“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

— Desmond Tutu

As quoted in Unexpected News : Reading the Bible with Third World Eyes (1984) by Robert McAfee Brown, p. 19
Context: If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.

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Desmond Tutu 85

South African churchman, politician, archbishop, Nobel Priz… 1931

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“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”

Desmond Tutu (1931) South African churchman, politician, archbishop, Nobel Prize winner

As quoted in Unexpected News : Reading the Bible with Third World Eyes (1984) by Robert McAfee Brown, p. 19

“We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”

Elie Wiesel (1928–2016) writer, professor, political activist, Nobel Laureate, and Holocaust survivor

“Time is on the side of the oppressed today, it's against the oppressor. Truth is on the side of the oppressed today, it's against the oppressor. You don't need anything else.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

Malcolm X Speaks (1965)

“You are always on the right side when you are with those who suffer persecution and injustice.”

Léon Bloy (1846–1917) French writer, poet and essayist

Source: Pilgrim of the Absolute (1947), p. 293

“The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but thought about it. Be aware of the thoughts you are thinking. Separate them from the situation, which is always neutral. It is as it is.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

“I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”

Elie Wiesel (1928–2016) writer, professor, political activist, Nobel Laureate, and Holocaust survivor

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“I have nothing but contempt for you idiotic chosen ones who have the heart to rejoice when there are the damned in Hell and the poor on earth; as for me, I am on the side of men and I will not leave it.”

Jean Paul Sartre book The Devil and the Good Lord

Act 6, sc. 6
The Devil and the Good Lord (1951)

“Indeed, the interests of the oppressors lie in 'changing the consciousness of the oppressed, not the situation which oppresses them';”

Paulo Freire (1921–1997) educator and philosopher

Source: Pedagogia do oprimido (Pedagogy of the Oppressed) (1968, English trans. 1970), Chapter 1, The Banking Concept of Education

“I omit from consideration here the fact that people who demand neutrality in any situation are usually not neutral, but in favor of the status quo.”

Max Eastman (1883–1969) American activist

Attributed by internet sources to Enjoyment of Poetry: With Other Essays in Aesthetics (1939), but not confirmed.
Source: Enjoyment of Poetry With Anthology for Enjoyment of Poetry (1951), p. 233 https://www.google.com/books/edition/_/oV5emKH2uhcC?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=status%20quo
Source: The quote appears to have been first published in the essay "The Slogan, 'Propaganda Has No Place in Art,' Is The Symptom Of A Decaying Culture" https://www.google.com/books/edition/_/WX3NyDFUC_MC?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=eastman, Stage Magazine (1934).

“Art is on the side of the oppressed. Think before you shudder at the simplistic dictum and its heretical definition of the freedom of art. For if art is freedom of the spirit, how can it exist within the oppressors?”

Edith Wharton (1862–1937) American novelist, short story writer, designer

Nadine Gordimer, "The Essential Gesture: Writers and Responsibility" http://www.tannerlectures.utah.edu/lectures/gordimer85.pdf, The Tanner Lectures on Human Values, University of Michigan (12 October 1984), p. 9
Misattributed

“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

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