Quotes about injustice (632 quotes, page 7)

“The great challenge before us is to find a way to use the bright promise of science and technology in a massive retaliation against poverty, hunger, and social injustice in the world.”

Walter Reuther (1907–1970) Labor union leader

Address before the Indian Council of World Affairs, New Delhi, India, April 5, 1956, as quoted in Walter P Reuther: Selected Papers (1961), by Henry M. Christman, p. 130
1950s, Address before the Indian Council on World Affairs (1956)

World , Hunger , Science , Way

“Humanity is entirely responsible for being at the root of the problems arising from global warming. We need to rethink the way we live on earth in order to preserve life. Global warming is out of control…. Time is not on our side, which is why I am calling on all young millennials to hasten this radical revolution. You are a part of nature and compassion decrees that you take care of it as much as you do yourselves. It is only through mutual support and co-operation that you will be able to contain disasters that are fuelled by economic and social injustice and are fuelled by greed, selfishness, and other negative states of mind…. You are responsible for the wellbeing of billions of humans and all manner of living species sharing the adventure of life on earth. It is up to you to protect natural resources and guard over air, water, oceans, forests, fauna and flora. To do so it is essential that you realize your potential for love and compassion in order to care for the earth. Learn to love it through sharing it rather than striving to possess it and thereby destroying it.”

Tenzin Gyatso (1935) spiritual leader of Tibet

A Call for Revolution (2017-2018)

Selfishness , Time , Support , Learning

“The mothers of all ages are those who have suffered because others suffered; for each of them, self is less sensitive than the sense of her child. Self is not locked up in the maternal heart, there to be cherished, as it is by the egoist, or to be crushed and silenced, as it is by the Saint. In the mother, self is not lost, but loses all its evil by the passionate personal love that distributes it among sons and daughters. Perfect self-less love would perhaps be distributed through the multitude, but a mother is not perfect: nature has so much use for her—separate, family use—that she cannot let her go free from irrational, indispensable partialities and limitings, even injustices, all serving the turn of the race.”

Alice Meynell (1847–1922) English publisher, editor, writer, poet, activist

Source: Mary, the Mother of Jesus: An Essay (1912), Ch. IV. "The Mother", p. 40

Family , Personality , Silence , Daughters

“I arose and said, As a colored woman, I hope this association will include in the resolution the injustices of various kinds of which colored people are the victims.”

Mary Church Terrell (1863–1954) African Americans' rights activist

p. 143

Hope , People , Color

“I must painfully record my opinion that grave injury has been done to religion in many minds — not in instructed minds, but in those which are ill-instructed or partially instructed, which have a large claim on our consideration — in consequence of steps which have, unhappily, been taken. Great mischief has been done in many minds through the resistance offered to the man elected by the constituency of Northampton, which a portion of the community believe to be unjust. When they see the profession of religion and the interests of religion ostensibly associated with what they are deeply convinced is injustice, they are led to questions about religion itself, which they see to be associated with injustice. Unbelief attracts a sympathy which it would not otherwise enjoy; and the upshot is to impair those convictions and that religious faith, the loss of which I believe to be the most inexpressible calamity which can fall either upon a man or upon a nation.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

1880s
Source: Except from a speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1883/apr/26/second-reading-adjourned-debate-second in the House of Commons (26 April 1883) in support of the atheist Charles Bradlaugh being permitted to take his seat in Parliament.

Loss , Faith , Religion , Question

“Every gentleman here is born a petty tyrant. Practised in acts of despotism and cruelty, we become callous to the dictates of humanity and all the finer feelings of the soul. Taught to regard a part of our own Species in the most abject and contemptible Degree below us, we lose that Idea of the dignity of Man which the Hand of Nature had implanted in us, for great and useful purposes. Habituated from our Infancy to trample upon the Rights of Human Nature, every generous, every liberal Sentiment, if not extinguished, is enfeebled in our Minds; and in such an infernal school are to be educated our future legislators and rulers. The laws of impartial Providence may even by such means as these avenge upon our posterity the injury done to a set of wretches whom our injustice hath debased to a level with the brute creation. These remarks were extorted by a kind of irresistible, perhaps an enthusiastic impulse; and the author of them, conscious of his own good intentions, cares not whom they please or offend.”

