter or extreme cold and on the day Gandhiji broke his fast it was also raining. Owing to this unusual weather condition, the pricking atmosphere made even person in well-placed positions shiver. Families after families of refugees who had come to Delhi for shelter were driven out (of mosques) and while doing so no provision was made for their shelter and stay. One or two families taking with them their children, women-folk and what little belongings they had with them and saying, "Gandhiji, do give us a place for shelter" even approached and came to Birla House. But was it ever possible for the cries of these poor Hindu people to reach Gandhiji living in the palatial Birla House! (…) But when Hindus in Pakistan were subjected to violent attacks he did not so much as utter a single word to protest and censure the Pakistan Government or the Muslims concerned. Gandhi was shrewd enough to know that while undertaking a fast unto death, had he imposed for its break some condition on the Muslims in Pakistan, there would have been found hardly any Muslims who could have shown some grief if the fast had ended in his death. It was for this reason that he purposely avoided imposing any condition on the Muslims. He was fully aware of from the experience that Jinnah was not at all perturbed or influenced by his fast and the Muslim League hardly attached any value to the inner voice of Gandhi. Gandhi is being referred to as the Father of the Nation. But if that is so, he had failed his paternal duty inasmuch as he has acted very treacherously to the nation by his consenting to the partitioning of it. I stoutly maintain that Gandhi has failed in his duty. He has proved to be the Father of Pakistan.’"
"‘70 (s). Cabinet Mission Plan. Early in the year 1946, the so-called Cabinet Mission arrived in India. (…) while firmly championing unity, the Mission introduced Pakistan through the back-door. (…) The Congress Party was so utterly exhausted by the failure of ‘Quit India’ that after some smoke-screen about its unflinching nationalism, it virtually submitted to Pakistan by accepting the Mission’s proposals.’ (…) Advice to Kashmir Maharaja. About Kashmir, Gandhiji again and again declared that Sheikh Abdullah should be entrusted the charge of the state and that the Maharaja of Kashmir should retire to Benares for no particular reason than that the Muslims formed the bulk of the Kashmir population. This also stands out in contrast with his attitude on Hyderbad where although the bulk of the population is Hindu, Gandhiji never called upon the Nizam to retire to Mecca. ‘70 (y). Removal of Tricolour Flag. The tricolour flag with the Charkha on it was adopted by the Congress as the National Flag out of deference to Gandhiji. (…) If any Hindu attached any importance to Shivaji’s Hindu flag, “Bhagva Zenda” the flag which freed India from the Muslim-domination it was considered communal. Gandhiji’s tri-colored flag never protected any Hindu woman from outrage or a Hindu temple from desecration, yet the late Bhai Parmanand was once mobbed by enthusiastic Congressmen for not paying homage to that flag.(…) When the Mahatma was touring Noakhali and Tippera in 1946 after the beastly outrages on the Hindus, the [tricolour] flag was flying on his temporary hut. But when a Muslim came there and objected (…), Gandhiji quickly directed its removal. All the reverential sentiments of millions of Congressmen towards that flag were affronted in a minute, because that would please an isolated Muslim fanatic. Yet the so-called Hindu-Muslim unity never took shape (…).’"
"71. (…) there was never a more stupendous fiction fostered by the cunning and believed by the credulous in this country for over a thousand years. Far from attaining freedom under his leadership, Gandhiji has left India torn and bleeding from a thousand wounds. ‘78. (…) In actual practice, however, Bose never toed the line that Gandhiji wanted during his term of office. And yet, Subhas was so popular in the country that against the declared wishes of Gandhiji in favour of Dr. Pattabhi Sitaramayya, he was elected president of the Congress for a second time with a substantial majority even from the Andhra Desha, the province of Dr. Pattabhi himself. This upset Gandhiji beyond endurance and he expressed his anger in the Mahatmic manner full of concentrated venom by stating that the success of Subhas was his own defeat and not that of Dr. Pattabhi. (…) Out of sheer cussedness, he absented himself from the Tripura Congress session, staged a rival show at Rajkot by a wholly mischievous fast, and [it was] not until Subhas was overthrown from the Congress gaddi that the venom of Gandhiji became completely gutted.’"
