Harry Belafonte Quotes

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Harry Belafonte

Profession : Musician

Birth : March 1, 1927

Peace is necessary. For justice, it is necessary. For hope, it is necessary, for our future.

Harry Belafonte

Although slavery may have been abolished, the crippling poison of racism still persists, and the struggle still continues.

Harry Belafonte

Bring it on. Dissent is central to any democracy.

Harry Belafonte

My activism always existed. My art gave me the platform to do something about the activism.

Harry Belafonte

If you believe in justice, if you believe in democracy, if you believe in people's rights, if you believe in the harmony of all humankind - then you have no choice but to back Fidel Castro as long as it takes!

Harry Belafonte

Movements don't die, because struggle doesn't die.

Harry Belafonte

Our foreign policy has made a wreck of this planet. I'm always in Africa... And when I go to these places I see American policy written on the walls of oppression everywhere.

Harry Belafonte

Without the rebellious heart, without people who understand that there's no sacrifice we can make that is too great to retrieve that which we've lost, we will forever be distracted with possessions and trinkets and title.

Harry Belafonte

If you want to look at the Monroe Doctrine and what happened when we wrote that, we stated what the business would be for America's power, especially in this hemisphere. We have always been the colonizer of this hemisphere, wherever we've been.

Harry Belafonte

I grew up in the Great Depression, and the jazz artists and Dixieland musicians were at the core of our communications and enjoyment. They were not passing fancies. They are something that is, and will be, listened to again and again. I have a space of reverence for some of those old jazz stars such as Sydney Bechet and Louis Armstrong.

Harry Belafonte

Poverty is terror. Having your Social Security threatened is terror. Having your livelihood as an elderly person slowly disappearing with no replenishment is terror.

Harry Belafonte

The pursuit of justice is all I have ever known.

Harry Belafonte

I don't think that we are a species or a people that can exist without making mistakes somewhere along the line.

Harry Belafonte

When I was 20 and 30, my visions for what the world would be, all things were possible.

Harry Belafonte

I think Bush has a very selfish, arrogant point of view. I think he is interested in power, I think he believes his truth is the only truth, and that he will do what he wants to do despite the people.

Harry Belafonte

You can be arrested and not charged. You can be arrested and have no right to counsel.

Harry Belafonte

Fascism is fascism. Terrorism is terrorism. Oppression is oppression.

Harry Belafonte

This generosity that has been offered to the United States says very much about the Venezuelan spirit.

Harry Belafonte

I've always been supportive of the right of Israel as a state, and I've always fought against anti-Semitism, even in my own community.

Harry Belafonte

America has never been moved to perfect our desire for greater democracy without radical thinking and radical voices being at the helm of any such quest.

Harry Belafonte