Emma Goldman was an anarchist political activist and writer who advocated for women's rights, free speech, and social justice. She was born in Lithuania in 1869 and immigrated to the United States in 1885. Goldman is renowned for her activism and her writings, which focused on topics such as freedom, sexuality, and birth control. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Emma Goldman on love, anarchist, feminist.
People have only as much liberty as they have the intelligence to want and the courage to take.
Only when human sorrows are turned into a toy with glaring colors will baby people become interested - for a while at least. The people are a very fickle baby that must have new toys every day.
If love does not know how to give and take without restrictions, it is not love, but a transaction that never fails to lay stress on a plus and a minus.
The demand for equal rights in every vocation of life is just and fair; but, after all, the most vital right is the right to love and be loved.
I'd rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck.
If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal.
Before we can forgive one another, we have to understand one another.
Emma Goldman inspirational quote
Emma Goldman Image Quotes
The most violent element in society is ignorance. — Emma Goldman
I'd rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck. — Emma Goldman
The most violent element in society is ignorance.
If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal. — Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman Short Quotes
Politicians promise you heaven before election and give you hell after
I want freedom, the right to self-expression , everybody's right to beautiful, radiant things.
Art is a part of the rebellion against the realities of its unfulfilled desire.
...The greatest bulwark of capitalism is militarism.
Someone has said that it requires less mental effort to condemn than to think.
The most unpardonable sin in society is independence of thought.
Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion.
Lack of fairness to an opponent is essentially a sign of weakness.
Conceit, arrogance, and egotism are the essentials of patriotism.
... nothing satisfies the craving of most women so much as scandal.
Emma Goldman Quotes About Love
I demand the independence of woman, her right to support herself; to live for herself; to love whomever she pleases, or as many as she pleases. I demand freedom for both sexes, freedom of action, freedom in love and freedom in motherhood. — Emma Goldman
Jealousy is indeed a poor medium to secure love, but it is a secure medium to destroy one's self-respect. For jealous people, like dope-fiends, stoop to the lowest level and in the end inspire only disgust and loathing. — Emma Goldman
Rather would I have the love songs of romantic ages, rather Don Juan and Madame Venus, rather an elopement by ladder and rope on a moonlight night, followed by the father's curse, mother's moans, and the moral comments of neighbors, than correctness and propriety measured by yardsticks. — Emma Goldman
Jealousy is indeed a poor medium to secure love, but it is a secure medium to destroy one — Emma Goldman
On rare occasions one does hear of a miraculous case of a married couple falling in love after marriage, but on close examination it will be found that it is a mere adjustment to the inevitable. — Emma Goldman
The most vital right is the right to love and be loved. — Emma Goldman
We Americans claim to be a peace-loving people. We hate bloodshed; we are opposed to violence. Yet we go into spasms of joy over the possibility of projecting dynamite bombs from flying machines upon helpless citizens. — Emma Goldman
Free love? as if love is anything but free. Man has bought brains, but all the millions in the world have failed to buy love. — Emma Goldman
Love is it's own protection. — Emma Goldman
Have not all theists painted their Deity as the god of love and goodness? Yet after thousands of years of such preachments the gods remain deaf to the agony of the human race. — Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman Quotes About Life
It is a tragedy, I feel, that people of a different sexual type are caught in a world which shows so little understanding for homosexuals and is so crassly indifferent to the various gradations and variations of gender and their great significance in life. — Emma Goldman
The ultimate end of all revolutionary social change is to establish the sanctity of human life, the dignity of man, the right of every human being to liberty and well-being. — Emma Goldman
Life without an ideal is spiritual death. — Emma Goldman
The spirit of militarism has already permeated all walks of life. Indeed, I am convinced that militarism is a greater danger here than anywhere else, because of the many bribes capitalism holds out to those whom it wishes to destroy. — Emma Goldman
The individual is the true reality of life. A cosmos in himself, he does not exist for the State, nor for that abstraction called "society," or the "nation," which is only a collection of individuals. — Emma Goldman
Since every effort in our educational life seems to be directed toward making of the child a being foreign to itself, it must of necessity produce individuals foreign to one another, and in everlasting antagonism with each other. — Emma Goldman
The experience of every-day life fully proves that the armed individual is invariably anxious to try his strength. The same is historically true of governments. Really peaceful countries do not waste life and energy in war preparations, with the result that peace is maintained. — Emma Goldman
