Abbie Hoffman > Quotes

“The only way to support a revolution is to make your own.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Free speech is the right to shout 'theater' in a crowded fire.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“Today is the first day of the rest of your life.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Revolution for the Hell of It

“There is absolutely no greater high than challenging the power structure as a nobody, giving it your all, and winning!”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Usually when you ask somebody in college why they are there, they'll tell you it's to get an education. The truth of it is, they are there to get the degree so that they can get ahead in the rat race. Too many college radicals are two-timing punks. The only reason you should be in college is to destroy it.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“I believe in compulsory cannibalism. If people were forced to eat what they killed, there would be no more wars.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Revolution is not something fixed in ideology, nor is it something fashioned to a particular decade. It is a perpetual process embedded in the human spirit.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“The first duty of a revolutionary is to get away with it.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“Smoking dope and hanging up Che's picture is no more a
commitment than drinking milk and collecting postage stamps.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“Above all, what you have as young people that's vitally needed to make social change, is impatience. You want it to happen now. There have to be enough people that say, "We want it now, in our lifetime. " We want to see apartheid in South Africa come down right now. We want to see the war in Central America stop right now. We want the CIA off our campus right now. We want an end to sexual harassment in our communities right now. Be adventurists in the sense of being bold and daring. Be opportunists and seize this opportunity, this moment in history, to go out and save our country. It's your turn now.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“To steal from a brother or sister is evil. To not steal from the institutions that are the pillars of the Pig Empire is equally immoral.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“In this state, dig it, you get twenty years for sale of dope to a minor. You only get five to ten for manslaughter. So like, the thing is, if you're selling to a kid and cops come, shoot the kid real quick!”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Lay off the needle drugs. The only dope worth shooting is Richard Nixon.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Hep is a very dangerous disease that can cause a number of permanent conditions, including death, which is extremely permanent.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“The 60’s are gone, dope will never be as cheap, sex never as free, and the rock and roll never as great.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Every rock or molotov cocktail thrown should make a very obvious political point. Random violence produces random propaganda results. Why waste even a rock?”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“Avoid all needle drugs — the only dope worth shooting is Richard Nixon.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“MR. WEINGLASS: Between the date of your birth, November 30, 1936, and May 1, 1960, what if anything occurred in your life?

HOFFMAN: Nothing. I believe it is called an American education.

-from the Chicago 7 trial”
― Abbie Hoffman

“I've had some good times, had some bad. Took some lumps. Scored some points. Half-way through life, at 43, I still say, 'go for broke.' No government, no FBI, no judge, no jailer is ever gonna make me say 'uncle.' Now, as then, let the game continue. I bet my stake on freedom's call; I'll play these cards with no regrets.”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Democracy is not something you believe in or hang your hat on, but something you do. You participate. If you stop doing it, democracy crumbles and falls. If you participate, the future is yours.”
― Abbie Hoffman, Steal This Book

“They told me that "with age comes wisdom", but all I got was hemorrhoids."
- Lecture tour for "Steal This Urine Test”
― Abbie Hoffman

“Sometimes the proper intellectual argument is "FUCK YOU!”
― Abbie Hoffman, Soon to Be a Major Motion Picture

“Julius, You radicalized more young people than we ever could. You're the country's top Yippie.”
― Abbie Hoffman, The Trial of the Chicago 7: The Official Transcript