YouSaid · the spoken record

Waters

lines on the record
13
first
2023-02-08
most recent
2023-02-08
sittings or episodes
1
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un-security-council

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  1. “The Powers that be have been persuaded to drop the arms race and perpetual war as their accepted modus operandum. We can stop squandering all our precious resources on war. We can feed our children. We can keep them warm. We may even learn to cooperate with all our brothers and sisters, and even save our beautiful planet home from destruction. Would that not be nice?”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  2. “I call out to President Biden, President Putin, President Zelenskyy, the United States of America, NATO, Russia and the European Union, one and all: please change course now and agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine today. That, of course, will be only the starting point, but everything extends from that starting point. Imagine the collective global sigh of relief, the outpouring of joy, the international joining of voices in harmony, singing an anthem to peace, John Lennon pumping the air with his fist from the grave, saying: we have finally been heard in the corridors of power. The bullies in the schoolyard have agreed to stop playing nuclear chicken. We are not all going to die in a nuclear holocaust, after all — at least not today.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  3. “It is also a message from all the people not quite starving but wondering how on Earth to make the pittance they earn meet the cost of a roof over their head and food for their families. My mother country, England, is — thank God — an empire no more. But in that country there is now a new catch phrase — eat or heat. One cannot do both. It is a cry echoing round the whole of Europe. Apparently, the only thing the Powers that be think we can all afford is perpetual war. How crazy is that? So, from the 4 billion or so brothers and sisters in this voiceless majority, who, together with the millions in the international anti-war movement, represent a huge constituency, we say: enough is enough. We demand change.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  4. “We are many who do not share in the profits of the war industry. We do not willingly raise our sons and daughters to provide fodder for your cannons. In our opinion, the only sensible course of action today is to call for an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine — no ifs, ands or buts. Not one more Ukrainian or Russian life is to be spent, not one; they are all precious in our eyes. The time has come to speak truth to power. I recall the story of the emperor’s new clothes. Well, the leaders of the Council members’ respective empires stand — to one degree or another — naked before us. We have a message for them. It is a message from all the refugees in all the camps, a message from all the slums and favelas, a message from all the homeless on all the cold streets, from all the earthquakes and floods on Earth.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  5. “We the people want universal human rights for all our brothers and sisters all over the world, irrespective of their ethnicity, religion or nationality. To be clear, that would include, but not be limited to the right to life and property under the law. That would apply, for instance, to Ukrainians and Palestinians. Let that sink in. Obviously, that would apply to the rest of us as well. One of the problems with wars is that in a war zone — or anywhere where people live under military occupation — there is no recourse to the law; there are no human rights. Today our topic is the possibility of peace in the Ukraine, with special reference to the arming of the Kyiv regime by third parties. I am running out of time. So what do the voiceless millions have to say? They thank the Council for hearing us today.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  6. “When I was about 13, I was struggling with some knotty adolescent problem or other, trying to decide what to do. It does not matter what it was. I cannot remember anyway, but my mum sat me down and said: “Now listen, you are going to be faced with many knotty problems during your life, Roger, and when you are, here is my advice — read, read, read. Find out everything you can about whatever it is. Look at it from all sides and all angles. Listen to all opinions, especially ones you do not agree with. Research it thoroughly. When you have done that, then you will have done all the heavy lifting and the next bit is easy.” “Is it? OK, mum, well, what is the easy bit?” I asked. “The easy bit is you just do the right thing,” she responded. Speaking of doing the right thing brings me to human rights.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  7. “I read in the paper this morning some anonymous diplomat quoted as saying: “Roger Waters to address the Security Council — what next, Mr. Bean?” For those who do not know, Mr. Bean is an ineffectual character in an English comedy show on television. So it is a penny to a pound — the anonymous diplomat is an Englishman. I think it is time to introduce my mother — Mary Duncan Waters. She was a big influence on me. She was a schoolteacher. I say was because she has been dead for 15 years. My father, Eric Fletcher Waters, was a big influence on me too. He too is dead. He was killed on 18 February 1944, near Aprilia, near the Anzio bridgehead in Italy. I was only five months old. So I know something about war and loss. Anyway, back to my mum.