Quotes / Full-Circle Revolution

Anime and Manga

"History is much like an endless waltz. The three beats of war, peace and revolution continue on forever."

— Mariemaia Kushrenada, Mobile Suit Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz

Amuro Ray: There's some things you don't understand. Revolutions are dreamt up by intellectuals, but reality forces them to take drastic measures. [...] Following a revolution, the passions of a rebirth get taken over by mediocrity. Intellectuals hate this and withdraw from society and politics to become recluses. Eventually...
Char Aznable: I'm not planning on changing the world!

— Mobile Suit Gundam: Char's Counterattack

Fan Works

"Besides, all revolution does is give the oppressed a chance to oppress someone else. I’m eighty-five years old, and I’ve seen this happen over and over. Mexicans, Americans, Indians—whoever they claim to be—a pack of fools, the lot of them."

— Esther Henke, Runaway Rose

"Really, Sanson? A Corsican Ruler? At least Louis was French."

— Charlotte Corday, Fate/Gag Order (Charlotte Corday's Birthday Special: Like a Slap to the Face!)

Film - Animated

Mayor: Titan has freed us!
Titan: Oh, I wouldn't say "freed". More like "under new management".

— Megamind

Film - Live Action

"Governments change... the lies stay the same."

— James Bond, GoldenEye

Literature

"Don't put your trust in revolutions. They always come around again. That's why they're called revolutions. People die, and nothing changes."

— Sam Vimes, Night Watch Discworld

"I see Barsad, and Cly, Defarge, The Vengeance, the Juryman, the Judge, long ranks of the new oppressors who have risen on the destruction of the old..."

— Sidney Carton, A Tale of Two Cities

"'Beasts of England' was the song of the Rebellion. But the Rebellion is now completed. The execution of the traitors this afternoon was the final act. The enemy both external and internal has been defeated. In 'Beasts of England' we expressed our longing for a better society in the days to come. But that society has now been established. Clearly this song has no longer any purpose."

— Squealer, Animal Farm

“For once Benjamin consented to break his rule, and he read out what was written on the wall. There was nothing there now except a single Commandment. It ran: ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL. BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS. After that it did not seem strange when the next day the pigs who were supervising the work of the farm all carried whips in their trotters. … It did not seem strange when Napoleon was seen strolling in the farmhouse garden with a pipe in his mouth—no not even when the pigs took Mr. Jones’s clothes out of the wardrobes and put them on ...”

— Animal Farm (again)

“But as the animals outside gazed at the scene, it seemed to them that some strange thing was happening. What was it that had altered in the faces of the pigs? … Twelve voices were shouting in anger, and they were all alike. No question now what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”

— Animal Farm (final words)

Catherine: You ever want to change the world, Hakram?
Hakram: World's always changing, Callow. We roll the boulder up the mountain until it falls down the other slope, and then we start again. If you're lucky, it doesn't crush anything you care for on the way down.

— A Practical Guide to Evil

Jim: What possible reason is there to go back to Borrigarde now?
Meryl: We can end the occupation! The time is right! All they need is a push, and that's us! The vengeful spirits of the dead, returning to take back our nation's glory! The people have lived under Pillock oppression for long enough! Stop sniggering!
Jim: I can't help it! You're like a little revolutionary piglet! You want to know what life is like under Pillock oppression? It's exactly the same as it always is: brown and full of livestock. Only difference is Derek the Fourth has to piss off and live in his beach house.

—Mogworld

The hand of Vengeance found the Bed
To which the Purple Tyrant fled
The iron hand crushd the Tyrants head
And became a Tyrant in his stead

— "The Grey Monk'', William Blake

When I am weaker than you, I ask you for freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am stronger than you, I take away your freedom because that is according to my principles.

— Children of Dune

Live-Action TV

All right. I mean, he's a bad boy, runs an Al-Qaeda website from Yemen; but you complained when Bush just wanted to read Americans' e-mails without a warrant. Wait a second. All that power that you didn't like when someone else had it, you decided to keep it. Oh, my God. You're Frodo. YOU'RE FRODO! Mr. President, do you know what you need to do? Throw the Ring into the fires of Mount Doom and destroy it. I know. I know. You think you can be trusted with the power because you're not a bad person. You're just being stalked by a strange and twisted creature who wants to take the precious Ring from you. (Photo of Gollum) No, no, no. Not him, the other one. (Photo of Sarah Palin) Yeah, that's the one.

