"Another question this war raises is just how what we call the under-developed countries became under developed in the first place. Why, for example, is Africa under-populated, and why do the resources of, say, Sierra Leone belong to Europe? Why, in short, does so much of the world eat too little and so little of the world eat too much? I am also curious to know just how a people calling itself sovereign allows itself to be fighting a war which has never been officially declared, and I am curious to know why so few people appear to be worried about the arresting precedent thus established. I am curious indeed to know how it happens that the mightiest nation in the world has been unable, in all these years, to conquer one of the smallest. I am curious to know what happens to the moral fabric, the moral sense, of the people engaged in so criminal an endeavor."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Academics from the United StatesShort story writers from the United StatesNovelists from New York CityPlaywrights from the United StatesAfrican Americans
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/James_Baldwin
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
James Baldwin
James Arthur Baldwin (2 August 1924 – 1 December 1987) was an American novelist, short story writer, playwright, essayist, and social critic.
146 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by James Baldwin →
Related Quotes
"The primary distinction of the artist is that he must actively cultivate that state which most men, necessarily, must…"
"Not everything that is faced can be changed; but nothing can be changed until it is faced."
"I, for example, do not bring down property values when I move in. You bring them down when you move out."
"Despair is a sin. I believe that. It is easy to be bleak about the human race, but there are people who have proved t…"
"One must say Yes to life, and embrace it wherever it is found — and it is found in terrible places. … For nothing is …"
"You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was Dost…"
"Leaving aside all the physical facts which one can quote, leaving aside rape or murder, leaving aside the bloody cata…"
"It is true that two wrongs don't make a right, as we love to point out to the people we have wronged. But one wrong d…"
"When the Israelis pick up guns, or the Poles, or the Irish, or any white man in the world says “give me liberty, or g…"
"Words like "freedom," "justice," "democracy" are not common concepts; on the contrary, they are rare. People are not …"