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  8. “The invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation was illegal. I condemn it in the strongest possible terms. However, the Russian invasion of Ukraine was not unprovoked, so I also condemn the provocateurs in the strongest possible terms. I now got that out of the way. When I wrote this speech yesterday, I included an observation that the power of veto in the Council lies only in the hands of its permanent members, and that I was concerned that this was undemocratic and rendered the Council somewhat toothless. This morning, however, I had a revelation upon waking. Maybe toothless, in some ways, is a good thing. If this is a toothless Chamber, I can open my big mouth on behalf of the voiceless without fear of getting my head bitten off. How cool is that?”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  9. “The voiceless majority is concerned that your wars — yes, your wars, for these perpetual wars are not of our choosing — will destroy the planet that is our home. Along with every other living thing, we would then be sacrificed on the altar of two things — profits from the war to line the pockets of the very, very few and the hegemonic march of some empire or other towards unipolar world domination. Please reassure us that that is not your vision, for there is no good outcome down that road. That road leads only to disaster. Everyone on that road has a red button in their briefcase. And the further we go down that road, the closer the itchy fingers get to that red button, and the closer we all get to Armageddon. Look across the Chamber. At this level, we are all wearing the same shoes. Let me get back to Ukraine.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  10. “What are their goals, by the way? Here I would direct my inquiries more to the five permanent members of the Council. What are their goals? What is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Is it bigger profits for war industries, more power globally, a bigger share of the global cake? Is Mother Earth a cake to be gobbled up? Does not a bigger share of the cake mean less for everyone else? What if today, in this place of safety, we were to look in another direction, to look at our capacity for empathy, for instance, and to put ourselves in others’ shoes, such as — right now, for instance — the shoes of that chap on the other side of the Chamber, or even the shoes of the voiceless majority, if they have any shoes, that is?”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  11. “But now they live on the street in a pile of cardboard, maybe even within sight of United Nations Headquarters. In any case, wherever they are in the world, war zone or not, together they make up a voiceless majority, and today I shall endeavour to speak for them. We the peoples wish to live. We wish to live in peace and in conditions of parity that give us a real opportunity to look after ourselves and our loved ones. We are hard workers, and we are ready to work hard. All we need is a fair crack of the whip. Maybe that is an unfortunate choice of idiom, after 500 years of imperialism, colonialism and slavery. I ask the Council to please help us. In order to help us, members may have to consider our predicament and, in doing so, take their eye off the ball for a moment. They may have to put their own goals momentarily to one side.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  12. “They may be mothers or fathers, facing the awful question of “How can I feed my child today?” They may be civilians, knowing that today the lights will surely go out, as they always do in war zones; that there is no fresh water, no fuel for the stove, no blankets — just barbed wire and watchtowers and walls and enmity. Or they might be over here, in a big, rich city like New York. Here, our brothers and sisters can still find themselves in dire straits. Somehow, however hard they may have worked all their lives, they may have lost their footing on the slippery, tilting deck of the neoliberal capitalist ship we call life in the city, falling overboard to end up drowning. Maybe they got sick, maybe they took out a student loan, maybe they missed a payment — the margins are slim. Who knows?”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source

  13. “Mr. Waters: I feel profoundly honoured to be afforded this singular opportunity to brief the Council today. With members’ forbearance, I shall endeavour to express what I believe to be the feelings of countless of our brothers and sisters all over the world, both here in New York and across the seas. I shall invite them into this Chamber to have their say. We are here to consider the possibilities for peace in war-torn Ukraine, especially in the light of the increasing volume of weapons arriving in that unhappy country, as has already been mentioned. Every morning when I sit down at my laptop, I think of our brothers and sisters in Ukraine and elsewhere who, through no fault of their own, find themselves in dire and often deadly circumstances. Over there, in Ukraine, they may be soldiers facing another deadly day at the front.”

    2023-02-08 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9256 (2023) · source