“The black fist is a meaningless symbol. When you open it, you have nothing but fingers — weak, empty fingers. The only time the black fist has significance is when there's money inside. There's where the power lies.”

— Jesse Owens

Said to Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who had given the black power salute while receiving their Olympic medals
Jesse Owens, Champion Athlete (1990)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 30, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The black fist is a meaningless symbol. When you open it, you have nothing but fingers — weak, empty fingers. The only …" by Jesse Owens?

Jesse Owens24

American track and field athlete 1913–1980

Mervyn Peake book Titus Groan

Source: Titus Groan (1946), Chapter 1 “The Hall of the Bright Carvings” (p. 9)

“You hit somebody with your fist and not with your fingers spread.”

Heinz Guderian (1888–1954) German general

Man schlägt jemanden mit der Faust und nicht mit gespreizten Fingern.
As quoted in Die Deutschen gepanzerten Truppen bis 1945 (1965) by Oskar Munzel, p. 209; this indicated the need to concentrate tank forces for one strong push in one direction and not distribute them over a large area.

“Think of yourselves as a hand. Each of you is a finger, and without the others you're useless. Alone, a finger can't grasp, or control, or form a fist. You are nothing on your own, and everything together.”

Karen Traviss British science fiction author

“I kept having dreams all night. I thought they were touching me with their fingers. But dreams don't have fingers, they have fists, so it must have been scorpions.”

Roberto Bolaño book The Savage Detectives

Source: The Savage Detectives

“The only time Republicans will shake fists and point fingers is over a war delayed, one that isn't led by the US, or a war waged without the necessary conviction (read collateral damage).”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“On The War Path With Samantha Power,” http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2013/06/on-war-path-with-samantha-power.html Economic Policy Journal, June 7, 2013. <br class="br">2010s, 2013

“The horror is this: In the end, it is simply a picture of empty meaningless blackness. We are alone. There is nothing else.”

Alan Moore book Watchmen

Dr. Malcolm Long, Watchmen #6
Watchmen (1986–1987)
Context: I looked at the Rorschach blot. I tried to pretend it looked like a spreading tree, shadows pooled beneath it, but it didn’t. It looked more like a dead cat I once found, the fat, glistening grubs writhing blindly, squirming over each other, frantically tunneling away from the light. But even that is avoiding the real horror. The horror is this: In the end, it is simply a picture of empty meaningless blackness. We are alone. There is nothing else.