"77. And the more the Mahatma condemned the use of force in the country’s battle for freedom, the more popular it became. This fact was amply demonstrated at the Karachi Session of the Congress in March 1931; in the teeth of Gandhiji’s opposition a resolution was passed in the open Session admiring the courage and the spirit of sacrifice of Bhagat Singh when he threw the bomb in the Legislative Assembly in 1929. Gandhiji never forgot this defeat and when a few months later Mr. Hotson, the Acting Governor of Bombay was shot at by Gogate, Gandhiji returned to the charge at an All-India Congress Committee meeting and asserted that the admiration expressed by the Karachi Congress for Bhagat Singh was at the bottom of Gogate’s action in shooting at Hotson. This astounding statement was challenged by Subash Chandra Bose. He immediately came into disfavor with Gandhiji. To sum up, the share of revolutionary youth in the fight for Indian Freedom, is by no means negligible and those who talk of India’s freedom having been secured by Gandhiji are not only ungrateful but trying to write false history."
"‘85. (…) I am therefore surprised when claims are made over and over again that the winning of freedom was due to Gandhiji. My own view is that constant pandering to the Muslim League was not the way to winning freedom. It only created a Frankenstein (…) permanently stationing a hostile, censorious, unfriendly and aggressive neighbour on what was once Indian territory. About the winning of Swaraj or freedom, I maintain that the Mahatma’s contribution was negligible. But I am prepared to give him a place as a sincere patriot. ‘85 (continued). In my opinion, S.C. Bose is the supreme hero and martyr of modern India (…) advocating all honourable means, including the use of force when necessary, for the liberation of India. Gandhiji and his crowd of self-seekers tried to destroy him.’ ‘89. (…) Mr. Jinnah had also openly demanded Pakistan. (…) He has deceived no one (…) His was the behaviour of an open enemy. (…) ‘90. Gandhiji had seen Mr. Jinnah many a time and called upon him. Every time he had to plead with him as “brother Jinnah”. He even offered him the premiership of the whole of India, but there was not a single occasion on which Mr. Jinnah had shown any inclination even to co-operate. ‘91. Gandhiji’s inner voice, his spiritual power and his doctrine of non-violence of which so much is made, all crumbled before Mr. Jinnah’s iron will and proved to be powerless. Briefly speaking, I thought to myself and foresaw I shall be totally ruined, and the only thing I could expect from the people would be nothing but hatred and that I shall have lost all my honour, even more valuable than my life, if I were to kill Gandhiji. But at the same time I felt that the Indian politics in the absence of Gandhiji would surely be proved practical, able to retaliate, and would be powerful with armed forces. No doubt, my own future would be totally ruined, but the nation would be saved from the inroads of Pakistan . People may even call me and dub me as devoid of any sense or foolish, but the nation would be free to follow the course founded on the reason which I consider to be necessary for sound nation-building.’ ‘92. Having known that with his spiritual power he could not influence Mr. Jinnah, Gandhiji should have either changed his policy or should have admitted his defeat and given way to others of different political views to deal with Mr. Jinnah and the Muslim League. But Gandhiji was not honest enough to do that. He could not forget his egoism or self, even for national interest. There was, thus, no scope left for practical politics while the great blunders—blunders as big as the Himalayas—were being committed.’"
"93 (a). Constantly for nearly one year after the horrible Noakhali massacre, our nation was bathing in the pool of blood. The Muslims indulged in horrible and dreadful massacre of humanity followed by reactions from Hindus in some parts. The attacks of Hindus on Muslims in the East Punjab, Bihar, or Delhi, were simply acts of reaction. It is not that Gandhiji did not know that the basic cause of these reactions was the outrages on Hindus by the Muslims in the Muslim majority Provinces. But still Gandhiji went on condemning strongly such actions of Hindus only, and the Congress Government went to the extent of threatening to even bombard the Hindus in Bihar to check their discontent (…) [Gandhi said in his prayer speeches] We should with a cool mind reflect when we are being swept away. Hindus should never be angry against the Muslims even if the latter might make up their minds to undo even their existence. If they put all of us to the sword, we should court death bravely (…) We are destined to be born and die, then why need we feel gloomy over it? (…) (6th April 1947) ‘93 (b). The few gentlemen from Rawalpindi who called upon me (…) asked me, what about those who still remain in Pakistan. I asked them why they all came here (to Delhi). Why they did not die there? I still hold on to the belief that one should stick to the place where we happen to live even if we are cruelly treated and even killed. Let us die if the people kill us, but we should die bravely with the name of God on our tongue. Even if our men are killed, why should we feel angry with anybody, you should realise that even if they are killed they have had a good and proper end. (…) (23rd September 1947) ‘93 (c). (…) If those killed have died bravely they have not lost anything but earned something. (…) They should not be afraid of death. After all, the killers will be none other than our Muslim brothers. Will our brothers cease to be our brothers after change of their religion? (…)’ [The instances can be multiplied, e.g., when meeting Hindu refugees from West Punjab, Gandhiji told them to return to their homes, even if this meant certain death:] ‘If all the Punjabis were to die to the last man without killing, the Punjab will become immortal. Offer yourselves as nonviolent, willing sacrifices.’"
