You cannot change any society unless you take responsibility for it, unless you see yourself as belonging to it and responsible for changing it. Grace Lee Boggs More Quotes by Grace Lee Boggs More Quotes From Grace Lee Boggs One of the things that's very important, when you're an activist and an organizer like me, is to understand that when things happen of that nature, some people become immobilized and other people begin to find solutions. And Detroit is the kind of city where we begin to find solutions. Grace Lee Boggs important cities people I'm not calling for a boycott on voting. But I think it should be very clear that just voting is not going to solve our problems. Grace Lee Boggs voting calling thinking I was working with C. L. R. James; I believed in Marxist ideas about the labor and movement and the workers being the secret to the future. And I learned differently just by being in Detroit and being married to Jimmy Boggs. Grace Lee Boggs being future secret ideas I don't know what the next American revolution is going to be like, but we might be able to imagine it if your imagination were rich enough. Grace Lee Boggs know rich revolution imagination I think that's a very important part of what we need in this country, is that sense that we have lived through so many stages and that we are entering into a new stage where we could create something completely different. Grace Lee Boggs new think important country I warn you, I'm a terrible housekeeper. Grace Lee Boggs housekeeper warn you terrible When I was growing up, Asians were so few and far between as to be almost invisible. And so the idea of an Asian American movement or an Asian American thrust in this country was unthinkable. Grace Lee Boggs american invisible growing-up country I had no idea what I was gonna do after I got my degree in philosophy in 1940. But what I did know was at that time, if you were a Chinese-American, even department stores wouldn't hire you. They'd come right out and say, 'We don't hire Orientals.' Grace Lee Boggs know you time philosophy When I came to Detroit, if you threw a stone up in the air and it came down, it would hit an autoworker because the Chrysler Jefferson plant where my husband worked was very close also to where we lived. Grace Lee Boggs down you plant husband I think Detroit is already providing a model for change in the world. I think that Detroit - I mean, people come from all over the world come to see what we're doing. People are looking for a new way of living. Grace Lee Boggs looking change people world Jimmy Boggs was born in a little town called Marion Junction, Alabama, where there were as many pigs, or more pigs, than even the people. But you know what? People in the South had an understanding that you could make a way out of no way, and that's how they survived. Grace Lee Boggs you understanding people way