Atheism in its negation of gods is at the same time the strongest affirmation of man, and through man, the eternal yea to life, purpose, and beauty. — Emma Goldman
... if the production of any commodity necessitates the sacrifice of human life, society should do without that commodity, but itcan not do without that life. — Emma Goldman
In taking out an insurance policy one pays for it in dollars and cents, always at liberty to discontinue payments. If, however, woman's premium is a husband, she pays for it with her name, her privacy, her self-respect, her very life, until death does part. — Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman Quotes About World
true emancipation ... will have to do away with the absurd notion of the dualism of the sexes, or that man and woman represent two antagonistic worlds. — Emma Goldman
Idealists foolish enough to throw caution to the winds have advanced mankind and have enriched the world. — Emma Goldman
The individual whose vision encompasses the whole world often feels nowhere so hedged in and out of touch with his surroundings as in his native land. — Emma Goldman
Idealists are foolish enough to throw caution to the winds. They have advanced mankind and have enriched the world. — Emma Goldman
Politics is the reflex of the business and industrial world. — Emma Goldman
Politics is the reflex of the business and industrial world, the mottos of which are: 'To take is more blessed than to give'; 'buy cheap and sell dear'; 'one soiled hand washes the other. — Emma Goldman
Poor human nature, what horrible crimes have been committed in thy name! All wars are wars among thieves who are too cowardly to fight and who therefore induce the young manhood of the whole world to do the fighting for them. — Emma Goldman
Anarchism, the great leaven of thought, is today permeating every phase of human endeavor.... It is the philosophy of the sovereignty of the individual. It is the theory of social harmony. It is the great, surging, living truth that is reconstructing the world, and that will usher in the Dawn. — Emma Goldman
We say that if America has entered the war to make the world safe for democracy, she must first make democracy safe in America. — Emma Goldman
Thinking men and women the world over are beginning to realize that patriotism is too narrow and limited a conception to meet the necessities of our time. — Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman Quotes About Politics
The State is the altar of political freedom and, like the religious altar, it is maintained for the purpose of human sacrifice. — Emma Goldman
It is organized violence on top which creates individual violence at the bottom. It is the accumulated indignation against organized wrong, organized crime, organized injustice, which drives the political offender to act. — Emma Goldman
In modern capitalism economic exploitation rather than political oppression is the real enemy of the people. — Emma Goldman
The political arena leaves one no alternative, one must either be a dunce or a rogue. — Emma Goldman
No real social change has ever been brought about without a revolution - Revolution is but thought carried into action. Every effort for progress, for enlightenment, for science, for religious, political, and economic liberty, emanates from the minority, and not from the mass. — Emma Goldman
Corruption of politics has nothing to do with the morals, or the laxity of morals, of various political personalities. Its cause is altogether a material one. — Emma Goldman
There is no hope even that woman, with her right to vote, will ever purify politics. — Emma Goldman
... woman's narrow and purist attitude toward life makes her a greater danger to liberty wherever she has political power. Man haslong overcome the superstitions that still engulf women. — Emma Goldman
Political violence is organized violence on the top which creates individual violence at the bottom. — Emma Goldman
Revolution is indeed a violent process. But if it is to result only in a change of dictatorship, in a shifting of names and political personalities, then it is hardly worth while. — Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman Quotes About Poor
Poor human nature, what horrible crimes have been committed in thy name! — Emma Goldman
Heaven must be an awfully dull place if the poor in spirit live there. — Emma Goldman
Poor America, of what avail is all her wealth, if the individuals comprising the nation are wretchedly poor? If they live in squalor, in filth, in crime, with hope and joy gone, a homeless, soulless army of human prey. — Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman Famous Quotes And Sayings
The most violent element in society is ignorance. — Emma Goldman
I'd rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck. — Emma Goldman
If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal. — Emma Goldman
The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the black man's right to his body, or woman's right to her soul. — Emma Goldman
Anarchism stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion and liberation of the human body from the coercion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. It stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals. — Emma Goldman
Merely external emancipation has made of the modern woman an artificial being. Now, woman is confronted with the necessity of emancipating herself from emancipation, if she really desires to be free. — Emma Goldman