"‘103. Had Gandhiji [had] a firm belief in the doctrine of non-violence, he should have made a suggestion for sending Satyagrahis instead of the armed troops and tried the experiment. (…) It was a golden opportunity for Gandhiji to show the power of his Satyagraha (…) ‘104. But Gandhiji did nothing of the sort. (…) Gandhiji was reading the dreadful news of the Kashmir war, while at the same time fasting to death only because a few Muslims could not live safely in Delhi. But he was not bold enough to go on fast in front of the raiders of Kashmir, nor had he the courage to practise Satyagraha against them. All his fasts were to coerce Hindus.’"
"111. Is it not a deplorable sight for people to see the Congress celebrate the occasion of the establishment of a Dominion Government in the rest of country shattered and vivisected by the Pakistan in the East and West and with the pricking thorn of Hyderbad it its midst? On seeing this downfall of the Congress under the dominance of Gandhiji, I am reminded of the well-known verse of Raja Bharthari to the effect:"
"‘115. In the year 1938, I led the first batch of volunteers who marched into the territory of the Hyderabad State when the passive resistance movement was started by the Hindu Mahasabha, with a demand for Responsible Government in the State. I was arrested and sentenced to one year's imprisonment. I have personal experience of the uncivilized, nay barbarous rule of Hyderabad and have undergone corporal punishment of dozens of cane slashes, for the offence of singing the 'Vande Mataram’ song at the time of prayer.’"
"119. I had a very good idea about fiery attacks that would be launched against me in the Press (for killing Gandhi). But I never thought that I could be cowed down by the fire poured against me by the Press. For, had the Indian Press impartially criticized the anti-national policy carried on by Gandhiji and had they impressed upon the people that the interest of the nation was far greater than the whim of any individual howsoever great he may be, Gandhiji and his followers could never have dared concede Pakistan to the Muslims as easily as has been done. The Press had displayed such weakness and submission to the High Command of the Congress that it allowed the mistakes of leaders pass away freely and unnoticed and made vivisection easy by their policy. The fear about such Press, weak and subservient as it was, could not therefore dislodge me from my resolve."
"121. Pakistan was conceded on the 15th of August 1947, and how? Pakistan was conceded by deceiving the people and without any consideration for the feelings and opinions of the people of Punjab, Bengal N.W.F. Province, Sind, etc. Indivisible Bharat was divided into two and in one of its parts a theocratic State was established. The Muslims obtained the fruit of their anti-national movements and actions in the shape of Pakistan. The leaders of the Gandhian creed ridiculed the opponents of Pakistan as traitors and communal minded, while they themselves helped in the establishment of a Muslim State in India yielding to the demands of Jinnah. This event of Pakistan had upset the tranquility of my mind. But even after the establishment of Pakistan if this Gandhian government had taken any steps to protect the interests of Hindus in Pakistan it could have been possible for me to control my mind which Was terribly shaken on account of this terrible deception of the people. But, after handing over crores of Hindus to the mercy of the Muslims of Pakistan Gandhiji and his followers have been advising them not to leave Pakistan but continue to stay on. The Hindus thus were caught in the hands of Muslim authorities quite unawares and in such circumstances series of calamities followed one after the other. When I bring to my mind all these happenings my body simply feels a horror of burning fire, oven now."
