Top 10 Book Quotes that Fill the “Teens Recognizing the Need for Social Justice theme!

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish and is now run by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. Each week she will post a new Top Ten list . Everyone is welcome to join.  This week’s topic is:

Top 10 Book Quotes that Fill the “Teens Recognizing the Need for Social Justice” theme!

“People like us in situations like this become hashtags, but they rarely get justice. I think we all wait for that one time though, that one time when it ends right.”
― Angie Thomas, The Hate U Give

“I’ve got one memory of the day everything happened: sharp pains in my chest and shoulder, and then not being able to breathe. In that moment when I thought I was dying, it hit me: despite how good of a dude Martin was, they still killed him, man.”
― Nic Stone, Dear Martin

“IF YOU ARE NEUTRAL IN SITUATIONS OF INJUSTICE, YOU HAVE CHOSEN THE SIDE OF THE OPPRESSOR.”
― Jason Reynolds, All American Boys

“But I have to warn you: Scrolling will never be enough. Reposting will never be enough. Hashtagging will never be enough. Because hatred has a way of convincing us that half love is whole. What I mean by that is we—all of us—have to fight against performance and lean into participation. We have to be participants. Active. We have to be more than audience members sitting comfortably in the stands of morality, shouting, “WRONG!” That’s too easy. Instead, we must be players on the field, on the court, in our classrooms and communities, trying to do right. Because it takes a whole hand—both hands—to grab hold of hatred. Not just a texting thumb and a scrolling index finger.”
― Jason Reynolds, Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You

“An AK-47 in a white hand has more rights than a Black kid with Skittles.”
― Kim Johnson, This Is My America

“Because a bunch of dudes beating on one dude who was already on the ground until he’s brain damaged and broken is wrong. Because prosecuting people differently for the same exact crimes because of skin color is wrong. Because some people being able to buy private islands while other people sleep outside on the ground is wrong. Because knowingly destroying poor communities with drugs let in to fund wars against foreign regimes is fundamentally wrong. Because even though you finally enact a Civil Rights Act not even thirty years ago, it doesn’t erase centuries of unequal wealth, unequal access, unequal schooling, unequal living conditions, unequal policing. You can’t tell people to pull up on bootstraps when half of them never had any boots to begin with, never even had the chance to get them. Or when you let people burn whole, thriving black communities to the ground and conveniently forget about it. Because maybe the problem isn’t only with “bad” people, maybe the problem is with the whole system.”
― Christina Hammonds Reed, The Black Kids

“And we stepped onto the tipping scales of Lady Justice with her eyes blindfolded, peeking through slits because that rag is so fucking old worn-out, stretched thin, barely even there”
― Ibi Zoboi, Punching the Air

“What a woman wears or doesn’t wear doesn’t give anyone the right to touch them. Well, you know he’s had a rough childhood. Abandoned by his mom, didn’t know his father, raised by his grandma who passed. We’ve all BEEN through a lot but that don’t give you no excuse to abuse girls.”
― Tiffany D. Jackson, Grown

“I know that existing as a human on this Earth should be enough to deserve respect and justice. But it isn’t. Instead, we focus on those who we deem worthy, for whom we allow ourselves to feel the weight of their loss. We mention potential not reached or promise of greatness gone unfulfilled, while others are erased from existence all together.
But we are more than the good ones.
We are the bad ones.
We are the okay ones.
We are the amazing ones.
We are the nothing-to-write-home-about-ones.
We are the beautiful ones.
We are just…ones.”
― Maika Moulite, One of the Good Ones

“I implore you to be more open minded, hermano. If we close ourselves off to the possibilities that lie outside of what tradition has dictated, we are destined for extinction.”
― Aiden Thomas, Cemetery Boys

What about you? Have you read any of these? Are these good quotes for this theme? Let me know in the comments!