How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Aba lavichè. Down with poverty.
Pa fe vyolans. Don't commit violence.
Aba kidnaping. Down with kidnapping.
Nou vle lape. We want peace.
Nou gen dwa pou nou edike tout moun. We want to educate everyone.
These slogans are a big joke, cos there's only poverty in the Site, and violence is everywhere. (1.195)
Signs posted throughout the Site say stuff like this. The saddest part about the signs is that violence is everywhere in the Site. It's the way of life. Shorty fills us in on this fact through jokes—as in, how funny the sign says "no violence" when it's all over the place. Yeah, we're not laughing, either.
Quote #2
They're doing it for revenge, not freedom, and that will kill their revolution before it's even born, like a slave mother doing violence to herself to destroy her mulat baby in the womb, the fruit of rape killed on the branch before it can fall. (4.13)
Toussaint can tell that many of his fellow rebels are only involved in the revolution so they can repay violence with violence. Can you blame them? He tells us they've been tortured, raped, murdered, and more as slaves. Yet he wants to change the system since no one will win from more violence.
Quote #3
He hoped that Isaac had remained inside the cottage, as he had instructed. Toussaint's son was a sensitive lad, although nearly a man, and not the type who should be involved in violence. (4.52)
Later, when we meet Isaac, it's clear what Toussaint means. The kid owns books, not weapons. Still, we wonder: Is there a type of man who should be involved in violence? We might argue that violence isn't something that anyone should aspire to, regardless of what type of person they are.
Quote #4
The problem was that he didn't necessarily want to. He had never killed anyone in his life, and he didn't want to start now. He wanted to understand all sides of a conflict before he ever had to pick up a weapon. (6.34)
Leave it to Toussaint to think about violence rationally. The book shows us there's just no avoiding violence during a revolution (or in the Site), though. It doesn't matter whether you want to engage in violence or not; you have to if you live in a situation like the characters do.
Quote #5
There were those who were so filled with hate by their experience, by their oppression, that they snapped and destroyed property or people. There were those who were so filled with sadness by their experience that they snapped and destroyed themselves; someone would find them hanging in the barn, or lying in the field with slit wrists. (6.37)
The three different types of slaves that Toussaint comes up with are very telling about his personality. To boil it down, slaves resort to either violence, sadness, or justice because they have suffered injustice. Unfortunately, most enslaved people fall into the first category. Luckily for them, Toussaint is squarely in the third.
Quote #6
I was in front of the door and I raised the shotgun as the shadow of a man loomed before me. I pulled the trigger. It was that quick. There was a boom so loud, like the world was falling down, and I saw a spray of black and red. I was thrown backward, and my shoulder was screaming where the stock of the gun had blown back into it. (13.141)
We're given a crash course in violence through Shorty's eyes. The first time he killed someone, Shorty was only twelve-years-old. Let that sink in for a moment. He's just a kid, not ready to enter the world or do much on his own, when he's forced into a world of gangs and shooting.
Quote #7
He would have been caught up in the violence, whether he liked it or not. Besides, he had seen what was to come. He knew slavery was going to end, and so he had to bear the duty of being the one to end it. (14.8)
Toussaint thinks about the revolution with certainty—he knows it will happen. Sure, his certainty is partially based on the fact that he saw the future, but that doesn't matter much. Also definite? The fact that there will be violence to make sure the revolution actually happens.
Quote #8
Flash. Papa falling, the machetes coming down like great shining birds, pecking violently, feeding on blood. Flash. The gangsters screeching and whooping as they cut him to piti-piti pieces. I looked beyond the balaclava of one man and all of a sudden he was Biggie, and there was a hatred burning in his eyes as he killed my papa. (19.50)
As Shorty thinks through some key moments in his life, it's clear he's had it rough. Let's make that super rough. Most of his memories include violence in one form or another. Being exposed to this from such a young age desensitizes Shorty and makes him think about violence in a different way than other teens.
Quote #9
They don't want to give Biggie a funeral, she said. They think it would become a pretext for violence in the Site. After what they did, with their guns! (21.5)
Stephanie points out the hypocritical way the U.N. operates. They are the ones who shot Biggie, yet they want to prevent violence by not holding a funeral. Is this just the party line, or do they actually think they're helping the people in the Site?
Quote #10
Sometimes when you have a gun in your hand it starts to do your thinking for you. I knew what she meant. Sometimes when I was holding a gun it was like the gun wanted to kill people, not me. Never me. (21.11)
We couldn't have said it better ourselves, Steph. Shorty thinks about her wise words and grasps that she's right. Sometimes it's not about whether he wants to kill someone but the fact that he has a gun in his hand, waiting to be used. That might sound like a cop-out, but it seems he actually believes it.