Global Citizen Quotes

“The human body resonates at the same frequency as Mother Earth. So instead of only focusing on trying to save the earth, which operates in congruence to our vibrations, I think it is more important to be one with each other. If you really want to remedy the earth, we have to mend mankind. And to unite mankind, we heal the Earth. That is the only way. Mother Earth will exist with or without us. Yet if she is sick, it is because mankind is sick and separated. And if our vibrations are bad, she reacts to it, as do all living creatures.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“When two brothers are busy fighting, an evil man can easily attack and rob their poor mother. Mankind should always stay united, standing shoulder to shoulder so evil can never cheat and divide them.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“One World is not abolishing frontiers, which would lead to a surge in migration, create tension and destabilise life on our planet. One World is rather abolishing the concept of borders in people's minds and replacing devotion to individual nations with belief in one united world, home to one race:
the human race.”
― Mouloud Benzadi

“One of the most important causes of division, war and violence in the world is nationalist sentiment.
NATIONALISM is simply another form of EXTREMISM.”
― Mouloud Benzadi

“I sometimes think that we, human beings, are so stupid. We are too busy fighting each other, killing each other, looking at each other as enemies, to realise that the real enemy we should all be fighting is the absolute truth that has spread division and hatred between us.”
― Mouloud Benzadi

“You are not just for the right or left, but for what is right over the wrong.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“If you want to bring the world closer to peace, be a peacemaker by creating peace whenever you can. If you find yourself engaged in an argument that only stirs anger in the heart, quickly make peace and carry on.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“I am for true world peace and building a beautiful global garden for our children.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“Let us recognize that we are all part of each other. We are all human. We are all one.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“God is my only leader. Truth is my only sword. Guided only by my conscience, I am a true citizen of the world.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“It was a question that had always haunted me and yet I could never answer it unequivocally. “Where are you from?” Why do people always ask this? What exactly do they expect to hear? They probably want to define a certain cultural frame of reference for themselves, and accordingly, place me in one of their pre-existing templates. This will allow us to carry on a conversation comfortably, but why does everyone think you want to go through this interrogation over and over again?”
― Dmitry Berkut, Clochard

“I don't need to write in all these languages of the world - those who care, will find a way. I write in more than one language because I want to. I want to leave at least something extremely personal for every culture in the world - that is, for as many cultures as I humanly can.

However in the end, the universal spirit of love, light and oneness transcends language and culture, and finds a home in the heart of every conscientious human being - and that's what counts. It's the bridge that counts, not the shape it comes in.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“I don't have any one native culture,
for I am native to every culture.
I am a native to the whole world,
I am a native to neighborhood earth.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“When I crossed the hundred books mark, I genuinely thought," I'm done ". But something happened! I don't know why, but my drive towards other languages became stronger than ever. I felt, now is the time to make parts of my legacy more accessible to other languages. I have never relied on anyone in my life for the realization of my legacy, so it was obvious that I was not gonna wait for somebody else to translate my works for me. Besides, when somebody else translates an original literature into another language, it always remains a translation - it can never become an original literature of that language and culture. This I absolutely did not want.

Sure, other than Turkish and Spanish, I have difficulty with other languages - that is, I am not at all fluent in them. But the point is, once I feel the language and culture in my veins, I can deliver my ideas in any language I want. And I've been doing exactly that over the years - absorbing as many cultures and languages into my bloodstream as I can that is. If you tear my heart open, you can find every single culture in the world, caringly placed and nurtured. Some call it gift, I call it intention.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“Once I feel the language and culture in my veins, I can deliver my ideas in any language I want. I can write in any language, because I want to. And no, I don't use some fancy AI tools. In fact, I have an uncompromising principle against the use of AI in literature. Heck, I opted not to use something so trivial as an image containing yours truly with a mace, as cover image of" Bulletproof Backbone ", because it collided with the book's anti-weaponry vision - so you can imagine my stance on fraudulent material generated by AI!

What I do use, while writing in other languages, is old-fashioned dictionary - online dictionary that is, to fix things like spelling, missing vocabulary and other broken bits - which makes me a broken polyglot. And believe you me, broken polyglots are potent polyglots. I may not be fluent in a lot of languages, but after I am long gone, each of these languages and cultures will have something distinctly personal left by me to call their own.