"122 . Every day that dawned brought forth the news about thousands of Hindus being massacred, Sikhs numbering 15 000 having been shot dead, hundreds of women torn of their clothes being made naked and taken into procession and that Hindu women were being sold in the market places like cattle. Thousands and thousands of Hindus had to run away for their lives and they had lost everything of theirs. Along line of refugees extending over the length of 40 miles was moving towards the Indian Union. How was this terrible happening counter-acted by the Union Government? Oh! by throwing bread to the refugees from the air!"
"These atrocities and the blood-bath would have to some extent been checked if the Indian Government had lodged strong protests against the treatment meted out to the Minorities in Pakistan or even if a cold threat had been held out to the Muslims in Indian of being treated in the same manner as a measure of retaliation. But the Government which was under the thumb of Gandhiji resorted to absolutely different ways. If the grievances of the minorities in Pakistan were voiced in the Press, it was dubbed as an attempt to spread disaffection amongst the communities and made an offence and the Congress Governments in several Provinces started demanding securities under the press Emergency Powers Act, one after the other."
"124. When all these happenings were taking place in Pakistan, Gandhiji did not even by a single word protest and censure the Pakistan Government or the Muslims concerned. The Muslim atrocities resorted to in Pakistan to root out the Hindu culture and the Hindu society have been entirely due to the teachings of Gandhiji and his behavior. If the Indian politics had been handled in a practical manner there would never have been the terrible human slaughter as has taken place–a thing without any precedent in history."
"128. It would not be out of place to state here that the ashes of Gandhiji were distributed in large towns and many rivers in India and abroad but the said ashes could not be immersed in the Holy Indus passing through the Pakistan in spite of the endeavors of Shri Shree Prakash, the Indian High Commissioner in Pakistan."
"129. Let us then take the case of 55 crores ... (h) The case of Hyderabad had also the same history. It is not at all necessary to refer to the atrocious misdeeds perpetrated by the Nizam's Ministers and the Razakars. Laiq Ali the Prime Minister of Hyderabad had an interview with Gandhiji during the last week of January 1948. It was evident from the manner in which Gandhiji looked at these Hyderabad affairs, that Gandhiji would soon start his experiments of non-violence in the State of Hyderabad and treat Kasim Razvi as his adopted son just as Suhrawardy. It was not at all difficult to see that it was impossible for the Government in spite of all the powers to take any strong measures against the Muslim State like Hyderabad so long as Gandhiji was there. Had the Government then decided to take any military of police action against Hyderabad it would have been compelled to withdraw its decision just as was done in the case of the payment of Rs. 55 crores, for Gandhiji would have gone on fast unto death and Government's hands would have been forced to save the life of Gandhiji."
"‘134. The practice of non-violence according to Gandhiji is to endure or put up with the blows of the aggressor without showing any resistance either by weapon or by physical force. Gandhiji has, while describing his non-violence, given the example of a “tiger becoming a follower of the creed of non-violence after the cows allowed themselves to be killed and swallowed in such large numbers that the tiger ultimately got tired of killing them.” It will be remembered that at Kanpur, Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthi fell victim to a murderous assault by the Muslims of the place on him. Gandhiji has often cited this submission to the Muslims’ blows as an ideal example of embracing death for the creed of non-violence. I firmly believed and believe that the non-violence of the type described above will lead the nation to ruin (…)’"
"‘136. There now remains hardly anything for me to say. If devotion to one’s country amounts to a sin, I admit I have committed that sin. If it is meritorious, I humbly claim the merit thereof. I fully and confidently believe that if there be any other court of justice beyond the one founded by mortals, my act will not be taken as unjust.’"
"‘139. I am prepared to concede that Gandhiji did undergo sufferings for the sake of the nation. He did bring about an awakening in the minds of the people. He also did nothing for personal gain, but it pains me to say that he was not honest enough to acknowledge the defeat and failure of the principle of non-violence on all sides. (…) But whatever that may be, I shall bow in respect of the service done by Gandhiji to the country (…) and before I fired the shots I actually (…) bowed to him in reverence. But I do maintain that even this servant of the country had no right to vivisect the country (…) There was no legal machinery by which such an offender could be brought to book and it was therefore that I resorted to the firing of shots at Gandhiji as that was the only thing for me to do.’"
"Had this act not been done by me, of course it would have been better for me. But circumstances were beyond my control."
