Power and responsibility

Power is little pieces of paper on the floor.
No one picks them up.
Ten people walk by and no one picks up the piece of paper on the floor.
The eleventh person walks by and is tired of looking at it,
and so he bends down and picks it up.
The next day he does the same thing.
And soon he’s in charge of picking up the paper.
Now – think of those pieces of paper as standing for responsibility.
This man or woman who is picking up the pieces of paper is,
by being responsible, acquiring more and more power…
All power is the willingness to accept responsibility.

        Larry Kramer, Reports from the Holocaust: The Making of an AIDS Activist