Human Rights Activists

"I regard the Honourable member for Randburg as a friend. I regard him as a person who has done tremendous work as treasurer of the United Party on the Witswatersrand branch. The test of friendship comes in what you do as a man in adversity. I want to say, and I make so secret of it, that I am my brother's keeper and I will not be his executioner."

"My Lord, it is difficult to reply in a restrained fashion. My learned friend must not use words such as 'Communist' lightly, when he refers to Kantor. Kantor is not a Communist. My learned friend has used the tactics of McCarthyism in an endeavour to smear him. I think, with respect, my learned friend is allowing himself to run away with facts that are not there. His complaint in count one is not that they found files with evidence. Oh not, he says that we found files with nothing in them. Not in Kantor's office, but in the office of Wolpe. Then my learned friend that the practice had been ruined and liquidated Knator's practice, my lord, it is not Kantor. It is not Kantor! Why I say it is so difficult to be restrained, is that my learned friend has thrown in everything hat concerns every accused in this case, and says 'that is why I don't want Kantor to get bail'."

"My lord, one can perhaps be pardoned for saying that perhaps his (Jimmy Kantor) biggest crime, if it is a crime, is that he was a partner of Harold Wolpe, and that Harold Wolpe was his brother-in-law."

"The cold, cruel reality is that with one current justice now approaching ninety, and four others over seventy, the day will inevitably arrive when a sitting justice lies in an intensive care unit, both unable to resign and unable to resume his or her duties."

"Most people are far more concerned that they can control their own bodies than they are about petitioning Congress."

"I am grateful that I have rights in the proverbial public square--but, as a practical matter, my most cherished rights are those that I possess in my bedroom and hospital room and death chamber."

"Much as we do not permit convicted pedophiles to teach kindergarten or convicted hijackers to board airplanes, common sense dictates that individuals who have been imprisoned for plotting violence against abortion clinics should never again be permitted anywhere near such facilities."

"Victory [over homophobia] may require five or maybe 20 years. Yet I have no doubt that "don't ask, don't tell" and same-sex adoption bans will be as unspeakable and inexplicable to my grandchildren as counting a slave as three-fifths of a human being."

"Depression and hopelessness are not the only reasons terminally ill patients wish to end their lives. Many individuals see nothing undignified about choosing to end their lives at the time and manner of their choosing — and many view such a choice as the meaningful culmination of a good life."

"I would prefer to believe that a market in fetal organs would empower women to use their reproductive capabilities to their own economic advantage."

"Nothing sells tombstones like a Girl Scout in uniform."

"I have vicarious morning sickness. Other people's babies make me nauseous."

"“For recent presidents, especially those still living, there is always the possibility, a rather strong one, that we will discover additional information that is presently known to physicians and presidents but not to the general public...Almost all of the modern presidents would have been rated higher and looked healthier on paper while in office than they do in retrospect with the benefit of information not released during their terms.”"

"The only thing more difficult than persuading someone else to start having sex with you is persuading yourself to stop."

"Maybe life involves the pairing of unsuitable people, those who wait and those who keep others waiting, and the key to happiness is finding the one person with whom you share the same internal chronometer."

"It was all about borders. And Arnold was on the wrong side of them. He’d end up spending the rest of his life in a 8’ x 10’ cell, another darling of the Left like Mumia Abu-Jamal or Lisl Auman, because he happened to be standing on one side of an arbitrary political boundary, a line as imaginary as the equator."

"You delude yourself that you live in a free country because you never test the boundaries of that freedom."

"Patriotism is being convinced your country is better because you were born in it."

"Nixon’s offences had been so long in the past, so much part of a different era that he now seemed like some lovable but bigoted uncle you tolerated at Christmas and Thanksgiving."

"One thing led to another. That was the only way to explain how Arnold Brinkman, who considered both professional sports and young children unjustifiable, had ended up at Yankee Stadium with a nine-year-old boy. (Page 5)"

"If God wanted teenagers to be abstinent, puberty would begin at twenty."

"If you give a man a hammer, he thinks he can solve all problems by pounding. Well, God gave men penises...."

"Be optimistic. Always put on clean underwear if you're going on a date."

"The boss is never your friend, even if you're sleeping with him."

"Always warm up the audience with a joke....If you are not a particularly funny person, make sure that you inform them that it's a joke...."

"I suspect that the vast majority of people, not knowing in advance whether they will either end up in a permanently vegetative state or be diagnosed with cancer, would prefer that any resources that would be spent on PVS care be reallocated to cancer research--or some similar enterprise that has the potential to help human beings who might actually recover."

"While the visible victims may draw the headlines and attract indignant protests from so-called "pro-life" organizations, the invisible victims are people like you and me who will suffer from diseases that are never cured because funds are being poured down a healthcare sieve in order to maintain permanently-unconscious bodies on complex and costly forms of life support."

