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What we need in the United States is not division, what we need in the United States is not hatred, what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness, but it's love, peace, and compassion towards one another, and a feeling of justice towards those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white, or whether they be black.

Robert F. Kennedy#82

JusticeEqualityPeaceUnityCompassion

About this quote

What does it mean?
True unity requires replacing division and violence with love, peace, compassion, and justice for all.
In plain terms
We need love and justice instead of hatred and violence to unite the country.
What can you take from it?
Choose compassion and justice over division to heal societal wounds.

Where it applies

  • social movements
  • political speeches
  • community reconciliation

Putting it to work

  • practice active compassion
  • advocate for justice
  • reject divisive rhetoric

Questions to consider

  • How can you show compassion to those you disagree with?
  • What justice is still missing in your community?

Another view

Love and compassion may feel abstract when facing deep structural injustice.

More from Robert F. Kennedy

  1. What is objectionable, what is dangerous about extremists, is not that they are extreme, but that they are intolerant. The evil is not what they say about thei…

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  2. Whenever men take the law into their own hands, the loser is the law. And when the law loses, freedom languishes.

    Permalink to quote #83
  3. What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet. No wrongs have ever been righte…

    Permalink to quote #80

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