"For the introduction of a new kind of music must be shunned as imperiling the whole state; since styles of music are never disturbed without affecting the most important political institutions."

~ Plato

"I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually."

~ James Baldwin

 

"In Germany they first came for the Communists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me -
and by that time no one was left to speak up."

~ German anti-Nazi activist, Pastor Martin Niemöller

"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate, In fact violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that."

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

"Those of us who shout the loudest about Americanism ... are all too frequently those who, by our own words and acts, ignore some of the basic principles of Americanism --
The right to criticize.
The right to hold unpopular beliefs.
The right to protest.
The right of independent thought.
The exercise of these rights should not cost one single American citizen his reputation or his right to a livelihood. Otherwise none of us could call our souls our own."

~ Senator Margaret Chase Smith of Maine 1950

"Loyalty is the realization that America was born of revolt, flourished in dissent, became great through experimentation. Our tradition is one of protest and revolt, and it is stultifying to celebrate the rebels of the past while we silence the rebels of the present."

~ Henry Steele Commager

 

"Freedom is not an ideal, it is not even a protection, if it means nothing more than freedom to stagnate, to live without dreams, to have no greater aim than a second car and another television set."

~ Adlai Stevenson

 

"Lots of people who complained about us receiving the MBE received theirs for heroism in the war -- for killing people. We received ours for entertaining other people. I'd say we deserve ours more."

~ John Lennon

"Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent."

~ Victor Hugo