wealth means power: the power to subdue, to crush, to exploit, the power to enslave, to outrage, to degrade. — Emma Goldman
The State, every government whatever its form, character or color - be it absolute or constitutional, monarchy or republic, Fascist, Nazi or bolshevik - is by its very nature conservative, static, intolerant of change and opposed to it. — Emma Goldman
No one has yet realized the wealth of sympathy, the kindness and generosity hidden in the soul of a child. The effort of every true education should be to unlock that treasure. — Emma Goldman
No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law. How can it be within the law? The law is stationary. The law is fixed. The law is a chariot wheel which binds us all regardless of conditions or place or time. — Emma Goldman
Religion! How it dominates man's mind, how it humiliates and degrades his soul. God is everything, man is nothing, says religion.But out of that nothing God has created a kingdom so despotic, so tyrannical, so cruel, so terribly exacting that naught but gloom and tears and blood have ruled the world since gods began. — Emma Goldman
To the indefinite, uncertain mind of the American radical the most contradictory ideas and methods are possible. The result is a sad chaos in the radical movement, a sort of intellectual hash, which has neither taste nor character. — Emma Goldman
It is essential that we realize once and for all that man is much more of a sex creature than a moral creature. The former is inherent, the other is grafted on. — Emma Goldman
Every daring attempt to make a great change in existing conditions, every lofty vision of new possibilities for the human race, has been labeled Utopian. — Emma Goldman
The people are urged to be patriotic ... by sacrificing their own children. Patriotism requires allegience to the flag, which means obedience and readiness to kill father, mother, brother, sister. — Emma Goldman
'What I believe' is a process rather than a finality. Finalities are for gods and governments, not for the human intellect. — Emma Goldman
How long would authority ... exist, if not for the willingness of the mass to become soldiers, policemen, jailers, and hangmen. — Emma Goldman
I do not believe in God, because I believe in man. Whatever his mistakes, man has for thousands of years been working to undo the botched job your god has made. — Emma Goldman
Religion, the dominion of the human mind; Property, the dominion of human needs; and Government, the dominion of human conduct, represent the stronghold of man's enslavement and all the horrors it entails. — Emma Goldman
If not for the direct action of a John Brown and his comrades, America would still trade in the flesh of the black man. — Emma Goldman
The soldier's business is to take life. For that he is paid by the State, eulogized by political charlatans and upheld by public hysteria. But woman's function is to give life, yet neither the State nor politicians nor public opinion have ever made the slightest provision in return for the life woman has given. — Emma Goldman
A practical scheme, says Oscar Wilde, is either one already in existence, or a scheme that could be carried out under the existing conditions; but it is exactly the existing conditions that one objects to, and any scheme that could accept these conditions is wrong and foolish. — Emma Goldman
John Burroughs has stated that experimental study of animals in captivity is absolutely useless. Their character, their habits, their appetites undergo a complete transformation when torn from their soil in field and forest. With human nature caged in a narrow space, whipped daily into submission, how can we speak of its potentialities? — Emma Goldman
No real social change has ever been brought about without a revolution... revolution is but thought carried into action. — Emma Goldman
Jealousy is the very reverse of understanding, of sympathy, and of generous feeling. Never has jealousy added to character, never does it make the individual big and fine. — Emma Goldman
Patriotism ... is a superstition artificially created and maintained through a network of lies and falsehoods; a superstition that robs man of his self-respect and dignity, and increases his arrogance and conceit. — Emma Goldman
The contention that a standing army and navy is the best security of peace is about as logical as the claim that the most peaceful citizen is he who goes about heavily armed. — Emma Goldman
Public school - where the human mind is drilled and manipulated into submission to various social and moral spooks, and thus fitted to continue our system of exploitation and oppression. — Emma Goldman
Revolution is but thought carried into action. — Emma Goldman
As to a thorough eradication of prostitution, nothing can accomplish that save a complete transvaluation of all accepted values--especially the moral ones--coupled with the abolition of industrial slavery. — Emma Goldman
ANARCHISM:The philosophy of a new social order based on liberty unrestricted by man-made law; the theory that all forms of government rest on violence, and are therefore wrong and harmful, as well as unnecessary. — Emma Goldman
Crime is naught but misdirected energy. — Emma Goldman
True, we have no conscription; that is, men are not usually forced to enlist in the army, but we have developed a far more exacting and rigid force-necessity. — Emma Goldman