"Money spent on vegetative patients is money not spent on preventive care, such as flu shots and mammograms. Each night in an ICU bed for such patients is a night that another patient with a genuine prognosis for recovery is denied such high-end care. Every dollar exhausted on patients who will never wake up again is a dollar not devoted to finding a cure for cancer."

"There is a fundamental difference, however, between asking to be permitted to keep a vegetative relative on costly machinery, and asking the taxpayers or society as a whole to pay for such machinery."

"Much as constitutional guarantees of press freedom do little good for prospective publishers if they do not have access to paper or ink, the right to aid in dying is strikingly useless if nobody is willing to help."

"Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar was fearless. He propogated love and humanity. He loved people and gave them a thought of humanity. Babasaheb never gave up he was fearless. So today I have had difficulties, problems or situation is bad I remember Babasaheb. That's why I get inspiration from him. That's why Babasaheb is my role model""

"The year 1940 was coming to an end when Ambedkar's magnum opus, Thoughts on Pakistan, was published. Written at a psychological moment, it fell like a bombshell on the heated atmosphere of the day... This historic book castigates the anti-reformist tendency of the Muslims... Some penetrating and caustic paragraphs describing the regressive bent of the Muslim mind, however, were deleted, it is said, at the instance of Ambedkar's close admirers. Otherwise [Ambedkar] would have experienced what H.G. Wells experienced at the hands of Muslims in London!... Thoughts on Pakistan is a masterpiece in which learning and thinking are blended and displayed at their highest order. It is entracing in its magic, intriguing in its construction, terse in its style, and provocative in its manner. It is a model in scientific propagation.... The effect of this book was terrible... It was applauded as an epitome of the political and social history of India; and it rocked Indian politics for over a decade. The Muslims rejoiced at this support to their ideal."

"Dr. Ambedkar has become a saint, and his opinions can now only be recited and quoted as final authority, but not subjected to any criticism on penalty of being dubbed "Brahminical reactionary". Dr. Ambedkar was a complex personality, not fit for simple glorification, nor of course for vilification. Undoubtedly, he was a very strong man, who stood his ground, and who rendered sterling services to the nation. On his intellectual achievements, our judgment will be more diversified. He was essentially a Western-educated man, and had imbibed some of the condescending incomprehension so typical of westernized Natives. Yet, among this class of Western-educated Indians, there is hardly any who has to such extent freed himself from pervasive prejudices and fashionable beliefs, such as the claim of a racial basis of caste. Because he himself had suffered the humiliation which many caste Hindus kept on inflicting on the untouchables, it is not abnormal that he was intemperately bitter against Hinduism. Nevertheless, he remained loyal to Hinduism in the broad sense, and rejected eager offers to take his followers into mass conversion to soul- greedy and imperialist religions. If we have uttered some criticism of his intellectual shortcomings regarding specific subjects, we could do so in a spirit of respect because we are also aware of his substantial intellectual qualities and merits, apart from his well-known political achievements for his country and his community. As an independent thinker, Dr. Ambedkar contrasts brightly with wind-bags like M.N. Roy and Jawaharlal Nehru, whose parrotting of fashionable slogans has not prevented them from remaining trendsetters for the secularist elite which is still ruling India. If he was not perfect in every respect, we would say that there is only so much which a man can do in a lifetime, so if a busy politician could not always find the time to seek out all the historical facts about complex subjects, it is really not abnormal."

"Ambedkar took a cool and hard look at Islam as a sworn enemy of Hindu society, even while being bitterly critical of the latter. Dr. Ambedkar was particularly outspoken about the social injustices in Islam, especially in his book Pakistan or the Partition of India... Many of Dr. Ambedkar’s observations on Islam would now be branded as “Hindu communalist” by the very people who claim his heritage. In fact, the literature of the RSS Parivar offers no counterpart to Ambedkar’s strong language about Islam: he was more openly anti-Islamic than Savarkar, Golwalkar or any Hindutva stalwart who is regularly accused of being just that. From the Hindu Revivalist point of view, Ambedkar, in writing his incisive criticism of Islam, did the homework which the Hindutva ideologues neglected... At Sangh Parivar functions, a picture of Ambedkar is mostly displayed along with pictures of Maharana Pratap, Shivaji, Guru Govind Singh, Hedgewar, Golwalkar and other more obvious Hindutva heroes. During BJP President L.K. Advani's flopped Rath Yatra (car procession) before the 1996 Lok Sabha elections, his car carried just two pictures: of freedom fighter Subhash Chandra Bose and of Dr. Ambedkar."

