End Slavery Quotes

Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4 | Page 5

Willingly no one chooses the yoke of slavery.
-- Aeschylus

“If you love your children, if you love your country, if you love the God of love, clear your hands from slaves, burden not your children or country with them.” -- Richard Allen

"Slavery was, in a very real sense, the first international human rights issue to come to the fore. It led to the adoption of the first human rights laws and to the creation of the first human rights non-governmental organization. And yet despite the efforts of the international community to combat this abhorrent practice, it is still widely prevalent in all its insidious forms, old and new. The list is painfully long and includes traditional chattel slavery; bonded labour; serfdom; and forced labour, including of children, women and migrants, and often for the purpose of sexual exploitation, domestic servitude and ritualistic and religious reasons.... -- Kofi Annan

Human beings are not property. On the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, let us reaffirm the inherent dignity of all men, women and children. And let us redouble our efforts so that the words of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights — 'no one shall be held in slavery or servitude' — ring true."
-- Kofi Annan

We could eradicate slavery. The laws are in place. The multi-nationals, the world trade organizations, the UnitedNations, they could end slavery, but they're not going to do it until and unless we demand it. -- Kevin Bales the 4th right in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is that there can be no slavery. Virtually every human being agrees that it is a moral wrong. Those key battles are won by people who went before us, who had the really tough job. Our job is simply to make sure that countries enforce their own laws and that slaves, when freed, have an opportunity forrehabilitation, reintegration, education, and so forth -- Kevin Bales

It surprises people that there’s actually a very large number of slaves in the world today—our best estimate is 27 million. And that is defining a slave in a very narrow way; we’re not talking about sweatshop workers or people who are just poor, we’re talking about people who are controlled by violence, who cannot walk away, who are being held against their will, who are being paid nothing.
-- Kevin Bales

Slavery is what slavery's always been: About one person controlling another person using violence and then exploiting them economically, paying them nothing. That's what slavery's about
-- Kevin Bales

“It’s as if all identity has been stolen from them, except their identity as slaves.”
-- Kevin Bales

We have to make it clear to the multi-nationals thatslavery is too high a price to pay for cheap goods
-- Kevin Bales

For some slaves, the first step out of bondage is to learn to see their lives with new eyes. Their reality is a social world where they have their place and some assurance of a subsistence diet. Born into slavery, they cannot easily redefine their lives outside the frame of enslavement.
-- Kevin Bales

Slavery is theft -- theft of a life, theft of work, theft of any property or produce, theft even of the children a slave might have borne.
-- Kevin Bales

See, it's no in between: you're either free or you're a slave.
-- H. Rap Brown

“We are asking people to understand that slavery still exists today; in fact, according to a recent New York Times article, if you count the number of women and children in bonded labor, domestic slavery or sexual slavery today, there are more slaves in the world than at any other time in history.” -- Charlotte Bunch

We must show new energy in fighting back an old evil. Nearly two centuries after the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade, and more than a century after slavery was officially ended in its last strongholds, the trade in human beings for any purpose must not be allowed to thrive in our time."
-- George W. Bush

Slavery can only be abolished by raising the character of the people who compose the nation; and that can be done only by showing them a higher one.
-- Maria Weston Chapman

Why should workers agree to be slaves in a basically authoritarian structure? They should have control over it themselves. Why shouldn't communities have a dominant voice in running the institutions that affect their lives? -- Noam Chomsky

 

End Slavery Quotes

Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4 | Page 5

 

END SLAVERY
HERO PIX

Richard Allen | Kevin Bales | Charlotte Bunch | Frederick Douglass | Leo Tolstoy

See Also Quotes on
Freedom

Freedom Day - February 1
End Slavery Day - December 2