Racism Quotes - Page 13

she thought of the mix of kids in her class and in Melissa’s and she knew that the future could be bright. No one had tried to say she didn’t have a right to be in that school, or acted interested in who her ancestors were, but they had been interested in who she was and where she had moved from. They wanted to know what she did and wore and liked.
Dixie Dawn Miller Goode
The humanitarian philosophies that have been developed (sometimes under some religious banner and invariably in the face of religious opposition) are human inventions, as the name implies - and our species deserves the credit. I am a devout atheist - nothing else makes any sense to me and I must admit to being bewildered by those, who in the face of what appears so obvious, still believe in a mystical creator. However I can see that the promise of infinite immortality is a more palatable proposition than the absolute certainty of finite mortality which those of us who are subject to free thought (as opposed to free will) have to look forward to and many may not have the strength of character to accept it.Thus I am a supporter of Amnesty International, a humanist and an atheist. I believe in a secular, democratic society in which women and men have total equality, and individuals can pursue their lives as they wish, free of constraints - religious or otherwise. I feel that the difficult ethical and social problems which invariably arise must be solved, as best they can, by discussion and am opposed to the crude simplistic application of dogmatic rules invented in past millennia and ascribed to a plethora of mystical creators - or the latest invention; a single creator masquerading under a plethora of pseudonyms. Organisations which seek political influence by co-ordinated effort disturb me and thus I believe religious and related pressure groups which operate in this way are acting antidemocratically and should play no part in politics. I also have problems with those who preach racist and related ideologies which seem almost indistinguishable from nationalism, patriotism and religious conviction.
Harry W. Kroto
What is the black shadow? It's the running inner dialogue we have with ourselves all day long about our fears of being inferior as black people. It is our internalization of the white man's lie that blacks are inferior to whites -- the very lie that was the foundation of our ancestors' enslavement. The black shadow is more than simply internalized racism; it's also our complex feelings of fear and despair about being black, and consequently our longing to be less black.
Marlene F. Watson
The Elsinore's bow tilted skyward while her stern fell into a foaming valley. Not a man had gained his feet. Bridge and men swept back toward me and fetched up against the mizzen-shrouds. And then that prodigious, incredible old man appeared out of the water, on his two legs, upright, dragging with him, a man in each hand, the helpless forms of Nancy and the Faun. My heart leapt at beholding this mighty figure of a man-killer and slave-driver, it is true, but who sprang first into the teeth of danger so that his slaves might follow, and who emerged with a half-drowned slave in either hand.I knew augustness and pride as I gazed--pride that my eyes were blue, like his; that my skin was blond, like his; that my place was aft with him, and with the Samurai, in the high place of government and command. I nearly wept with the chill of pride that was akin to awe and that tingled and bristled along my spinal column and in my brain. As for the rest--the weaklings and the rejected, and the dark-pigmented things, the half-castes, the mongrel-bloods, and the dregs of long-conquered races--how could they count? My heels were iron as I gazed on them in their peril and weakness. Lord! Lord! For ten thousand generations and centuries we had stamped upon their faces and enslaved them to the toil of our will.
Jack London
Beware the ridiculous. It will one day rule you.
Steven Dietz
If this society ascribes roles to Black men which they are not allowed to fulfill, is it Black women who must bend and alter our lives to compensate, or is it society that needs changing?
Audre Lorde
Let's make justice a process, not an afterthought
Simon Tam
a delegate shout out from the floor: “Peonage, Anti-Lynch Bill, poll tax, these are our issues. They are the most controversial issues in American life, and some of us will have to die for them! Yes, we want to join with the CIO! We cannot stop for controversy!” And there in the faces of my people I saw strength. There with the whites in the audience I saw the positive forces of civilization and the best guarantee of America’s future.
