Audre Lorde on responsibility

I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.

Anger is an appropriate reaction to racist attitudes, as is fury when the actions arising from those attitudes do not change.

There are no new ideas, just new ways of giving those ideas we cherish breath and power in our own living.

The United States stands at the pinnacle of world power. This is a solemn moment for the American democracy. For with primacy in power is joined an awe-inspiring accountability for the future.

Winston Churchill1874–1965

• America

Each man must for himself alone decide what is right and what is wrong, which course is patriotic and which isn’t. You cannot shirk this and be a man. To decide against your conviction is to be an unqualified and excusable traitor, both to yourself and to your country, let me label you as they may.

Mark Twain1835–1910Papers of the Adam Family (1939), Part VI: “Two Fragments from a Suppressed Book Called ‘Glances at History’ or ‘Outlines of History’ “

Being responsible sometimes means pissing people off.

Colin Powell1937–2021The Powell Principles (2003)