— Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1972, p. 21. New York City protest against child labor, 1909. Don’t dwell on the bad, but focus on God instead. Bible verses about oppression If you’re feeling oppressed in life for whatever reason the best thing to do is cast your burdens on God. It shows a photo of Biko, and has been flagged as possibly false by Facebook’s fact-checking system. When education is not liberating, the dream of the oppressed is to become the oppressor. On the other hand, oppressed people often wish to be like the oppressor. At times, it is a hashtag; at other moments, it is a declaration, a cry of rage, a sharing of light. I put together this list of 15 inspirational quotes about the importance of standing up for what you believe in: Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.-Martin Luther King Jr. *** Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.-Martin Luther King Jr. *** We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.-Martin Luther King Jr. *** But it's not. If the goal of the oppressed is to become fully human, they will not achieve their goal by merely reversing the terms of the contradiction, by simply changing poles. In other words, the envy of the power and prestige of the oppressors and the hankering to become one of … The oppressed feel an irresistible attraction to the oppressors and their way of life; they want to imitate and follow them. This may seem simplistic; it is not. Black people have desired big cars, Equality can feel like oppression. It has become a movement that is international, worldwide in its scope of liberation for black and oppressed … The protest need not be merely physical-the throwing of stones and bullets-if it is mental, spiritual; if it expresses itself in silent, persistent dissatisfaction, the cost to the oppressor is terrific. Remember He … Yes, it is. Is the quote by Biko? “But almost always, during the initial stage of the struggle, the oppressed, instead of striving for liberation, tend themselves to become oppressors, or “sub-oppressors.” The very structure of their thought has been conditioned by the contradictions of the concrete, existential situation by which they were shaped. “The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.” A graphic shared on Facebook attributes this quote to the late South African anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko. Black Lives Matter has become what black communities all over the world have needed it to become. Resolution of the oppressor-oppressed contradiction indeed implies the disappearance of the oppressors … Freire, in his book Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1968), writes: ‘Their ideal is to be men; but for them, to be men is to be oppressors. The very structure of their thought has been conditioned by the contradiction of the concrete, existential situation by which they were shaped. But it's not. He cares for the people who feel crushed and are treated unfairly every day. This is their model of humanity’. Oppression costs the oppressor too much if the oppressed stands up and protests. Only power that springs from the weakness of the oppressed will be sufficiently strong to free both. Happy Friday. What you're feeling is just the discomfort of losing a little bit of your privilege -- the same discomfort that an only child feels when she goes to preschool and discovers that there are other kids who want to play with the same toys as she does. 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