— Jon Stewart, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, "Respect Mah Authoritah", June 15, 2010

So let me ask you a question about this brave new world of yours: When you've killed all the bad guys, and it's all perfect, and just, and fair, when you have finally got it exactly the way you want it, what are you going to do with the people like you? The troublemakers. How are you going to protect your glorious revolution from the next one?

— The Doctor, Doctor Who, "The Zygon Inversion"

Edward Waltz: You may think I'm a monster but what I am is necessary. No society can survive without order. Free thought is not free - there is no such thing as revolutio - the oppressed always become the oppressors and the cycle repeats itself over and over. The only way to win is to stay out of the cycle. (Beat) You don't understand a word that I've been saying.
Rosalee: I'm sorry, I wasn't listening.

— Grimm

"Listen, years ago I rode with Juárez against Emperor Maximilian. I lost many chickens but I thought it was worth it to be free. When Porfirio became President, I supported him — but he stole my chickens. Then came Huerta and he stole my chickens. Then it was Carranza's term, and he stole my chickens too. Now comes Pancho Villa to liberate me and the first thing he does is steal my chickens!... What makes one different from the others? My chickens don't know. All over the world revolutions come and go. Presidents rise and fall. They all steal your chickens. The only thing to change is the name of the man who takes them."

— An Old Mexican Farmer, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles

Music

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution,
Take a bow for the new revolution,
Smile and grin at the change all around,
Pick up my guitar and play,
Just like yesterday,
Then I'll get on my knees and pray...
We don't get fooled again!

— The Who, "Won't Get Fooled Again"

There's nothing in the streets
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are replaced, by the by
And the parting on the left,
Is now parting on the right,
And the beards have all grown longer overnight

— The Who, from the same song

Everybody has the perfect solution,
It's just hard to resist the sweet seduction.
There ain't no trick to winning double what you bet.
Welcome to revolution roulette.

— Poets of the Fall, "Revolution Roulette"

The tyrant
Resurrected as King
Who's Midas touch an Iron Fist
All the world proclaiming
Yesterday's man as Traitor
Yet welcome with open arms
His brother as tomorrows Dictator

— Primordial, "Traitors Gate"

Noises on the radio, megaphones on cars
Sermons from the street of shame, know-it-alls in bars
Posters in suburbia, experts on TV
Don't let them disturb-i-ya
They're just the powers that be
Hey-Ho!
Don't worry! Nobody can win! (Hey-Ho! Hey-Ho!)
No matter who you vote for, the government always gets in.

— The Bonzo Dog Band, "No Matter Who You Vote For The Government Always Gets In"

I wish I could find it the way to restore peace.
Blessed were the days we held in vain.
I'd give it all for a chance at redemption
As the cycle turns again.
You've seen it before now you'll see it begin.
You've seen the changes and the blood pooling.
If you think it ends here, think again.

— Tim Pool, "Will of the People"

Radio

Attaché of Banana Republic: Alas, this Thursday is a national holiday in Marilia. We celebrate our liberation by the hero Pancho Manuel Gonzales.
Mr. Lamb: Oh dear. Well, next Thursday will do.
Attaché: Another national holiday. We celebrate the overthrow of tyrant Pancho Manuel Gonzales.

— The Men from the Ministry

Tabletop Games

Wasted and wounded, bruised and brutal Brujah, how does your rebellion grow? Ranting and raving and chanting and changing everything but your own weary self. You would pluck out the eyes of the rest of the world before you would rinse the film of filth from your eyes and see that the outer world you hate looks a lot like your self-polluted inner landscape. You know, the one you flee from. Remember, all revolutions go 360 degrees. That's why they call them revolutions. That's what I call a vicious circle.