"‘140. (…) So strong was the impulse of my mind that I felt that this man should not be allowed to meet a natural death so that the world may know that he had to pay the penalty of his life for his unjust, anti-national and dangerous favouritism towards a fanatical section of the country. I decided to put an end to this matter and to the further massacre of lakhs of Hindus for no fault of theirs. May God now pardon him for his egoistic nature which proved to be too disastrous for the beloved sons of this Holy Land.’"
"I sat brooding intensely on the atrocities perpetrated on Hinduism and its dark and deadly future if left to face Islam outside and Gandhi inside, and (…) decided all of a sudden to take the extreme step against Gandhi."
"‘147. May the country properly known as Hindusthan be again united and be one and may the people be taught to discard the defeatist mentality leading them to submit to the aggressors. This is my last wish and prayer to the Almighty.’"
"‘149. It is a fact that in the presence of a crowd numbering 300 to 400 people I did fire shots at Gandhiji in open daylight. I did not make any attempt to run away; in fact, I never entertained any idea of running away. I did not try to shoot myself, it was never my intention to do so, for it was my ardent desire to give vent to my thoughts in an open Court."
"‘150. My confidence about the moral side of my action has not been shaken even by the criticism levelled against it on all sides. I have no doubt honest writers of history will weigh my act and find the true value thereof on some day in future. ‘Akhand Bharat Amar Rahe! ‘Vande Mataram!’"
"It was at the Kakinada session of the Congress in 1923, that its President Mohammed Ali objected to the singing of the song on the premise that music was taboo in Islam. The singer V P Paluskar said "You have no authority from singing the Vande Mataram. Moreover, if singing in this place is against your religion, how is it that you tolerate music in your presidential procession?" In 1922 it had adopted Iqbal’s Sare jahanse see accha Hindustan hamara as the associate national anthem to satisfy the Muslims. In 1937 the League condemned the Congress for foisting Vande Mataram as the national song. Accordingly the Congress decided to cut those portions of the song that were likely to offend Muslim susceptibilities."
"Bhajans were also not spared (by Gandhi). The soul-elevating chanting of "Raghupati Raja Ram patita pavana Sita Ram" was intoned on the lips of millions of our countrymen for the last several centuries. A new line "Ishwar Allah tere nam, sab so sanmati de Bhagavan" was added to the original."
"The Flag Committee in 1931 consisting of Sardar Patel, Nehru, Maulana Azad, Master Tara Singh, D B Kalelkar, N S Hardikar and Pattabhi Sitaramayya recommended that the national flag should be of kesari or saffron color having on it at the left top quarter the charkha in blue. However, the AICC dare not differ from Gandhi’s choice of the tricolor scheme. It simply okayed his decision."
"I never stole in my childhood, so there was no question of apologising to my father. (Godse referring to Gandhi's autobiographical story, where Gandhi stole a piece of gold from his father's watch and later on apologised to his father)"
"I never took a vow of celibacy as I was already practising celibacy. (Godse referring to Gandhi's diktat of advocating celibacy even to newlyweds)"
"I was moving around the refugee camps and helping the destitute with food and clothes. But I did not wander half-naked because the refugees were naked. (Godse referring to Gandhi's way of empathising with destitutes not by helping them but by imitating their unfortunate circumstances)"
"I never spun yarn."
"I never cleaned my toilet."
"I never observed silence till I was hanged."
"There was only one common factor in Gandhi's life and mine. We were both the cause of each other's death. He wanted to live at any cost for his principles and I was prepared to die at all costs for mine."
"Nathuram had declared before the court that he had left the RSS in 1934 as the then RSS chief was facing a lot of trouble. But he actually never left the organisation."
"Both [Gandhi and Godse] were committed and courageous nationalists; both felt that the problem of India was basically the problem of the Hindus because they constituted the majority of Indians; and both were allegiant to the idea of an undivided free India. Both felt austerity was a necessary part of political activity. Gandhi’s asceticism is well-known, but Godse too lived like a hermit. He slept on a wooden plank, using occasionally a blanket and even in the severest winter wore only a shirt. Contrary to the idea fostered by the popular Hollywood film on him, Nine Hours to Rama, Godse neither smoked nor drank. In fact, he took Gandhi’s rejection of sexuality even further: he never married and remained a strict celibate. Like Gandhi, Godse considered himself a sanatani or traditional Hindu and, in deference to his own wishes, he was cremated according to sanatani rites... Yet, and in this respect too he resembled Gandhi, he said he believed in a casteless Hindu society and in a democratic polity. He was even in favour of Gandhi’s attempts to mobilize the Indian Muslims for the nationalist cause by making some concessions to the Muslim leadership. Perhaps it was not an accident that Godse began his political career as a participant in the civil disobedience movement started by Gandhi and ended his political life with a speech from the witness stand which, in spite of being an attack on Gandhi, none the less revealed a grudging respect for what Gandhi had done for the country."