For example, I may not speak fluent German, yet if I write even one page in the German language, it'll forever become an indelible part of the German culture. It'll not be some off-key German translation of an original Naskar, rather it'll be a German literature from the vast Naskarean oeuvre.

Sure, I know my limits in each of these languages, that's why I keep my sentence structure simple, which I am not compelled to do in Turkish and Spanish. But more than my limits, I am aware of my limitlessness. And once the being transcends the limits of language, culture, border and tradition, puny apparatus like intellect is bound to follow.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“One Mission, Many Vessels
(The Sonnet, 1313)

One thunder, visions plenty.
One mission, vessels plenty.
One source, seekers plenty.
One fate, fervors plenty.

From dust we're born,
In dust we're gone.
Cashes to ashes,
Bitcoins in trashes,
Division is nefarious,
Unity is dawn.

The day the billions of people of earth
are valued more than the billionaires,
that day you shall be human being,
that day you are king and queen.

Naskar doesn't have flag or nation,
My flag is world flag - my nation, world nation.
Call me poet, scientist or humanitarian,
Naskar is the spirit of world integration.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“It's a slippery slope from nationality to nationalism.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“Grow so big with your ideas that you become a threat to every nationalist state in the world.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“From Ape to Human (The Sonnet)

To label a spirit is to cripple a spirit,
What we call cultural imprints are prison.
Society of such culture is no human society,
but merely an overglorified animal kingdom.

Sure, the culture we're born in are part of us,
But it must never take over human identity.
That's how heritage facilitates bias-n-hate,
And culture becomes excuse for inhumanity.

Call it advaita, nirvana or humanity,
the purpose is to surpass all divide.
Anything that distances mind from mind,
must never be defended as cultural pride.

Mission is, not to remove cultural imprints,
But to be civilized enough to surpass them.
Only then can we be the bridge of benevolence,
Only then the glorified ape shall emerge as human.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Dervis Vadisi: 100 Promissory Sonnets

“My roots are grounded in humanity,
not in one culture or nation.
Cosmos courses through my corpuscles,
My life is a call to expansion.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yaralardan Yangın Doğar: Explorers of Night are Emperors of Dawn

“My legacy does not represent the achievement of any one culture, my legacy represents the capacity of the entire humankind.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“My life is a repository of what is possible if you put your petty tribalisms aside.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations

“My flag is world flag - my nation, world nation.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“Humanity first, nationality later - compassion first, religion later.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Gospel of Technology

“Until the entire earth is one nation, there is no earth.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Amantes Assemble: 100 Sonnets of Servant Sultans

“I am the Visva, I am the Victor.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavictor: Kanima Akiyor Kainat

“Stars-n-stripes, union jack, all trivial,
for the world is my neighborhood.
I got no brotherhood of cult or creed,
for the world is my brotherhood.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations

“World is My Brotherhood
(Sonnet 1616)

No neighborhood without brotherhood,
No sainthood without martyrdom.
Martyrdom doesn't mean dying in body,
but to be lost in others' ascension.

You're born with a human backbone,
Don't let it be vilified by cowardice.
Backbone responsible is backbone honored,
Backbone responsible is antidote to malice.

World is in your care, carry it with grace.
No bigger disgrace than backbone bending!
Find a cause that honors your human backbone,
Humans can break, while animals bend for nothing.

Stars-n-stripes, union jack, all trivial,
for the world is my neighborhood.
I got no brotherhood of cult or creed,
for the world is my brotherhood.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations

“World is my brotherhood.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations

“Sonnet 1154

Hate only keeps traveling round the world,
Until one person chooses to break the cycle.
War only keeps migrating border to border,
Until one nation chooses to break the cycle.

Our ancestors handed us hate as heritage,
Like good little apes we embraced it as honor.
Never for a moment we paused to ponder,
How one stupid prejudice leads to another!

We have the capacity to conquer the stars,
Yet we've chained ourselves to the graveyard.
In the guise of prehistoric patriotism,
Apes made a paradigm out of hate and hurt.

Such paradigm belongs in bin -
it's time, the cycle breaks.
Bomb the world with music,
pizza and poetry you idiots,
not Semtex, C4 and RDX.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavictor: Kanima Akiyor Kainat