—Vampire: The Masquerade - Clanbook: Malkavian

Theater

Gonzalo: In the commonwealth I would by contraries execute all things; for no kind of traffic would I admit; no name of magistrate; letters should not be known; riches, poverty, and use of service, none; contract, succession, bourn, bound of land, tilth, vineyard, none; no use of metal, corn, or wine, or oil; no occupation; all men idle, all; and women too, but innocent and pure; no sovereignty—
Sebastian: Yet he would be king on it...
Antonio: The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the beginning!

—The Tempest

Video Games

"The flags may be different, but the methods are the same."

— Viktor Reznov, Call of Duty: Black Ops

"I didn't help you destroy Mundus so you could take his place!"

— Dante to Vergil, DmC: Devil May Cry

Help Screen: "Help Fluffykins cross the Land of Carrots and defeat the Moo King!"
Ending: "Fluffykins the Bunny reigned over the Land of Carrots for many years with an iron fist. His era bringing forth the darkest of its kind yet known."

— Mega Mash

Solas: Why not go all the way? You see injustice. And you have organized a group to fight it. Don't you want to replace it with something better?
Sera: What, just lop off the top? What does that do, except make a new top to frig it all up?

— Dragon Age: Inquisition

"Don't you get it? The Saints didn't solve a goddamn thing. Drugs were still being pushed, innocent people were still getting killed...all we did was turn into Vice Kings that wore purple..."

—Julius Little, Saints Row 2

You really that naive? Tomorrow there'll be a new Mengsk and another one after that. Your great, shining dream of the future is just an illusion."

— Tosh, Starcraft II Wings Of Liberty

And so, the Mayor was arrested and sent to jail, destined to spend the rest of their life eating imitation brand jailhouse Fud. The denizens of the city rejoiced, as their new mayor brought hope for a brighter future. In time, the mayor became corrupted by power, money, and bacon cheeseburgers, prompting the formation of a new Resistance. Events repeated themselves in an infinite loop. This came to be known as "the circle of life". Some might consider this to be a beautiful thing. Others might consider the whole process to be ultimately kinda pointless.

—Ending narration, Streets of Rogue

I admire your experience, courage, and achievements, Herkunftshorn. You overthrew prejudice and the old order — more firmly entrenched than the Spires are now — and brought opportunity to every Leithanian. You gave the nation unprecedented vitality, and were to be revered as the greatest monarch in its history. But then you pushed the country into war, erected even more terrifying spires, and inflicted suffering a hundred times more painful to the very people you had given hope to.

— Empress Hildegard Grimmacht, Arknights: Zwillingstürme im Herbst

Web Original

"This is the problem with the revolutionaries, most of them fight against something evil but really just want that power for themselves to inflict it on those they don't like. But it never stops there, once they get the power to get rid of those they don't like they turn it on everyone else."

—NNick Plays, on the main antagonist of Luminous Avenger iX

"...[the mercenary life] is about more than just 'killing people'; it has many complicated facets. I once helped topple a fascist South African government in a week! I mean, it was replaced by another in two, but I still got paid."

—Pip's Grandfather, Hellsing Ultimate Abridged Episode 6

Lula (da Silva) has had his own 1988 quote thrown back at him on every social media platform on the Internet: "In Brazil, when a poor man steals, he goes to jail. When a rich man steals, he becomes a minister." Many Brazilians see this as Lula predicting his own future.

— Hank Green, VlogBrothers, Brazil's Government is Falling Apart...and it's Good News?

Like many popular revolutions, CHAZ was founded on some very noble causes: ending police brutality, standing up against racism, abolishing the police... not sure how noble that last one is, with even the mayor of Seattle calling the new nation a "summer of love." Not so noble was the fact that the moment the nation was formed, a border wall was put up, border patrol guards with guns enforced very strict immigration policies, a monarch filled the power vacuum, their own brand of police patrolled the inside with, what do you know— their own cases of police brutality, and of course some good old systematic racism with things like black-only safe spaces.

— Jake Tran, Jake Tran, The Economics of CHAZ / CHOP: Anarchy at its Finest

Western Animation

"The Big-Helmeted Pakleds will no longer control us! I am now Pakled leader! Behold my giant helmet!"