"One immediate consequence of the murder which is usually left unmentioned in the numerous hagiographies of the Mahatma is the wave of revenge which hit the Hindu Mahasabha, the RSS and most of all, the Chitpavan Brahmin caste. It seems that most hagiographers were embarrassed with the way the apostle of non-violence was mourned by his fans as well as by others who merely used the opportunity for, as in Red Fort Trial (p. 4) P.L. Inamdar puts it, ‘the manhunt of Maharashtrian Brahmins irrespective of their party allegiance by non-Brahmins in Poona and other districts.’ Offices and houses were burnt down, numerous people were molested and at least eight people were killed, according to an official tradition. However the article ‘Gandhi is killed by a Hindu’, published by The New York Times on 31 January 1948, puts the number of mortal victims in Bombay (now called Mumbai) alone, and on the first day alone, already at fifteen. Locals in Pune (where of course the Hindu Rastra office was set on fire, along with the offices of other pro-Hindu papers) told me they estimated the death toll in Pune alone at fifty. One of the rare studies of the event, by Maureen Patterson, concludes that the greatest violence took place not in the cities of Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur, centres of Hindu nationalism, but in ‘the extreme southwest of the Deccan plateau—the Desh—of the Marathi linguistic region’, including Satara, Belgaum and Kolhapur. Then, as now, press reporting on communal rioting was under strict control, and Maureen Patterson reports that even decades after the facts, she was not given access to relevant police files. So, we may not know the exact magnitude of this ‘Gandhian violence’ until all the records are opened, but the death toll may well run into several hundreds.... But unlike in the case of the anti-Sikh pogrom, where a few local Congress leaders were brought to trial after a long delay, and where references to the events keep on being made in studies of ‘communalism’, the Mahatma riots had no consequences for the perpetrators and were flushed down the memory hole, probably because the accused in the latter case did not have a high profile."
"‘The audience was visibly and audibly moved. There was a deep silence when he ceased speaking. Many women were in tears and men were coughing and searching for their handkerchiefs. (…) I have, however, no doubt that had the audience on that day been constituted into a jury and entrusted with the task of deciding Godse’s appeal, they would have brought in a verdict of ‘not guilty’ by an overwhelming majority."
"In 1998, a Mumbai playwright, Pradeep Dalvi, tried to recreate some of the atmosphere in his play Me Nathuram Godse Boltoy (‘This Is Nathuram Godse Speaking’). After seven performances, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee managed to convince the Maharashtra state government, a Hindu nationalist coalition of Shiv Sena and BJP, to withdraw clearance for the play."
"Although he failed in his matriculation examination, he is widely read. While arguing his appeal, he showed a fair knowledge of the English language and a remarkable capacity for clear thinking."
"I see America for what it is. It's another Germany. It's the Fourth Reich. America makes Hitler's and Germany's records look good."
"It is because of America's racism that black people and colored people around the world are oppressed. Throughout history black people who spoke out against America and her racism have been subjected to exile, assassination, murder, or imprisonment. So what happened to me is nothing new or different. Justice is a joke in this country for black people, and it stinks of its hypocrisy. Justice in this country means "just-us white folks." Black people must understand that there is no redress of grievances in the courts but only in the streets, through armed guerrilla action."
"Of course I'm a racist, just like Lyndon Johnson, like Kennedy, like Lincoln, like Washington, like all Negroes—because all Negroes are racist. Everybody who lives in America is either racist or will become one. One cannot stay neutral: one must stand on one side or the other, without mixing colors or ideas—white with white, black with black. Integration is impossible. We are not interested in it and don't want it."
"When a race of people is oppressed within a system that fosters the idea of competitive individualism, the political polarization around individual interests prevents group interests. Each negro prides himself on his ability to reason or think as an individual. Therefore, any gains are to the individual and not to the group."
