World History Quotes

“Eurocentrism is quite simply the colonizer's model of the world.”
― J.M. Blaut, The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical Diffusionism and Eurocentric History

“More often and more insistently as that time recedes, we are asked by the young who our "torturers" were, of what cloth were they made. The term torturers alludes to our ex-guardians, the SS, and is in my opinion inappropriate: it brings to mind twisted individuals, ill-born, sadists, afflicted by an original flaw. Instead, they were made of the same cloth as we, they were average human beings, averagely intelligent, averagely wicked: save the exceptions, they were not monsters, they had our faces, but they had been reared badly. They were, for the greater part, diligent followers and functionaries, some frantically convinced of the Nazi doctrine, many indifferent, or fearful of punishment, or desirous of a good career, or too obedient. All of them had been subjected to the terrifying miseducation provided for and imposed by the schools created in accordance with the wishes of Hitler and his collaborators, and then completed by the SS "drill." Many had joined this militia because of the prestige it conferred, because of its omnipotence, or even just to escape family problems. Some, very few in truth, had changes of heart, requested transfers to the front lines, gave cautious help to prisoners or chose suicide. Let it be clear that to a greater or lesser degree all were responsible, but it must bee just as clear that behind their responsibility stands that the great majority of Germans who accepted in the beginning, out of mental laziness, myopic calculation, stupidity, and national pride the "beautiful words" of Corporal Hitler, followed him as long as luck and lack of scruples favored him, were swept away by his ruin, afflicted by deaths, misery, and remorse, and rehabilitated a few years later as the result of an unprincipled political game.”
― Primo Levi

“. . . I've learned over the years that if more people knew more about history, our world would be a better place. History is constantly speaking to us. Travelers enjoy a privileged way to hear it—and sometimes an up-close chance to witness history in the making.”
― Rick Steves, For the Love of Europe: My Favorite Places, People, and Stories

“All too often world history is told as if religion did not matter. The Spanish conquered New Spain for gold, and the British came to New England to catch fish. The French Revolution had nothing to do with Catholicism, and the U.S. civil rights movement was a purely humanitarian endeavor. But even if religion makes no sense to you, you need to make sense of religion to make sense of the world.”
― Stephen Prothero, God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World--and Why Their Differences Matter

“No universal history leads from savagery to humanitarianism, but there is one leading from the slingshot to the atomic bomb.”
― Theodor W. Adorno

“If we were being absolutely honest , wouldn't we just call [the Third World] the exploited world?”
― Shahnaz Habib, Airplane Mode: An Irreverent History of Travel

“We hope to show that it is possible to read humanity's development as a dismemberment of sorcery, and propose that our current over-specialised and compartmentalised world of ideas is built entirely from the bloody gobbets of a butchered, pre-existing dreamtime.”
― Alan Moore

“Maps of the world are whitewashed,
history of the world is whitewashed,
ethics of the world are whitewashed,
knowledge of the world is whitewashed.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Iftar-e Insaniyat: The First Supper

“A million years without private property
and only 7000 with private property and
rich and poor”
― Ernesto Cardenal

“To see the world as it is, first we gotta take off our western glasses. Look at the human world with human eyes, only then you'll fathom justice and progress.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“The history of the world is a whitewashed history.”
― Abhijit Naskar, When Veins Ignite: Either Integration or Degradation

“The world doesn't have history,
what we have is whitewashed history.
The world doesn't have progress,
what we have is westwashed progress.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“World History 101 - The Actual History

History is not a record of truth, history is a record of triumph. The triumphant writes history as it fits their narrative - or to be more accurate, history is written by the conquerors for maintaining the supremacy of the conquerors, while the conquered lose everything.

Let me give you an example. In a commendable endeavor of goodwill and reparations a descendant of the British conquerors, President Lyndon Johnson started Hispanic Heritage Week, which was later expanded into a month by another white descendant, President Ronald Reagan - fast forward to present time - during the Hispanic Heritage Month the entire North America tries to celebrate Native American history. But there is a glitch - Spanish is not even a Native American language.

