Stalin: These people evidently think that socialism calls for equalization, for leveling the requirements and personal, everyday life of the members of society. Needless to say, such an assumption has nothing in common with Marxism, with Leninism. By equality Marxism means, not equalization of personal requirements and everyday life, but the abolition of classes, i.e., a) the equal emancipation of all working people from exploitation after the capitalists have been overthrown and expropriated; b) the equal abolition for all of private property in the means of production after they have been converted into the property of the whole of society; c) the equal duty of all to work according to their ability, and the equal right of all working people to receive in return for this according to the work performed (socialist society); d) the equal duty of all to work according to their ability, and the equal right of all working people to receive in return for this according to their needs (communist society). Moreover, Marxism proceeds from the assumption that people's tastes and requirements are not, and cannot be, identical and equal in regard to quality or quantity, whether in the period of socialism or in the period of communism. There you have the Marxist conception of equality. Marxism has never recognized, and does not recognize, any other equality.... The bourgeois writers are fond of depicting Marxist socialism as an old tsarist barracks where everything is subject to the “principle” of equalization. But Marxists cannot be responsible for the ignorance and stupidity of bourgeois writers. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3696
Mao Zedong: I believe that the laboring people and all progressive peace-loving people of the world will take the same path as we do, following the direction pointed out by Comrade Stalin, and take up the sacred cause of protecting world peace. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3697
Lenin: We know very well that there are still many defects in the organisation of Soviet power in this country. Soviet power is not a miracle-working talisman. It does not, overnight, heal all the evils of the past- illiteracy, lack of culture, the consequences of a barbarous war, the aftermath of predatory capitalism. But it does pave the way to socialism. It gives those who were formerly oppressed the chance to straighten their backs and to an ever-increasing degree to take the whole government of the country, the whole administration of the economy, the whole management of production, into their own hands. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3698
Lenin: Soviet power is the road to socialism that was discovered by the masses of the working people, and that is why it is the true road, that is why it is invincible. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3699
Lenin: What is Soviet power? What is the essence of this new power, which people in most countries still will not, or cannot, understand? The nature of this power, which is attracting larger and larger numbers of workers in every country, is the following: in the past the country was, in one way or another, governed by the rich, or by the capitalists, but now, for the first time, the country is being governed by the classes, and moreover, by the masses of those classes, which capitalism formerly oppressed. Even in the most democratic and freest republics, as long as capital rules and the land remains private property, the government will always be in the hands of a small minority, nine-tenths of which consist of capitalists, or rich men. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3700
Helen Keller: When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3702
Mao Zedong: In order to have a real grasp of Marxism, one must learn it not only from books, but mainly through class struggle, through practical work and close contact with the masses of workers and peasants. When in addition to reading some Marxist books our intellectuals have gained some understanding through close contact with the masses of workers and peasants and through their own practical work, we will all be speaking the same language, not only the common language of patriotism and the common language of the socialist system, but probably even the common language of the communist world outlook. If that happens, all of us will certainly work much better. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3706
Ursula K. Le Guin: The exercise of imagination is dangerous to those who profit from the way things are because it has the power to show that the way things are is not permanent, not universal, not necessary. Having that real though limited power to put established institutions into question, imaginative literature has also the responsibility of power. The storyteller is the truthteller. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3709
James Connolly: It is an axiom accepted by all Socialists that the ruling class industrially will always be the ruling class politically, and will also dominate in all other walks of life and fields of thought. That until the epoch of revolution arrives the interests of the class who hold the dominant machinery of production will colour and mould the entire thought and institutions of society at large. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3713
William Montgomery Brown: With our materials, factories, railroads and skill, all should have enough and to spare of every necessity, but so far is this from being the case that millions are insufficiently fed, clothed, housed and warmed, and are doomed to a perpetual and exhaustive drudgery which leaves neither leisure nor energy for the cultivation of their soul life. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3714
Stalin: Can such a radical transformation of the old bourgeois system of society be achieved without a violent revolution, without the dictatorship of the proletariat? Obviously not. To think that such a revolution can be carried out peacefully within the framework of bourgeois democracy, which is adapted to the domination of the bourgeoisie, means one of two things. It means either madness, and the loss of normal human understanding, or else an open and gross repudiation of the proletarian revolution. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3715
Michał Kalecki: It is the export surplus and the budget deficit which enable the capitalists to make profits over and above their own purchases of goods and services. The connection between 'external' profits and imperialism is obvious. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3717
Baltasar Gracián: It’s a sad thing not to have friends, but it must be even sadder not to have enemies. Because someone without enemies is a sign that they have neither: talent that casts a shadow, courage that others fear, honor that others murmur about, wealth that others covet, nor anything good that others envy. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3718