"White folks get all righteous and wonder why Black people steal and gamble. Same reason white folks do. We need money, because the society says you must have it to keep from starving. If you got it, you eat. If you don't, tough. But white people are able to make their stealing and gambling legitimate. White man'll sell you a $20 suit for $50 and call it good business. What he actually did was steal $30. White man'll buy a watch for $5.00 sell it for $49.95 and call the difference, profit. Profit is a nice word for stealing which the society has legitimatized."
"America is a country that makes you want things, but doesn't give you the means to get those things."
"But this is the kind of education we were subjected to. Education ain't just what comes out of the books, but it's everything that goes on in the school. And if you leave school hating yourself, then it doesn't matter how much you know. Education in america has to be viewed as propaganda machinery. All educational systems are propaganda machines, but for Black people, the american educational system is a propaganda machine we don't need. It propagandizes against us. It makes us hate ourselves."
"I was always at odds with teachers. There are certain things in negro institutions that you have to do if you expect to make good grades and certain things you don't do. One of those things is you don't talk back. You don't challenge the existing order. Well, I challenge anything that doesn't make good sense."
"If authority is to be used, it should not be a coercive type thing. After all, what dictates that a person can be put in an authoritative position over someone else? If it's experience, then respect should come from that, not authority. People should adhere to rules because they respect them and not because some position mandates that respect."
"In negro america, anything the teacher or the preacher or the doctor says is law. Not because it's right, but because of who said it. In white america, if the President or Senator Dipshit says it, no one challenges it. It can be wrong as hell, but everybody applauds anyway. I don't give a shit who says what. If the muthafucka is wrong, he's wrong."
"In this country, authority is a cover for wrong. I don't respect wrong and I don't respect authority that represents wrong."
"The whole concept of authority has to be redefined. People have to understand that individuals, not positions, merit respect. Negro america and white america assume that positions mandate respect. When this respect for position does not materialize, they begin to utilize force. This is why the Black world has rejected both negro america and white america and their ideas of authority."
"Do you think I'm kidding, Mr. Hitler? I need more money!"
"We were writing little symphonies for the kids."
"I enjoyed all the records very much. I made them all from the heart. I made them all with art in mind, and all to reveal a picture of where I was when I made them."
"Here, I'm going to make you a big star … and you don't have to pay any dues. … For that, you're going to get no respect from your contemporaries. … To me, that was the cruelest thing."
"People made fun of me, the little kid who was making rock'n'roll records. But I knew. I would try to tell all the groups, we're doing something very important. Trust me. And it was very hard because these people didn't have that sense of destiny. They didn't know they were producing art that would change the world. I knew."
"I have devils inside that fight me."
"When Chris Benoit and CM Punk battle for the vacant ECW World Title at Vengeance: Night of Champions, it will be a clash of both present – and perhaps future – legends in sports-entertainment. The Rabid Wolverine is a former World Champion and perhaps a future WWE Hall of Famer."
"Chris Benoit was replaced by Johnny Nitro for the ECW Championship match at Vengeance, as Benoit was not there due to personal issues, stemming from the death of his wife Nancy."
"Last weekend, I had heard about Chris Benoit no showing Vengeance because of a family emergency, and I had heard rumors about why that was. I was reading rumors and speculation about this matter online, and one of them included that his wife may have passed away, and I did the wrong thing by posting it on wikipedia"
"He (Benoit) was peaceful and kept to himself. I think it had to be something personal, a domestic problem between him and his wife. She was into devil-worship stuff. It was part of her (wrestling) character, but (she was) somebody who gets so close to their character, someone who gets into their character too much. Sometimes these people believe their own publicity."
"There were Persian children slaves in Madina. Seeing them, Piruz would say, You have been enslaved at such a tender age. This Omar sees eaten my heart. I will take his heart out. He made for himself a dagger with a very sharp edge and smeared it with poison."
"Omar then is reported to have asked Abu Lulu: "I heard that you make windmills; make one for me as well." In a sullen mood, Piruz said, Verily I will make such a mill for you, that the whole world would remember it."
"Abu Lu’lu’ah is a disbeliever, according to the consensus of the people of Islam. He was a Magi from among the worshipers of fire, so he killed Umar out of hatred for Islam and its people, out of love for the Magi, and in revenge for the infidels, for what Omar did to them when he conquered their lands, killed their leaders, and divided their money."
