Slogans from the French Uprising, 1968


"All power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely."

"We want structures that serve people, not people serving structures."

"The revolution doesn't belong to the committees, it’s yours."

"I’m a Marxist--of the Groucho variety." (Je suis Marxiste--tendance Groucho).

"Comrades, let’s lynch Séguy!" [Georges Séguy, head bureaucrat of the Communist Party-dominated labor union].

"Man is neither Rousseau’s noble savage nor the Church’s or La Rochefoucauld’s depraved sinner. He is violent when oppressed, gentle when free."

"A single non-revolutionary weekend is infinitely more bloody than a month of total revolution."

"Those who lack imagination cannot imagine what is lacking."

"A cop sleeps inside each one of us. We must kill him. Drive the cop out of your head."

"We don’t want to be the watchdogs or servants of capitalism."

"The cause of all wars, riots and injustices is the existence of property." [St. Augustine].

"Commute, work, commute, sleep . . ."

"Since 1936 I have fought for wage increases. My father before me fought for wage increases. Now I have a TV, a fridge, a Volkswagen. Yet my whole life has been a drag. Don’t negotiate with the bosses. Abolish them."

"The future will only contain what we put into it now."

"The more you consume, the less you live. Commodities are the opium of the people."

"Abolish copyrights: sound structures belong to everyone."

"This concerns everyone."

"Boredom is counter-revolutionary." (l'ennui est contre-révolutionnaire).

"Imagination takes power!" (l'imagination prend le pouvoir!).

"Be realistic, ask the impossible." (soyez réalistes, demandez l'impossible).

"Take your desires for reality." (prenez vos désirs pour la réalité).

"They are buying your happiness. Steal it." (on achète ton bonheur. Vole-le).

"Even if God existed it would be necessary to abolish him." (même si Dieu existait, il faudrait le supprimer).

"The boss needs you, you don't need him." (le patron a besoin de toi, tu n'as pas besoin de lui).

"Summer will be hot!" (l'été sera chaud!).

"We will beg for nothing. We will ask for nothing. We will take, we will occupy." (on ne revendiquera rien, on ne demandera rien. on prendra, on occupera).

"Worker: You are 25, but your union is from another century." (travailleur : tu as 25 ans mais ton syndicat est de l'autre siècle).

"We don't want a world where the guarantee of not dying of starvation brings the risk of dying of boredom." (nous ne voulons pas d'un monde où la certitude de ne pas mourir de faim s'échange contre le risque de mourir d'ennui).

"In a society that has abolished every kind of adventure the only adventure that remains is to abolish the society."

"Those who make revolutions half-way only dig their own graves." (ceux qui font les révolutions à moitié ne font que se creuser un tombeau).

"Run, comrade, the old world is behind you!"

"Under the paving stones, the beach." (sous les pavés, la plage).

"Live without wasted time and enjoy without hindrance." (vivre sans temps mort et jouir sans entrave).

"Barricades close the street but open the way." (la barricade ferme la rue mais ouvre la voie).

"When the National Assembly becomes a bourgeois theater, all the bourgeois theaters should be turned into national assemblies." [Written above the entrance of the occupied Odéon Theater].

"Warning: ambitious careerists may now be disguised as "progressives."

"Stalinists, your children are with us!"

"Be cruel."

"I love you!!! Oh, say it with paving stones!!!"

"Under 21? Here is your ballot!" [with a picture of a brick].

"Read Reich and act accordingly!"



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