2008
Ali Salem
Acceptance Speech: Civil courage, I feel, is that soft emotion pushing civilization forward. It's the sound of reason and the music of human souls. It's the only emotion that turns people into lovers. You cannot defend life unless you fall in love with it. In a certain stage in the life of a youth he feels a strong tendency to be great, to do something courageous, something heroic. In that stage we must push him to think of life as a beautiful thing worthy of loving and living. Not only his personal life, but the life of all the others. To educate him that he will be courageous not when he kills himself and the others, but when he lives in peace with them. To tempt him to believe, that he will be courageous only when he declares his thoughts without fear.