The opposite of poverty is not wealth. I don't believe that. I actually think, in too many places, the opposite of poverty is justice.
Interpretation
True wealth is measured not by riches, but by the presence of justice and fairness in society.
In this quote, Bryan Stevenson challenges the conventional notion that wealth is the opposite of poverty. Instead, he emphasizes that true opposition to poverty lies in the pursuit of justice. This perspective highlights that societal inequities and injustices contribute significantly to poverty, and achieving justice can create an environment where everyone has the opportunity to thrive.
In practice
In a speech on social justice, mentioning Stevenson's quote can emphasize the importance of fairness in alleviating poverty.
That's my mission: I really want to get in the heads and hearts of kids and persuade them that they can believe things they haven't seen, they can do things that maybe others haven't done before them, that they are more than their worst acts.
We all have a responsibility to create a just society
One of the things that pains me is we have so tragically underestimated the trauma, the hardship we create in this country when we treat people unfairly, when we incarcerate them unfairly, when we condemn them unfairly.
Somebody has to stand when other people are sitting. Somebody has to speak when other people are quiet.
I grew up in a segregated community: I couldn't go to the public schools, beaches, certain parts of town.
If we had done the work that we should have done in the 20th century to combat our history of racial inequality, no one could win national office after demonizing people because they're Mexican or Muslim. We would be in a place where we would find that unacceptable.
Promoting active liberty does not mean allowing the majority to run roughshod over minorities. It calls for taking special care that all groups have a chance to fully participate in society and the political process.
Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to annihilate rather than to convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love.
Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter. I won't have any money to leave behind. I won't have the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. But I just want to leave a committed life behind. And that's all I want to say.
It was clear to me as a civil rights leader in the '60s that unless we put the social and economic underpinnings beneath the political and the civil rights, we wouldn't go anywhere.
Most states in the union where the death penalty is theoretically on the books don't have executions.
Mass incarceration is a massive system of racial and social control.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.