George Mason (1725–1792) American delegate from Virginia to the U.S. Constitutional Convention

Source: Virginia Charters (1773)

School , Soul , Law , Future

“Rights come from human experience, particularly experiences with injustice… In a word, rights come from wrongs.”

Alan M. Dershowitz (1938) American lawyer, author

Shouting Fire: Civil Liberties in a Turbulent Age, Little, Brown & Company, New York, NY, (2002) p. 4

“There was something fundamentally wrong with our economic system. It was based upon injustice and could not last.”

David Lloyd George (1863–1945) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Leader of the Liberal Party in the House of Commons
Source: Speech to the Welsh National Liberal Federation in Rhyl (9 July 1926), quoted in The Times (10 July 1926), p. 16

“I forgive the injustice carried out in the name of justice,”

Paulo Coelho book Aleph

Aleph (2011)

Forgiveness , Justice

“In this world that hides injustice, selfishness, hatred, falseness and appearance; you, impose on yourself to be a good person.”

Prevale (1983) Italian DJ and producer

Original: (it) In questo mondo che cela ingiustizia, egoismo, odio, falsità ed apparenza; tu, imponiti di essere una brava persona.
Source: prevale.net

Selfishness , Personality , Falseness , World

“So long as production is left to the uncontrolled decisions of private individuals, conducted, guided and inspired by the motive of profit, so long will Poverty, Insecurity and Injustice continue.”

Hugh Gaitskell (1906–1963) British politician

'Why I Am a Socialist', South Leeds Worker (December 1937), quoted in Philip Williams, Hugh Gaitskell: A Political Biography (1979), p. 68

Motivation , Decision

“We are now in a moment where people have no excuses to deny the injustice that's happening in the middle of a global pandemic. Things feel different this time because we were able to tap into a sense of our own agency, our own power and our genuine love for each other.”

Opal Tometi (1984) Nigerian–American writer, strategist and community organizer

Black Lives Matter Was Always Designed to Be a Global Movement, Vice] (7 July 2020)

People , Sense , Time , Love

“Every injustice that we suffer at the hands of men is at the same time a trial that comes to us from God.”

Frithjof Schuon (1907–1998) Swiss philosopher

[2019, Esoterism as Principle and as Way, World Wisdom, 139, 978-1-93659765-9]
Spiritual life, Trials

God , Time , Suffering , Men

“If there can be agreement that certain rights are essential to reduce the chances of perfect injustice, that constitutes the beginning of a solid theory of rights.”

Alan M. Dershowitz (1938) American lawyer, author

Source: Shouting Fire: Civil liberties in a Turbulent Age (2002), p. 34

Chance , Perfection

“We want no injustice done to other people. I do not appeal to you merely as a class, but I do appeal to you workers to form yourselves into an organisation which will use political power in order to protect our human conditions and give you fair play in life.”

Ramsay MacDonald (1866–1937) British statesman; prime minister of the United Kingdom

Speech in the Hippodrome, Darlington (25 May 1929), quoted in The Times (27 May 1929), p. 9
1920s

People , Life

“So how to we get at stopping war? We have to create trust. We have to get rid of injustice.”

Benjamin Creme (1922–2016) artist, author, esotericist

Source: The State of the World 2010, public lecture in New York City, USA, (July 2010)

War

“I object to the suppression of the truth. I think the injustice of not being able to bring light to the situation dissolves all equitable application of the rule of law.”

Paul Gosar (1958) American politician and dentist

Appealing for Tommy Robinson on Twitter, as quoted in * 2018-07-19
Ronald J. Hansen
The Arizona Republic
Paul Gosar takes up for U.K. anti-Muslim activist, is accused of aiding a bigot.
Source: https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/arizona/2018/07/19/paul-gosar-takes-up-anti-muslim-activist-accused-aiding-bigot/798818002/

Light , Truth , Law , Thinking

“It's funny, the power of beauty, to make us forget such injustice.”

Oscar Niemeyer (1907–2012) Brazilian architect

Original: (pt) É estranho o poder da beleza, que nos faz esquecer tanta injustiça.
Source: Quoted in Alberto Xavier, Depoimento de uma geração: arquitetura moderna brasileira

Forgetting , Beauty

“I ask anyone to point to any territorial change we made in respect to Germany in Europe which is in the least an injustice, judged by any principle of fairness.”

