Tony Benn > Quotes

“There is no moral difference between a Stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. They both kill innocent people for political reasons.”
― Tony Benn

“If we can find the money to kill people, we can find the money to help people.”
― Tony Benn

“Most things in life are moments of pleasure and a lifetime of embarrassment; photography is a moment of embarrassment and a lifetime of pleasure.”
― Tony Benn

“All war represents a failure of diplomacy.”
― Tony Benn

“I think there are two ways in which people are controlled. First of all frighten people and secondly, demoralise them.”
― Tony Benn

“What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable? And how can we get rid of you”
― Tony Benn

“The Marxist analysis has got nothing to do with what happened in Stalin's Russia: it's like blaming Jesus Christ for the Inquisition in Spain.”
― Tony Benn

“An educated, healthy & confident nation is harder to govern”
― Tony Benn

“If the Labour Party could be bullied or persuaded to denounce its Marxists, the media - having tasted blood - would demand next that it expelled all its Socialist and reunited the remaining Labour Party with the SDP to form a harmless alternative to the Conservatives, which could then be allowed to take office now and then when the Conservatives fell out of favour with the public. Thus British Capitalism, it is argued, will be made safe forever, and socialism would be squeezed of the National agenda. But if such a strategy were to succeed… it would in fact profoundly endanger British society. For it would open up the danger of a swing to the far-right, as we have seen in Europe over the last 50 years.”
― Tony Benn

“I have divided politicians into two categories: the Signposts and the Weathercocks. The Signpost says: 'This is the way we should go.' And you don't have to follow them but if
you come back in ten years time the Signpost is still there. The Weathercock hasn’t got an opinion until they've looked at the polls, talked to the focus groups, discussed it with the
spin doctors. And I've no time for Weathercocks, I'm a Signpost man. And in fairness, although I disagreed with everything she did, Mrs Thatcher was a Signpost. She said what she meant. Meant what she said. Did what she said she’d do if you voted for her. So everybody who voted for her shared responsibility for what happened. And I think that we do need a few more Signposts and few fewer Weathercocks.”
― Tony Benn

“I don't think people realise how the establishment became established. It simply stole the land and property off the poor, surrounded themselves with weak minded sycophants for protection, gave themselves titles and have been wielding power ever since.”
― Tony Benn

“Broadcasting is really too important to be left to the broadcasters.”
― Tony Benn

“I don't make mistakes. I make predictions which immediately turn out to be wrong.”
― Tony Benn, Arguments for Socialism

“Of course, Mao made his mistakes, because everybody does, but at least he allowed working people to smoke, even in the most trying circumstances, such as when, for one reason or another, they found themselves up before the firing squad.”
― Tony Benn

“I'm all in favour of free expression provided it's kept rigidly under control.”
― Tony Benn, Arguments for Socialism

“When I was seven I got dressed up as a city gent and walked into the Bank of England shouting ' fuck the Pound'.”
― Tony Benn, Arguments for Socialism

“After fifteen years I have decided to resign my membership of the Dennis The Menace Fanclub. It
brought me no benefits worth mentioning.”
― Tony Benn, More Time for Politics: Diaries 2001-2007

“By the end of his sixteen-course meal in Buckingham Palace, Ramsay McDonald discovered he had changed his mind about the workers owning the means of production. From now on, he felt it better that the Dukes and Duchesses should continue to own the means of production. The workers would just have to make do with what was left over.”
― Tony Benn, Dare to Be a Daniel: Then and Now

“You can’t have an economic structure worldwide whereby capital can move but labour can’t, and if you’re going to follow this, then labour must be able to come to wherever it’s more profitable. These are the people that are being kept out by the Asylum Bill, on the grounds that they are economic migrants and all of that, but of course all the money that’s invested abroad is economic migrant money.”
― Tony Benn, Free at Last! Diaries, 1991-2001

“I was stunned with outrage.”
― Tony Benn, Free at Last! Diaries, 1991-2001

“The Prime Minister keeps me on around here because I make him look good.”
― Tony Benn

“Clement Attlee, who looked like a sadistic sanitary inspector...”
― Tony Benn

“In the course of my life I have developed five little democratic questions. If one meets a powerful person--Adolf Hitler, Joe Stalin or Bill Gates--ask them five questions: “What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable? And how can we get rid of you?” If you cannot get rid of the people who govern you, you do not live in a democratic system.”
― Tony Benn

“He referred to Aneurin Bevan as 'Urinal' Bevan. As for the working classes, they couldn't write their own names in shit on a lavatory wall. I said I thought they could.”
― Tony Benn, The Benn Diaries, 1940-1990

“Howay yabastaaz I'll t-t-take the f-f-fuckin lorrayaz! Am fuckin al reet me man. Why aye!”
― Tony Benn, Letters to my Grandchildren: Lessons for the Future

“But if there is hope, it lies in ordinary working people. When you put it in words it sounds reasonable: it is when you look at the human beings passing you on the pavement that it becomes an act of faith.”
― Tony Benn, Arguments for Socialism

“Clare Short, who today poses as an anti-war warrior but was six years ago Blair's cheerleader-in-chief for bombing Yugoslavia. After the attack on Radio-Televizija Jugoslavenska she said, 'The propaganda machine is prolonging the war and it's a legitimate target'. Amnesty International pointed out 'intentionally directing attacks against civilian objects is a war crime under the Rome Statutes of the International Criminal Court'.”
― Tony Benn

“If there's one thing I've learned, it's that life is one crushing defeat after another until you just wish Kinnock was dead.”
― Tony Benn

“... the usual problem of the reformer [is] that we have to run the economic system to protect our people who are now locked into it while we change the system. And if you run it without seeking to change it then you are locked in the decay of the system, but if you simply pass resolutions to change it without consulting those who are locked in the decaying system, then you become irrelevant to the people you seek to represent… We cannot content ourselves with speaking only to ourselves; we must raise these issues publicly and involve the community groups because we champion what they stand for. We must win the argument, broaden the base of membership, not only to win the election but to generate the public support to carry the policies through.”
― Tony Benn

“Αν αρχειοθετείς το καλάθι των αχρήστων σου για πενήντα χρόνια, έχεις μια δημόσια βιβλιοθήκη.”
― Tony Benn 1925 Βρετανός πολιτικός τέως υπουργός