Sunday afternoon is always a good time for a good documentary. Today, it was time to sit down and watch Howard Zinn: You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train. Until not too long ago, I admit my ignorance: I had no clue who Howard Zinn was… until I walked into a local Berkeley coffee shop with one of our new advisors at the Diabetes Hands Foundation and saw her pointing at his image on the wall, saying: “Howard Zinn! He’s one of my heroes…” I knew I had to find out more about him.

It turns out Howard Zinn wrote a seminal book titled A People’s History of the United States, a book where he sought:

“…to present American history through the eyes of working people, rather than political and economic elites.”

I learned there was a 2004 documentary about his life (good that he was alive at the time -he passed away in early 2010) so I decided to watch it today. As I watched the documentary, I live tweeted it:

Here’s a POWERFUL thought from Zinn, not unlike what Ghandi said in the day:

“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.”

He inspired me to write this:

Forget about trying to please everyone and focus on doing the right thing.

I would love to hear your thoughts on Howard Zinn. Have you read about him/his work?