"Dr. Ambedkar never got disappointed with difficult tasks, but faced the situation with great courage. I am especially appealing to the younger generation of students to take a leaf out of Dr. Ambedkar's life. At difficult times, his life can be a great inspiration.... [Ambedkar] came to the RSS camp in Pune and appreciated its patriotism, discipline and complete absence of untouchability. But he said he was in a hurry and Sangh work appears to be a little slow.... We salute the Architect of our Constitution, his erudition and hard work, his great patriotism and practical outlook. But it was natural that he could not stomach the indignities heaped on the Dalits and the attitude of our upper castes in the Hindu society appeared to change too slowly. Let us take a vow on this occasion to make the Hindu society free from aberrations, a society full of harmony, self-confidence and knowledge, so that it can carry the message of the great Rishis to the whole world."

"Sitting in the Chair and watching the proceedings from day to day, I have realised as nobody else could have, with what zeal and devotion the members of the Drafting Committee and especially its Chairman, Dr. Ambedkar in spite of his indifferent health, have worked. We could never make a decision which was or could be ever so right as when we put him on the Drafting Committee and made him its Chairman. He has not only justified his selection but has added lustre to the work which he has done."

"There is not one instance, not one single, solitary instance in which Ambedkar participated in any activity connected with the struggle to free the country. Quite the contrary- at every possible turn he opposed the campaigns of the national movement, at every setback to the movement he was among those cheering for failure."

"You have found your saviour in Ambedkar. I am confident that he will break your shackles. Not only that, a time will come, so whispers my conscience, that he will shine as a front-rank leader of all-India fame and appeal."

"Ambedkar is my Father in Economics. He is true celebrated champion of the underprivileged. He deserves more than what he has achieved today. However he was highly controversial figure in his home country, though it was not the reality. His contribution in the field of economics is marvelous and will be remembered forever..!"

"His (Dr. Ambedkar's) personality, erudition and capacity to lead and organise-would have by themselves marked him out as an outstanding asset to our nation. But in addition to that the in-estimable services he has rendered to our motherland in trying to stamp out untouchability and the result he has achieved in instilling a manly spirit of self-confidence in millions of the depressed classes, constitute an abiding, patriotic as well as humanitarian achievement. The very fact of the birth of such a towering personality among the so-called untouchable castes could not but liberate their souls from self-depression and animate them to challenge the super-arrogative claims of the so-called touchables."

"...though Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar had been a Buddhist for only seven weeks, during that period he had probably done more for the promotion of Buddhism than any other Indian since Ashoka. At the time of this death three quarters of a million Untouchables had become Buddhists, and in the months that followed hundreds of thousands more took the same step – despite the uncertainty and confusion that had been created by the sudden loss of their great leader… This was Ambedkar’s last and greatest achievement, so that even though it was as the Architect of the Constitution of Free India and the Modern Manu that he passed into official history and is today most widely remembered, his real significance consists in the fact that it was he who established a revived Indian Buddhism on a firm foundation."

"He (Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar) had pioneered the renaissance of Buddhism in India and was responsible for millions embracing Buddhism in the land of its birth."

"Dr. Ambedkar is considered very wise not only because of his erudition and intellectual acumen, but because his learning and ability are being used for the good of the common people. Others use their knowledge and ability for the selfish or sectarian benefit."

"I have seen people who are born in the lowest category of Hindu law, the sudras, the untouchables, so intelligent: when India became independent, the man who made the constitution of India, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, was a sudra. There was no equal to his intelligence as far as law is concerned — he was a world-famous authority... Ambedkar was educated in England, and he became the world-famous authority as far as constitutions are concerned. And when he came back to India, India became free and there was no choice; nobody was even close to him..."

"I have met Doctor Ambedkar. He was one of the intelligent men I have ever met."

"We believe that the future is what we make it. We believe that no matter who you are or where you come from, every person can fulfill their God-given potential. Just as a Dalit like Dr. Ambedkar could lift himself up and pen the words of the constitution that protects the rights of all Indians. We believe that no matter where you live – whether a village in Punjab or the by lanes of Chandni Chowk, an old section of Kolkata or a new high-rise in Bangalore – every person deserves the same chance to live in security and dignity, to get an education, to find work, and to give their children a better future."

"There was one portrait. And interestingly, it was not of the leader of the Shiv Sena or of Shivaji, the Sena's warrior god, but of the long-dead Dr. Ambedkar (...) Popular-and near-ecstatic-movements like the Shiv Sena ritualize many different needs. The Sena here, honouring an angry and (for all his eminence) defeated man, seemed quite different from the Sena the newspapers wrote about."

"B R Ambedkar deserves to be remembered always by us because of his fight against social injustice. The great service that he had rendered in framing the constitution of India."

"Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar like God to me, I am President because of him. I feel happy and privileged that I am attending the convocation ceremony of the Dr Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University which is named after Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar. His life was full of struggles and so it was with notable works."

"I am coming from a 'backward section of society,' and was prime minister today only because of Ambedkar."