It's hard to believe that after all this time, we haven't posted a blog. I just finished reading "Philip Vera Cruz: A Personal History of Filipino Immigrants and the Farmworkers Movement" so I figure I'd give all you some food for thought, courtesy of Manong Philip himself.
"The movement should be the most important thing. If the leader becomes the most important parts of the movement, then you won't have a movement if the leader is gone. The movement must go beyond its leaders. It must be something that is continuous, with goals and ideals the leadership can then build upon."
"For me we need the truth more than we need heroes."
"It was the Filipinos, not the Mexicans, who started this phase of the farmworkers movement when they alone sat down in Delano grape fields back in 1965 and started what became known as the 'farmworkers movement' that eventually developed into the UFW."
"Some young people think that dressing a certain way or wearing your hair a certain way or having a beard makes you a radical. Well, different dress styles perhaps can express progressive thinking, but the progressive spirit has to be from within, not just in the way you dress or how you look externally."
"I've always believed that the future belongs to the young people. Young people can effect change that sometimes old people are no longer interested in. Change, of course, has to come gradually, but I believe that you've got to keep working with the youth to nurture their ideas and ideals."
"If more young people could just get involved in the important issues of social justice, they would form a golden foundation for the struggle of all people to improve their lives."
"All in all I have faith in the younger generation. They are much more knowledgeable and progressive than my generation...It's a long process and I know it's very difficult for people to get together and win struggles. There are many hard lesson I have learned here in this country and the younger generation will learn them, too, and will do an even better job than we did."
"I see life as a continuous progressive struggle -- a group of people struggle to survive. They get older and then they are gone. But the next ones will come together and solve some of their problems. They'll align themselves with others and make advances that the previous generation wasn't able to accomplish."
"You should never desert the workers. Fight to improve the unions and educate the workers. Nothing will really change in this country without the total support of the working class."
"Wokers will unite successfully only when there's better understanding of the issues in their entirety, including honest differences of opinions which could give us a broader view of the solutions to our problems."
"Our survival in this country as a minority is determined by how well we learn from the lessons of the past."
"Our system in this country continually tries to play the workers off against each other when of course the workers' struggle is really against the big corporations...It's crucial that the minorities who live in this country understand the rules of the system, the capitalist rules. This system can be very dangerous and confusing if you don't understand how it works. It is not accidental that this system completely fails to supply jobs for everyone. The system needs unemployed people as sort of a reminder to those who are working that they'd better be good and not complain too much. This system also intentionally allows an increasing number of workers to enter the country and then gets these new immigrants, the unemployed, and the other workers to fight among themselves for jobs."
"People become insecure and afraid in this country, and our economic system turns them against each other and they learn to hate. This happens when people don't understand this system they live in, they get confused, and they fight each other, but really, you know, they should fight the system that teaches them to think this way."
"Others argue that the undocumented worker takes away jobs here in this country. Well, it only seems that they are taking away jobs, but actually, it's only because there are not enough jobs provided by the economy. It's the government's job to help people get work."
"The politicians call it Socialism when they give a little money to the poor to keep them alive but when they give huge amounts of money to a big business to keep it alive they call it 'subsidies.'"
"I have learned through my experiences in this country that minorities do not have a monopoly on virtue and are just as likely to exploit as a white person when tempted by power and influence."
"I always try to respect the interests of other people. I think that the other parts of the world are just as important as the Philippines or the United States. Therefore, I feel I belong to the world."
"I have always really believed in education because I knew that was one thing that could open up opportunities for me."
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Hopefully you can get some inspiration from these quotes. I know I did.
Peace,
ReVision