"Firuz was one of the greatest Muslims and Mujahideen of Islam, and was considered one of the most honest and truthful followers of Amir al-Mu'minin Ali Ibn Abi Talib. It is known that Abu Lulu was one of the best Shiites of Ali."
"No man is your enemy, no man is your friend. Every man is your teacher!"
"I couldn't have her. I wasn't going to let anybody else have her."
"I want my closing statement to be one of love and a calling to [his] fellow Christians to end the death penalty. An eye for an eye was used as justification to the jury for seeking the death penalty. Why? Because we no longer live under the Old Testament law but now live under the New Testament. [...] We are now under God's grace and mercy."
"[The electric chair would] burn and cook him alive, but the alternative is just as monstrous. If he chose lethal injection, he risked the prolonged death suffered by all three of the men South Carolina has executed since September — three men Brad knew and cared for — who remained alive, strapped to a gurney, for more than twenty minutes. He does not wish to inflict that pain on his family, the witnesses, or the execution team. But, given South Carolina's unnecessary and unconscionable secrecy, Brad is choosing as best he can."
"When Brad went to prison, he rededicated himself to his Christian faith. He has devoted every day since to prayer, repentance, and the work of redemption. Brad is a peaceful, trusted presence on death row. Guards describe him as respectful and helpful. He serves as an informal chaplain to his fellow prisoners. He is a source of strength to his siblings and children. He is also in declining health and poses a danger to no one."
"I did see a splash of blood when the bullets entered his body. It was not a huge amount, but there was a splash that you could see kind of protrude from the wound. [...] His arms flexed. There was something in his midsection that moved. I'm not necessarily going to call them breaths. I don't really know. But there was some movement that went on there for two or three seconds. It was very fast."
"My heart started pounding a little after Sigmon’s lawyer read his final statement. The hood was put over Sigmon’s head, and an employee opened the black pull shade that shielded where the three prison system volunteer shooters were. About two minutes later, they fired. There was no warning or countdown. The abrupt crack of the rifles startled me. And the white target with the red bullseye that had been on his chest, standing out against his black prison jumpsuit, disappeared instantly as Sigmon’s whole body flinched. It reminded me of what happened to the prisoner 21 years ago when electricity jolted his body. I tried to keep track, all at once, of the digital clock on the wall to my right, Sigmon to my left, the small, rectangular window with the shooters and the witnesses in front of me. A jagged red spot about the size of a small fist appeared where Sigmon was shot. His chest moved two or three times. Outside of the rifle crack, there was no sound."
"He expressed remorse every day of his incarceration at the violence that he caused and sought to be a different person since his incarceration. [He] tried to be as supportive and loving as kind as possible to everyone in his midst, whether that was his neighbors on death row, whether that was corrections officers, whether that was pen pals and family members that he was supporting from afar, emotionally and spiritually."
"He knows what the firing squad is going to do to his body — he knows it's going to break his bones, he knows it's gonna pulverize his organs. And it's a measure of how impossible the choice was here."
"I saw Richard Moore die [...] [He looked] serenely at the celling, as his lawyer, who [had become] close to him while fighting for his life over a decade, wept."
"Now at the feast the governor was accustomed to releasing to the multitude one prisoner whom they wished. And at that time they had a notorious prisoner called Barabbas. Therefore, when they had gathered together, Pilate said to them, “Whom do you want me to release to you? Barabbas, or Jesus who is called Christ?” [...] But the chief priests and elders persuaded the multitudes that they should ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus. The governor answered and said to them, “Which of the two do you want me to release to you?”"
"Now at the feast he was accustomed to releasing one prisoner to them, whomever they requested. And there was one named Barabbas, who was chained with his fellow rebels; they had committed murder in the rebellion. Then the multitude, crying aloud, began to ask him to do just as he had always done for them. But Pilate answered them, saying, “Do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?” [...] But the chief priests stirred up the crowd, so that he should rather release Barabbas to them. [...] So Pilate, wanting to gratify the crowd, released Barabbas to them; and he delivered Jesus, after he had scourged Him, to be crucified."
"And they all cried out at once, saying, “Away with this Man, and release to us Barabbas”— who had been thrown into prison for a certain rebellion made in the city, and for murder."
"Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?” And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews, and said to them, “I find no fault in Him at all."