Whether our reformers admit it or not, the economic and social inferiority of women is responsible for prostitution. — Emma Goldman
The higher mental development of woman, the less possible it is for her to meet a congenial male who will see in her, not only sex, but also the human being, the friend, the comrade and strong individuality, who cannot and ought not lose a single trait of her character. — Emma Goldman
Anarchism is the great liberator of man from the phantoms that have held him captive; it is the arbiter and pacifier of the two forces for individual and social harmony. — Emma Goldman
The triumph of the philosophy of Atheism is to free man from the nightmare of gods; it means the dissolution of the phantoms of the beyond. — Emma Goldman
What I believe is a process rather than a finality. — Emma Goldman
The philosophy of Atheism represents a concept of life without any metaphysical Beyond or Divine Regulator. It is the concept of an actual, real world with its liberating, expanding and beautifying possibilities, as against an unreal world, which, with its spirits, oracles, and mean contentment has kept humanity in helpless degradation. — Emma Goldman
It is safe to say that no other superstition is so detrimental to growth, so enervating and paralyzing to the minds and hearts of the people, as the superstition of Morality. — Emma Goldman
Anarchism aims to strip labor of its deadening, dulling aspect, of its gloom and compulsion. It aims to make work an instrument of joy, of strength, of color, of real harmony, so that the poorest sort of a man should find in work both recreation and hope. — Emma Goldman
Puritanism, in whatever expression, is a poisonous germ. On the surface everything may look strong and vigorous; yet the poison works its way persistently, until the entire fabric is doomed. — Emma Goldman
Morality and its victim, the mother - what a terrible picture! Is there indeed anything more terrible, more criminal, than our glorified sacred function of motherhood? — Emma Goldman
Salvation lies in an energetic march onward towards a brighter and clearer future. — Emma Goldman
Thus Dante's motto over Inferno applies with equal force to marriage: "Ye who enter here leave all hope behind. — Emma Goldman
There is no greater fallacy than the belief that aims and purposes are one thing, while methods and tactics are another ... All human experience teaches that methods and means cannot be separated from the ultimate aim. — Emma Goldman
Some people never seem to learn from experience. No matter how often they had seen the lion devour the lamb, they continued to cling to the hope that the nature of the beast might change. If only the lion could get to know the lamb better, they argued, or talk matters over. — Emma Goldman
A true conception of the relation of the sexes will not admit of conqueror and conquered; it knows of but one great thing; to give of one's self boundlessly, in order to find one's self richer, deeper, better. — Emma Goldman
Man must get back to himself before he can learn his relation to his fellows. Prometheus chained to the Rock of Ages is doomed to remain the prey of the vultures of darkness. Unbind Prometheus, and you dispel the night and its horrors. — Emma Goldman
Methods and means cannot be separated from the ultimate aim. — Emma Goldman
The American suffrage movement has been, until very recently, altogether a parlor affair, absolutely detached from the economic needs of the people. — Emma Goldman
all government, whatever its forms or pretenses, is a dead weight that paralyzes the free spirit and activities of the masses. — Emma Goldman
To-day is the parent of to-morrow. The present casts its shadow far into the future. — Emma Goldman
No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law. How can it be within the law? — Emma Goldman
You cannot build up a standing army and then throw it back into a box like tin soldiers. Armies equipped to the teeth with weapons, with highly developed instruments of murder and backed by their military interests, have their own dynamic functions. — Emma Goldman
I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from convention and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to become a nun and that the movement would not be turned into a cloister. If it meant that, I did not want it. — Emma Goldman
The most disheartening tendency common among readers is to tear out one sentence from a work, as a criterion of the writer's ideas or personality. — Emma Goldman
The pathos of it all is that the America which is to be protected by a huge military force is not the America of the people, but that of the privileged class. — Emma Goldman
When one has been threatened with a great injustice, one accepts a smaller as a favour. — Emma Goldman
In the struggle for supremacy the various political parties outdo each other in trickery, deceit, cunning, and shady machinations, confident that the one who succeeds is sure to be hailed by the majority as the victor. That is the only god--Success. As to what expense, what terrible cost to character, is of no moment. — Emma Goldman
Life Lessons by Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman taught the importance of standing up for what you believe in and not being afraid to speak out against injustice.
She showed that it is possible to make a difference and inspire others to fight for their rights even when facing opposition.
Her legacy serves as an example of the power of activism and how it can be used to create positive change in society.
Citation
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