David Lloyd George (1863–1945) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Prime Minister
Source: Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1919/jul/03/territorial-adjustments#column_1215 in the House of Commons on the Treaty of Versailles (3 July 1919)

Change

“Peace cannot be established by blaming religion; rather, it can only be achieved by campaigning against transgression and injustice while keeping religion aside.”

Mirza Masroor Ahmad (1950) spiritual leader of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community

Others

Peace , Religion

“We said no to communism. We said no to apartheid. We said no to injustice. We said no to oppression. And we said yes to freedom, yes to democracy. Now I ask you: What do we say to war? CROWD: No!”

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

February 15, 2003 speaking before a massive rally in New York to oppose the imminent U.S. invasion of Iraq
Source: As quoted in Archbishop Desmond Tutu (1931-2021) on Apartheid, War, Palestine, Guantánamo, Climate Crisis & More https://www.democracynow.org/2021/12/27/life_and_legacy_archbishop_desmond_tutu, Democracy Now!, December 27, 2021

Democracy , Freedom , War , Communication

“Injustice ... regardless to whomever acted upon or performed against, is still injustice. The unjust person is never relieved of the responsibility of these acts under the pretext that the injustice is done against a heterodox and not to a believer. As our Lord Jesus Christ in the Gospels said do not oppress or accuse anyone falsely; do not make any distinction or give room to the believers to injure those of another belief.”

Metrophanes III of Constantinople (1520–1580) Patriarch of Constantinople

Statement condemning the mistreatment of Jews on the Island of Crete by Orthodox powers.
Source: An Orthodox Christian View of Non-Christian Religions https://www.goarch.org/-/an-orthodox-christian-view-of-non-christian-religions by Rev. Dr. George C. Papademetriou; Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America

Personality , Falseness , Christ

“Compassion for other human beings has to extend to the society that’s been grinding the powerless under its heel. The more civilized the society becomes, the more humane it becomes; the more it can see its own humanity, the more it sees the ways in which its humanity has been behaving inhumanly. This injustice of the world inspires a rage so intense that to express it fully would require homicidal action; it’s self-destructive, destroy-the-world rage. Simply put, I’ve learned that I must find positive outlets for anger or it will destroy me. I have to try to find a way to channel that anger to the positive, and the highest positive is forgiveness.”

Sidney Poitier (1927) American-born Bahamian actor, film director, author, and diplomat

Variant: I’ve learned that I must find positive outlets for anger or it will destroy me. There is a certain anger; it reaches such intensity that to express it fully would require homicidal rage — self-destructive, destroy-the-world rage — and its flame burns because the world is so unjust. I have to try to find a way to channel that anger to the positive, and the highest positive is forgiveness.
Source: The Measure of a Man (2000)

Learning , Rage , World , Forgiveness

“The smallest evil that is inflicted on us seems to us a monstrous and horrible injustice. On the contrary, we are willing to consider the evils of others' light and to excuse and mitigate the injustices suffered by them.”

Daniel Salamanca (1863–1935) President of Bolivia (1863-1935)

Light , Suffering , Evil

“We cannot bury pain and trauma forever. As I said in Tulsa, great nations do not hide from their histories. We are a great nation, and by reckoning with and remedying the injustices of the past, America will become greater still.”

Joe Biden (1942) 47th Vice President of the United States (in office from 2009 to 2017)

2022, June 2022, Statement by President Joe Biden on the 101st Anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre

Pain , History , Past

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Therefore, no American can afford to be apathetic about the problem of racial justice. It is a problem that meets every man at his front door.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, The Rising Tide of Racial Consciousnes (1960)

Justice , Problem

“Dialogue for the sake of conversation serves no ethical, moral or practical purpose. Dialogue that is one way, or in which we are silent about our grave concerns about injustice, or where we end up kowtowing, appeasing or unwittingly complicit with evil, is immoral.”

Benedict Rogers (1974) London-based human rights activist

Vatican should talk to China — but not at any price https://www.ucanews.com/amp/vatican-should-talk-to-china-but-not-at-any-price/93985 (1 October 2021)

Evil , Way