Equality Quotes
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Equality Quotes
For centuries, people have fought for equality in riots, songs, and the pages of novels. Click on any equality quote below to see it in context and find out where it falls on Shmoop's pretentious scale. We'll give you details on who said it, when they said it, and in some cases, why on earth they thought it was okay to say it.
"A sense of the fundamental decencies is parceled out unequally at birth"Source: The Great Gatsby | Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."Source: Animal Farm | Author: George Orwell
"All in the game. All in the game, yo."Source: The Wire | Speaker: Omar Little
"And they brought us whole binders full of women."Source: 2012 Presidential Debate | Speaker: Mitt Romney
"Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the dream and the hope of the slave. I rise. I rise. I rise."Source: Still I Rise | Author: Maya Angelou
"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."Source: Brave New World | Author: Aldous Huxley
"But this is a truth that applies to the human race and to no particular race of men."Source: To Kill a Mockingbird | Author: Harper Lee
"But you just gotta understand that that’s the way it is and keep on steppin'."Source: The Watsons Go to Birmingham | Author: Christopher Paul Curtis
"Can we all get along?"Source: Press Conference | Speaker: Rodney King
"Captain, it is I, Ensign Pulver, and I just threw your stinking palm tree overboard. Now, what's all this crud about no movie tonight?"Source: Mister Roberts | Speaker: Frank Pulver
"Chivalry is not only dead, it's decomposed."Source: The Palm Beach Story | Speaker: John D. Hackensacker III
"Dave, stop. Stop, will you? Stop, Dave. Will you stop, Dave? Stop, Dave. I'm afraid."Source: 2001: A Space Odyssey | Speaker: HAL 9000
"Ebony and ivory live together in perfect harmony."Source: Ebony and Ivory | Speaker: Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder
"Education is the key to unlock the golden door of freedom."Source: 1896 Letter to Booker T. Washington | Author: George Washington Carver
"Education is the most powerful weapon we can use to change the world."Source: 2003 Speech | Speaker: Nelson Mandela
"Everybody in the whole cell block was dancing to the jailhouse rock!"Source: "Jailhouse Rock" | Speaker: Elvis Presley
"Excuse me while I kiss this guy."Source: "Purple Haze" | Speaker: Jimi Hendrix
"Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes. How do you measure, measure a year?"Source: Seasons of Love | Speaker: Cast of Rent
"Flushed with his impassioned gibberish, he saw himself standing alone on the last barrier of civilization."Source: The Great Gatsby | Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
"From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs."Source: Critique of the Gotha Program | Author: Karl Marx
"He chose poorly."Source: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade | Speaker: Grail Knight
"Hitler didn't snub me—it was our president who snubbed me. The president didn't even send me a telegram."Source: A Republican Rally in Baltimore, Maryland | Speaker: Jesse Owens
"Hoke, you're my best friend."Source: Driving Miss Daisy | Speaker: Miss Daisy
"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world."Source: The Diary of Anne Frank | Author: Anne Frank
"I shot the sheriff"Source: I Shot the Sheriff | Speaker: Bob Marley
"I think of myself as a man."Source: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner | Speaker: John Prentice
"I want my MTV!"Source: MTV commercial | Speaker: Various
"I'm a smart, strong, sensual woman."Source: Bob's Burgers | Speaker: Tina Belcher
"I'm no hero. I put my bra on one boob at a time like everyone else."Source: Bob's Burgers | Speaker: Tina Belcher
"I'm Nobody! Who are you?Source: I'm Nobody! Who are you? | Author: Emily Dickinson
Are you — Nobody — too?"
"If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change."Source: "Man in the Mirror" | Speaker: Michael Jackson
"If you want to know what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals."Source: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire | Author: J. K. Rowling
"In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman."Source: 1965 Speech | Speaker: Margaret Thatcher
"In recognizing the humanity of our fellow beings, we pay ourselves the highest tribute."Source: Furman v. Georgia | Author: Thurgood Marshall
"In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you."Source: Pride and Prejudice | Author: Jane Austen
"It don't matter if you're black or white."Source: Black or White | Speaker: Michael Jackson
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be."Source: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire | Author: J.K. Rowling
"Let us then suppose the mind to be, as we say, white paper."Source: Essay Concerning Human Understanding | Author: John Locke
"Man is the only creature that consumes without producing."Source: Animal Farm | Author: George Orwell
"Match me, Sidney."Source: Sweet Smell of Success | Speaker: J.J. Hunsecker
"Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's passing."Source: To Kill a Mockingbird | Speaker: Reverend Sykes
"Mr. Christian!"Source: Mutiny on the Bounty | Speaker: Captain Bligh
"My country is the world; my countrymen are mankind."Source: Declaration of Sentiments, The Liberator Magazine | Author: William Lloyd Garrison
"My soul has grown deep like the rivers."Source: The Negro Speaks of Rivers | Author: Langston Hughes
"No man is good enough to govern any woman without her consent."Source: The annual convention of the California State Suffrage Association | Speaker: Susan B. Anthony
"One must lie under certain circumstances and at all times when one can't do anything about them"Source: To Kill a Mockingbird | Author: Harper Lee
"Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun."Source: Problems of War and Strategy | Speaker: Mao Zedong
"Right is right, and wrong is wrong."Source: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn | Author: Mark Twain
"Serving on a jury forces a man to make up his mind and declare himself about something. Men don't like to do that. Sometimes it's unpleasant."Source: To Kill a Mockingbird | Author: Harper Lee
"Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed."Source: Up from Slavery: An Autobiography | Author: Booker T. Washington
"That is just the way with some people. They get down on a thing when they don't know nothing about it."Source: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn | Author: Mark Twain
"The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."Source: March from Selma, 1965 | Speaker: Martin Luther King, Jr.
"The caged bird sings of freedom"Source: Caged Bird | Author: Maya Angelou
"The revolution is not an apple that falls when it is ripe! You have to make it fall."Source: Libération | Speaker: Che Guevara
"The seaweed is always greener in somebody else's lake."Source: The Little Mermaid | Speaker: Sebastian
"There's something in our world that makes men lose their heads—they couldn't be fair if they tried."Source: To Kill a Mockingbird | Author: Harper Lee
"They call me Mister Tibbs!"Source: In the Heat of the Night | Speaker: Detective Virgil Tibbs
"We didn't land on Plymouth Rock. The rock was landed on us."Source: Speech at the Audubon Ballroom | Speaker: Malcolm X
"We didn't land on Plymouth Rock—Plymouth Rock landed on us."Source: Malcolm X | Speaker: Malcolm X (played by Denzel Washington)
"We're not worthy! We're not worthy!"Source: Wayne's World | Speaker: Wayne and Garth
"We've got to fight until we overcome."Source: Ballot or the Bullet | Speaker: Malcolm X
"What you see is what you get!"Source: The Flip Wilson Show | Speaker: Geraldine Jones
"What's so funny 'bout peace, love, and understanding?"Source: "Peace, Love, and Understanding" | Speaker: Elvis Costello
"Yas queen!"Source: Broad City | Speaker: Ilana Wexler
"You just hold your head high and keep those fists down. No matter what anybody says to you, don't you let 'em get your goat. Try fighting with your head for a change."Source: To Kill a Mockingbird | Author: Harper Lee