Native Americans did not even speak Spanish, until the brutes of Spain overran Puerto Rico like pest bearing disease and destruction, after a pathetic criminal called Columbus stumbled upon "La Isabela" in the 1500s.

Many of the natives struggled till death to save their home - many were killed by the foreign diseases to which they had no immunity. Those who lived, every last trace of their identity was wiped out, by the all-powerful and glorious spanish colonizers - their language, their traditions, their heritage, everything - just like the Portuguese did in Brazil.

The Spaniards would've done the same to Philippines on the other side of the globe, had they had the convenience to stay longer. Heck, even the name Philippines is not the original name - the original name of the islands was (probably) Maniolas, as referred to by Ptolemy. But when the Spaniard retards of the time set foot there, they named it after, then crown prince, later Philip II of Spain.

Just reminiscing those abominable atrocities makes my blood boil, and yet somehow, the brutal "glory" of the conquerors lives on as such even in this day and age, as glory that is.

That's why José Martí is so important, that's why Kwanzaa is so important, that's why Darna is so important - in the making of a world that has a place for every culture, not just the culture of the conquerors.

No other "civilized" people have done more damage to the world than the Europeans, and yet, on the pages of history books their glory of conquest is still packaged as glory, not as atrocity. Why is that? I don't know the answer - do you?

Trillions of dollars, pounds and euros in aid won't suffice to undo the damage - but what just might heal those wounds from the past, is if the offspring of the oppressors and the offspring of the oppressed, both hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder, unravel the history as it happened, not as it was presented - what just might heal the scars of yesterday, is if together we come forward to learn about each other's past, so that for the first time in history, we can actually write "human history", not the "conquerors' history" - so that for the first time ever, we write history not as conquerors and conquered, not as oppressors and oppressed, but as one species - as one humankind.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“No other "civilized" people have done more damage to the world than the Europeans.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“... the official history of this world is not necessarily to be believed.”
― Sarah J. Maas, House of Sky and Breath

“There never was a war of the free world against fascism, there was only war between two versions of fascism - because the so-called free world has tortured and massacred more lives than the third reich could only dream of.

There never was a world war between good and evil, there was only war between two evils. There never was a world war against tyranny, there was only war between an established tyrant regime and a rising one. The real first world war has just begun - the war between good and evil - the war between emancipation and occupation - between inclusion and exclusion - between expansion and contraction - between reason and rigidity - between humanity and inhumanity. I call it, World War Human.

And unlike previous times, we won't win this war by old-fashioned bullets and bombs, or by deceit and diplomacy. The World War Human can only be won by education, and education alone - by an ardent, absolute, unambiguous, unbending, undoctrinated, unphobic, unwhitewashed, decolonized, nonpartisan, gender neutral, valiant, self-correcting and conscientious execution of education.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“World history mirrors the judgment of time that results in results to learn, not verdicts to punish.”
― Ehsan Sehgal

“Black History is World History, we are all offsprings of Africa.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“White history sells the West as the free world, but dig into earth history, and you'll realize, West is the biggest threat to life and freedom.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Sonnets From The Mountaintop

“If the history of humanity were 24 hours
let's say
private property, classes, division
into rich and poor: these would be the last 10 minutes.
INJUSTICE/ the last 10 minutes.
(The top layer of earth with Mayan pottery and Goodyear tires.)
So all the great subconscious
is Communist”
― Ernesto Cardenal, Zero hour and other documentary poems

“South Earth Summon (Naskaristana 2800)

I am the Son of South Earth,
my spice-tolerance is superhuman,
but lies-tolerance is nonexistent -
my resilience knows no mortal limit,
but I have zero tolerance for intolerance.

I speak more languages than most northerners,
I've devoured more scriptures than most northerners,
I have assimilated more cultures and disciplines,
which is why I say, there is no north, no south,
when it comes to virtues and vices of human nature.

