Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths Quotes

“You see, love for the victim demanded struggle, while love for the opponent ruled out doing harm. But in fact, love for the opponent likewise demanded struggle. Why? Because by hurting others, the oppressor also hurts himself. Of course, the oppressor isn’t likely to be aware of that. He may be thoroughly enjoying his power and wealth. But beneath all that, his injustice is cutting him off from his fellow humans and from his own deeper self. And when that happens, his spirit can only wither and deform. Now, that’s not obvious, and if you don’t believe it, I don’t know any way I might convince you. But if that does pass through your filter, you may be well on your way to understanding Gandhi.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi said that only people with a high regard for the law were qualified for civil disobedience.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Satyagraha was instead an instrument of unity.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi saw that the power of any tyrant depends entirely on people being willing to obey. The tyrant may get people to obey by threatening to throw them in prison, or by holding guns to their heads. But the power still resides in the obedience, not in the prison or the guns.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi’s most decisive influence on his opponents was more indirect than direct.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Satyagraha—Gandhi’s nonviolent action—was not a way for one group to seize what it wanted from another. It was not a weapon of class struggle, or of any other kind of division. Satyagraha was instead an instrument of unity. It was a way to remove injustice and restore social harmony, to the benefit of both sides.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi noted also that violent revolutions almost always end in repressive dictatorships. Once the rebel troops gain control, they naturally keep acting as they’re used to—in other words, they start running the country like a military camp.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“People try nonviolence for a week, and when it ‘doesn’t work,’ they go back to violence, which hasn’t worked for centuries.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“you look closely at so-called popular liberation movements, you’ll find that they’re seldom started by the peasants or workers they’re supposed to benefit. These armed struggles may gradually build wider support—but in almost every case, they’re launched by students or other intellectuals in the name of the people.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Let me give a general description of what seems really to have happened when Gandhi and his followers committed civil disobedience: Gandhi and followers break a law—politely. Public leader has them arrested, tried, put in prison. Gandhi and followers cheerfully accept it all. Members of the public are impressed by the protest, public sympathy is aroused for the protesters and their cause. Members of the public put pressure on public leader to negotiate with Gandhi. As cycles of civil disobedience recur, public pressure grows stronger. Finally, public leader gives in to pressure from his constituency, negotiates with Gandhi.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi said, “I believe that no government can exist for a single moment without the cooperation of the people, willing or forced, and if people suddenly withdraw their cooperation in every detail, the government will come to a standstill.” That was Gandhi’s concept of power—the one he’s accused of not having. It’s a hard one to grasp, for those used to seeing power in the barrel of a gun. Their filters do not pass it. And so they call Gandhi idealistic, impractical. •”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Each of us too sees the world through our own “filter”—a filter made up of our assumptions, our motivations, and the categories we use to sort out and organize our experience. This filter determines how we see the world. When we come across something that doesn’t match our assumptions, motivations, and categories, our filter blocks it out. It’s not that we choose to reject it. Consciously, we don’t even perceive it. Or else we perceive it in a partial, distorted form. It”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi was not talking about defeating or overthrowing anyone. Satyagraha—Gandhi’s nonviolent action—was not a way for one group to seize what it wanted from another. It was not a weapon of class struggle, or of any other kind of division. Satyagraha was instead an instrument of unity. It was a way to remove injustice and restore social harmony, to the benefit of both sides.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“If exponents of armed struggle were less concerned with proving their manliness and more concerned with the welfare of the people they claim to stand up for, they might discover that nonviolent forms of struggle, everything considered, work better.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Other negative side-effects of violence come into view once the struggle comes to an end. For instance, violence generally leaves the two sides as long-standing enemies. Maybe the most amazing thing about Gandhi’s nonviolent revolution is, not that the British left, but that they left as friends, and that Britain and India became partners in the British Commonwealth. Gandhi noted also that violent revolutions almost always end in repressive dictatorships. Once the rebel troops gain control, they naturally keep acting as they’re used to—in other words, they start running the country like a military camp.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“For example, say that a Third World country undergoes a spontaneous, country-wide, mass noncooperation campaign against its dictator, lasting weeks or even months. Tens of thousands march in the streets, newspapers and radio stations defy the censors, whole cities are shut down for days at a time as people go on strike. Noted citizens call for the dictator’s resignation, no one follows his orders, he has completely lost control. Finally, four or five military officers, carrying out the obvious will of the people, march nearly unopposed into the presidential palace, arrest the dictator, and escort him out of office. Chances are that our news media and history books will thereafter attribute the dictator’s downfall, purely and simply, to “a military coup.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Each of us too sees the world through our own “filter”—a filter made up of our assumptions, our motivations, and the categories we use to sort out and organize our experience. This filter determines how we see the world. When we come across something that doesn’t match our assumptions, motivations, and categories, our filter blocks it out. It’s not that we choose to reject it. Consciously, we don’t even perceive it. Or else we perceive it in a partial, distorted form. It seems that nonviolence has a particularly hard time passing through many people’s filters.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“All my actions have their source in my inalienable love of humankind.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“When Satyagraha worked, both sides won.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Maybe the most amazing thing about Gandhi’s nonviolent revolution is, not that the British left, but that they left as friends, and that Britain and India became partners in the British Commonwealth.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi saw that the power of any tyrant depends entirely on people being willing to obey.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Other negative side-effects of violence come into view once the struggle comes to an end. For instance, violence generally leaves the two sides as long-standing enemies. Maybe the most amazing thing about Gandhi’s nonviolent revolution is, not that the British left, but that they left as friends, and that Britain and India became partners in the British Commonwealth.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Nonviolent action, on the other hand, requires more patience because the action is less thrilling.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Of course, noncooperation and civil disobedience overlapped. Noncooperation too was to be carried out in a “civil” manner. Here too, Gandhi’s followers had to cheerfully face beating, imprisonment, confiscation of their property—and it was hoped that this willing suffering would cause a “change of heart.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi ruled out direct coercion, such as trying to physically block someone. Hostile language was banned. Destroying property was forbidden. Not even secrecy was allowed.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi and followers break a law—politely. Public leader has them arrested, tried, put in prison. Gandhi and followers cheerfully accept it all. Members of the public are impressed by the protest, public sympathy is aroused for the protesters and their cause. Members of the public put pressure on public leader to negotiate with Gandhi. As cycles of civil disobedience recur, public pressure grows stronger. Finally, public leader gives in to pressure from his constituency, negotiates with Gandhi.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“Gandhi called his overall method of nonviolent action Satyagraha. This translates roughly as “Truth-force.”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World

“almanacs”
― Mark Shepard, Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths: Civil Disobedience, Nonviolence, and Satyagraha in the Real World