Alexander Berkman Quotes

It is the system, rather than individuals, that is the source of pollution and degradation. My prison-house environment is but another manifestation of the Midas-hand, whose cursed touch turns everything to the brutal service of Mammon.

In short, Anarchism means a condition or society where all men and women are free, and where all enjoy equally the benefits of an ordered and sensible life.

Anarchy: It is NOT bombs, disorder or chaos. It is NOT robbery and murder. It is NOT a war of each against all. It is NOT a return to barbarism or to the wild state of man. Anarchism is the very opposite of all that.

…existence has become an unreasoning, wild dance around the golden calf, a mad worship of God Mammon. In that dance and in that worship man has sacrificed all his finer qualities of the heart and soul — kindness and justice, honor and manhood, compassion and sympathy with his fellowman.

Certainly the worker has nothing to lose by a change from government and capitalism to a condition of no government, of anarchy.

Anarchism means voluntary co-operation instead of forced participation. It means harmony and order in place of interference and disorder.

War paralyzes your courage and deadens the spirit of true manhood. It degrades and stupefies with the sense that you are not responsible, that ’tis not yours to think and reason why, but to do and die,’ like the hundred thousand others doomed like yourself. War means blind obedience, unthinking stupidity, brutish callousness, wanton destruction, and irresponsible murder.

Socialism, like Christianity destroyed itself to gain power

What is this thing we call government? Is it anything but organized violence? The law orders you to obey, and if you don’t obey, it will compel you by force – all governments, all law and authority finally rest on force and violence, on punishment or fear of punishment.

War means blind obedience, unthinking stupidity, brutish callousness, wanton destruction, and irresponsible murder.

When the highwayman holds his gun to your head, you turn your valuables over to him. You ‘consent’ alright, but you do so because you cannot help yourself, because you are compelled by his gun. Are you not compelled to work for an employer? Your need compels you, just as the highwayman’s gun.

The cure for evil and disorder is more liberty, not suppression.