So I'm not saying South is better than the North,
but reparations are foundational to civilization;
enlightenment was born in the South of Earth -
math, medicine, poetry, philosophy, theology,
almost everything was invented in the South,
then the Northerners barged in,
and pretended they invented astrophysics.

I come from the other half of the world that
has been systematically reduced to footnotes
of northernized history normalized as world history,

now I am a bigger giant than
all your white giants combined,
now I speak, and you listen.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Nazmahal: Palace of Grace

“In sciences white people are not the pioneers, in philosophy white people are not the pioneers, in art and astrophysics whiteys are not the pioneers, in medicine and mathematics whiteys are not the pioneers, then how on earth did you come by this insane inkling that white people are the super race, how many bottles did you have, or did you bang your head against the rocks while making fire!”
― Abhijit Naskar, Hazrat-e Humanity: The Uncultured Polyglot

“History of the world written by colonizers is no different from map of the world made by flat earthers.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Hazrat-e Humanity: The Uncultured Polyglot

“I hold the view that the World Spirit has given the times the order to advance; such an order is obeyed; this being strides forward like an armored, firmly closed phalanx, irresistibly and as imperceptibly as the sun moves, through thick and thin; it is flanked by innumerable light troops for and against it; most of them have no idea of what is at stake, and only get knocked on over the head, as if by an invisible hand. All the hesitant fibbing and sophisticated shadow boxing in the world is of no help against it; it can only reach about as high as the shoelaces of this colossus and smear a bit of mud or shoe polish on them, but it cannot loosen them, much less remove the divine shoes with the elastic soles or the seven-league boots, if the colossus puts them on. The safest game (both inwardly and outwardly) is, I dare say, to keep one's eye on the advancing giant.”
― Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

“If you want to establish plurality on planet earth, you must first dismantle the historic desecrator of plurality, which is eurocentrism.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Hazrat-e Humanity: The Uncultured Polyglot

“Till you outgrow white narrative, you'll never learn the human story.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Hazrat-e Humanity: The Uncultured Polyglot

“Our names (Global South) are not doormats of empire, our dust is larger than Greece and Rome.”
― Abhijit Naskar, With Love From A Blue Rock

“Own your color, your accent, own your stories, your theologies, be proud of your sweat, your stubborn dignity – for the North wrote itself as civilized, but we, the Global South, authored humanity. They told us, history is white, holiness is western, progress is european – but the hands that built the world, with science, medicine, poetry, philosophy, astronomy and mathematics, were black, brown and indigenous.”
― Abhijit Naskar, With Love From A Blue Rock

“Eurocentrism - The First Global Catastrophe (Sonnet 2626)

Climate change is nothing,
the first humanly caused
global catastrophe was eurocentrism -

before colonials, science was rooted in society, and
philosophy was rooted in community, not snobbery,
medicine was centered on people, not profit,
religion was lived experience, not salesmanship -

farmland was family, not property,
innovation empowered life, not luxury -

psychology prioritized understanding
and healing, not analysis and isolation,
poetry was the everyday way of life,
not aristocratic escapism.

Sure, there was superstition back then as well,
but no superstition of the pre-colonial world
comes close in atrocity to the fancy superstitions
of the imperials marketed as progress.

Eurocentrism is the biggest impediment to education -
stand and burn the colonial syllabus, that's enlightenment!”
― Abhijit Naskar, With Love From A Blue Rock

“Before colonials, science was rooted in society, and
philosophy was rooted in community, not snobbery,
medicine was centered on people, not profit,
religion was lived experience, not salesmanship. Sure, there was superstition back then as well, but no superstition of the pre-colonial world comes close in atrocity to the fancy superstitions of the imperials marketed as progress. Eurocentrism is the biggest impediment to education - stand and burn the colonial syllabus, that's enlightenment!”
― Abhijit Naskar, With Love From A Blue Rock