— Pakled Rebel Leader, Star Trek: Lower Decks sums up the trope perfectly.

Real Life

“If you took the most ardent revolutionary, vested him in absolute power, within a year he would be worse than the Tsar himself.”

— Mikhail Bakunin

"Why independence, if the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow?"

— Jose Rizal, reformist and National Hero of the Philippines

"The slave begins by demanding justice and ends by wanting to wear a crown."

— Albert Camus (by way of Manic Street Preachers)

"[M]en change their rulers willingly, hoping to better themselves, and this hope induces them to take up arms against him who rules: wherein they are deceived, because they afterwards find by experience they have gone from bad to worse."

—Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince

"Every revolution ends in the reappearance of a new ruling class."

— Sebastien Faure

"Do you remember the Tsar? I'm like the Tsar."

— Josef Stalin

"Every single empire in its official discourse has said that it is not like all the others, that its circumstances are special, that it has a mission to enlighten, civilize, bring order and democracy, and that it uses force only as a last resort. And, sadder still, there always is a chorus of willing intellectuals to say calming words about benign or altruistic empires, as if one shouldn't trust the evidence of one's eyes watching the destruction and the misery and death brought by the latest mission civilizatrice."

— Edward Said, Orientalism

"Put an underdog on top and it makes no difference whether his name is Russian, Jewish, Negro, Management, Labor, Mormon, Baptist he goes haywire. I've found very, very few who remember their past condition when prosperity comes."

— Harry S. Truman

"Off goes the head of the king, and tyranny gives way to freedom. The change seems abysmal. Then, bit by bit, the face of freedom hardens, and by and by it is the old face of tyranny. Then another cycle, and another. But under the play of all these opposites there is something fundamental and permanent — the basic delusion that men may be governed and yet be free."

— H. L. Mencken

"How quickly revolutions grow old; and, worse still, respectable."

— G. K. Chesterton

"We think anarchy and rebellion, as stances, are obsolete, and dishonest. As a matter of fact, they're designed to keep people where they are."

— Devo co-founder, Jerry Casale

"Progress is not an illusion, it happens, but it is slow and invariably disappointing. There is always a new tyrant waiting to take over from the old—generally not quite so bad, but still a tyrant. Consequently two viewpoints are always tenable. The one, how can you improve human nature until you have changed the system? The other, what is the use of changing the system before you have improved human nature? They appeal to different individuals, and they probably show a tendency to alternate in point of time. The moralist and the revolutionary are constantly undermining one another."

"One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship."

— George Orwell

"So we bounce on, from government by one group of affluent people to government by a different group of affluent people. Consensus-minded centrism yields to authoritarianism, which will self-destruct in time and allow the consensus-minded another chance, which they will invariably fumble, and so on. When will it all end? When the People finally come back for their party."

— Thomas Frank, Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People?

“Had Mao died in 1956, his achievements would have been immortal. Had he died in 1966, he would still have been a great man but flawed. But he died in 1976. Alas, what can one say?”

— Chen Yun

"Tech’s biggest winners have effectively built monopolies, whether in office software (Microsoft), social media (Facebook), or search advertising (Google). Rather than foster innovation, the tech giants have grown so large that they scare off entrepreneurs in their path. Venture capitalists have a term for the menacing shadow cast by tech Goliaths: the kill zone. The outsize power of tech’s biggest companies has worsened regional inequality, concentrating wealth in the handful of metro areas where they’ve set up shop. Eighty percent of venture-capital investment goes to just three states—California, New York, and Massachusetts. The internet’s tools were supposed to shatter legacy empires, free untapped creativity, and spread wealth. Instead, the tech powers have become as cutthroat and anticompetitive as the companies they once aimed to replace."

— Derek Thompson, The Real Problem With Silicon Valley

"When the Bolsheviks in Russia were outsiders, they vigorously opposed censorship and the secret police, they advocated self-determination for ethnic minorities, and so forth; but as soon as they came into power themselves, they imposed a tighter censorship and created a more ruthless secret police than any that had existed under the tsars, and they oppressed ethnic minorities at least as much as the tsars had done."

— Dr. Theodore Kaczynski, Industrial Society and Its Future