Ward Churchill > Quotes

“The American people are free to do exactly what they are told.”
― Ward Churchill

“At this juncture, the entire planet is locked, figuratively, in a room with the sociocultural equivalent of Hannibal Lecter. An individual of consummate taste and refinement, imbued with indelible grace and charm, he distracts his victims with the brilliance of his intellect, even while honing his blade. He is thus able to dine alone upon their livers, his feast invariably candlelit, accompanied by lofty music and a fine wine. Over and over the ritual is repeated, always hidden, always denied in order that it may be continued. So perfect is Lecter's pathology that, from the depths of his scorn for the inferiors upon whom he feeds, he advances himself as their sage and therapist, he who is incomparably endowed with the ability to explain their innermost meanings, he professes to be their savior. His success depends upon being embraced and exalted by those upon whom he preys. Ultimately, so long as Lecter is able to retain his mask of omnipotent gentility, he can never be stopped. The spirit of Hannibal Lecter is thus at the core of an expansionist European 'civilization' which has reached out to engulf the planet.”
― Ward Churchill, A Little Matter of Genocide: Holocaust & Denial in the Americas 1492 to the Present

“If the U.S. foreign policy results in massive death and destruction abroad, they cannot feign innocence when some of that destruction is returned. On 9/11/2001, Americans noticed that payback can be a real motherfucker.”
― Ward Churchill

“Could it be that toxic mimics are toxic because they ignore responsibility, they ignore relationship, they ignore presence, they substitute control for fluidity and choice?”
― Ward Churchill

“The desire for a nonviolent and cooperative world is the healthiest of all psychological manifestations. This is the overarching principle of liberation and revolution. Undoubtedly, it seems the highest order of contradiction that, in order to achieve nonviolence, we must first break with it in overcoming its root causes. Therein lies our only hope.”
― Ward Churchill, Pacifism As Pathology: Reflections on the Role of Armed Struggle in North America

“The Jews who participated in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, including those who went on what they thought were suicide missions, had a higher rate of survival than those who went along. Never forget that.
The only way out of a double bind is to smash it. Never forget that either.
--Derrick Jensen”
― Ward Churchill, Pacifism As Pathology: Reflections on the Role of Armed Struggle in North America

“There can be no question that the entirety of the continental United States has been expropriated from its original, indigenous inhabitants, with incalculably harmful consequences accruing to them in the process. From a moral perspective, it should be equally clear that no humane solution to the overall issues confronting any American radical can reasonably be said to exist, should it exclude mechanisms through which to safeguard the residual land base and cultural identities of these people.”
― Ward Churchill, Marxism and Native Americans