I was not an activist.

Poverty is the worst form of violence.

It’s empowering to know I am doing something, I am taking a stand, I am disrupting.

The ideals and principles for which Dr King fought have never been forgotten and are as relevant today as they were 40 years ago.

Poverty is the mother of crime.

Everybody’s worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there’s a really easy way: stop participating in it.

I’m not anti-middle-class in the slightest. Look at me! I am very pro people putting time and money and effort into trying to improve the world.

The white man is destroying the world.

I have always hated slavery, I think, as much as any abolitionist. I have been an Old Line Whig. I have always hated it, but I have always been quiet about it until this new era of the introduction of the Nebraska Bill began.

I hope that people around the world will be as inspired as I am to step up and to speak out on behalf of girls around the world who struggle to go to school.

It’s a blessing that South Africa has a man like Nelson Mandela.

Nothing is being done to stop the climate and ecological emergency from happening and to secure the future wellbeing for future generations.

We think sometimes that poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.

I’ve never written a political song. Songs can’t save the world. I’ve gone through all that.

My son Emilio is running for Congress to continue the fight for social justice.

I think I’m one of the most patriotic people that I’ve ever encountered in America. I consider myself a bedrock patriot. I participate very actively in local politics, because my voice might be worthwhile. I participate in a meaningful way – not by donations; I work at it.

Charity creates a multitude of sins.

I personally have always been in favor of people who are gay being permitted to marry legally – and I still feel that way.

Standing in support of children is something we should all be able to get behind, regardless of party affiliation.

The ‚peace movement‘ exists only in the fantasies of the paranoid.

Mitt Romney subscribes to the cynical logic that says the American dream belongs to some of us but not all of us.

I’ve been fighting with Acorn, alongside Acorn, on issues you care about, my entire career.

Leaders in all spheres who are living with HIV should be encouraged, not coerced, to lead by example and disclose their HIV status.

Patriot: the person who can holler the loudest without knowing what he is hollering about.

How can we help President Obama?

Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.

I hate victims who respect their executioners.

I’ve rarely kept my distance from kind of – I don’t know if we can call it politics, but kind of, civic engagement and that kind of thing, except I tended to think, ‚Well, do it yourself before you start telling other people what they should be doing.‘

Sometimes the poor are praised for being thrifty. But to recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque and insulting. It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less.

Judge Afiuni has suffered enough. She has been subject to acts of violence and humiliations to undermine her human dignity. I am convinced that she must be set free.

If people continue to feel like Democrats are looking after poor folks and Republicans are looking after rich folks and nobody is looking after me, then we don’t get a lot of stuff done. And the trend lines evidence the fact that folks have gotten squeezed. And obviously, 2007, 2008 really ripped open for people how vulnerable they were.

Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.

I am such a political person.

We must do everything in our power to cease the behaviour that makes children everywhere feel afraid.

In matters of truth and justice, there is no difference between large and small problems, for issues concerning the treatment of people are all the same.

No intelligent black man or black woman in his or her right black mind wants white boys and white girls coming to their homes to marry their black sons and daughters.

I know black people love the idea that we finally have a beautiful, good-looking black president. But if he is doing awful things to us, we should wake up.

The idea that there is one kind of African is, of course, ridiculous. Sometimes African entrepreneurs want to kill you because you are saying public health is the priority, not roads. Of course they are right to press for that issue, but so are we right, I believe, to argue, for example, that millions of children could and should be vaccinated.

The right of every American to first-class citizenship is the most important issue of our time.

The welfare state is not really about the welfare of the masses. It is about the egos of the elites.

Many interviewers when they come to talk to me, think they’re being progressive by not mentioning in their stories any longer that I’m black. I tell them, ‚Don’t stop now. If I shot somebody you’d mention it.‘

Fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you.

On October 15, 1965, an estimated 70,000 people took part in large-scale anti-war demonstrations.

Some say we should not engage in activism. Instead we should leave everything to our politicians and just vote for a change instead. But what do we do when there is no political will? What do we do when the politics needed are nowhere in sight?

One of the problems of organizing in the North, in the rich countries, is that people tend to think – even the activists – that instant gratification is required. You constantly hear: ‚Look I went to a demonstration, and we didn’t stop the war so what’s the use of doing it again?‘

I liberate minds with my music. That’s more important than liberating a few people from apartheid or whatever.

I am involved in a freedom ride protesting the loss of the minority rights belonging to the few remaining earthbound stars. All we demanded was our right to twinkle.

It’s difficult to believe that people are still starving in this country because food isn’t available.

My job is not to represent Washington to you, but to represent you to Washington.

It is a strange trade that of advocacy. Your intellect, your highest heavenly gift is hung up in the shop window like a loaded pistol for sale.

The reason why I am proud of my part in the punk movement is that I think it really did implant a message that was already there. The hippies told it to me, but punk made it something cool for people to stand up for, which is that we do not believe government, that we are against government.

I want to make a policy statement. I am unabashedly in favor of women.

All I can say is I am sensitive to discrimination on any basis because I have experienced that upset.

As long as poverty, injustice and gross inequality persist in our world, none of us can truly rest.

In terms of my involvement in ‚don’t ask, don’t tell‘ and marriage equality and anti-bullying and social emotional learning in schools – these are all things that arise out of my relationship with the world and with my fans.

I speak to the black experience, but I am always talking about the human condition.

I feel very happy to be living in Berkeley because there are a lot of people who are politically active here.

It’s always going to be a fight for anyone who isn’t an older white man. I want to fight for anyone who doesn’t have a fight.

The proper study of mankind is woman.

To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a rage almost all the time.

When I was president, I announced and I still maintain that I can live with Roe v. Wade. I did everything I possibly could as president under that ruling, which I don’t think ought to be changed, to minimize the need for abortions. I think every abortion is a result of a horrible series of errors on the part of people involved.