Ralph Ellison
Mark, trying his best to distance himself from the cruel and pathetic 21st century, hadn’t listened to the news reports, not even when the dark green jeeps and helicopters showed up in town, men dressed in identical uniforms, just like in school, always standing with stony faces, setting up shelters and warning signals and food storage boxes. And as the public service announcements and racist propaganda bloomed onto the screens in every classroom, Mark’s only observation was that the United States still had such a long way to go. When times were dire, they resorted to using inaccurate stereotypes and ignorance as a weapon, with an impressionable society always willing to believe without further question.
Rebecca McNutt
As for the majority, it is not so much race as it is political affiliation that really divides it today. What was once an issue of physical difference is now one of intellectual difference. Men have yet to master disagreeing without flashing all their frustrations that come with it; the conservative will throw half-truths while the liberal will throw insults. Combine these and what do you get? A dishonest mockery of a country.
Criss Jami
Racism is a stubborn whitehead on the face of society.
Stefan Emunds
Nowadays, a simple faulty brake light traffic stop, can get a black person killed. It's better to fix the broken light bulb, then having to face and cooperate with a senseless police officer.
Anthony Liccione
What mattered was that these beliefs had swept through the souls of everyone else like a plague. He couldn't see the end of it. Even a hundred years in the future, he knew, the roots still had not been fully pulled up from society. Wherever, whenever he went, the color of his skin set the boundaries of what he could achieve, and there was very little--if any--recourse for finding a way around it.
Alexandra Bracken
We look at each other a second. " I'm tired of the rules," I say. Aibileen chuckles and looks out the window. I realise how thin this revelation must sound to her.
Kathryn Stockett
[Prison] relieves us of the responsibility of seriously engaging with the problems of our society, especially those produced by racism and, increasingly, global capitalism.
Angela Y. Davis
Yeah, I love being famous. It's almost like being white, y'know?
Chris Rock
Labelling is no longer a liberating political act but a necessity in order to gain entrance into the academic industrial complex and other discussions and spaces. For example, if so called “radical” or “progressive” people don’t hear enough “buzz” words (like feminist, anti-oppression, anti-racist, social justice, etc.) in your introduction, then you are deemed unworthy and not knowledgeable enough to speak with authority on issues that you have lived experience with. The criteria for identifying as a feminist by academic institutions, peer reviewed journals, national bodies, conferences, and other knowledge gatekeepers is very exclusive. It is based on academic theory instead of based on lived experiences or values. Name-dropping is so elitist! You're not a "real" feminist unless you can quote, or have read the following white women: (insert Women's Studies 101 readings).
Krysta Williams
On my more difficult days, I'm not sure what's more of a pain in my ass -- being black or being a woman. I'm happy to be both of these things, but the world keeps intervening.
Roxane Gay
The master's tools will never dismantle the master's house. They may allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.
Audre Lorde
The coalition emerges out of your recognition that it’s fucked up for you, in the same way that we’ve already recognized that it’s fucked up for us. I don’t need your help. I just need you to recognize that this shit is killing you, too, however much more softly, you stupid motherfucker, you know?
Fred Moten
As a black woman interested in feminist movement, I am often asked whether being black is more important than being a woman; whether feminist struggle to end sexist oppression is more important than the struggle to racism or vice versa. All such questions are rooted in competitive either/or thinking, the belief that the self is formed in opposition to an other...Most people are socialized to think in terms of opposition rather than compatibility. Rather than seeing anti-racist work as totally compatible with working to end sexist oppression, they often see them as two movements competing for first place.
Bell Hooks
Self respect by definition is a confidence and pride in knowing that your behaviour is both honorable and dignified. When you harass or vilify someone, you not only disrespect them, but yourself also.Street harassment, sexual violence, sexual harassment, gender-based violence and racism, are all acts committed by a person who in fact has no self respect. -Respect yourself by respecting others.
Miya Yamanouchi
I love analogies! Let’s have one.Imagine that you dearly love, absolutely crave, a particular kind of food. There are some places in town that do this particular cuisine just amazingly. Lots of people who are into this kind of food hold these restaurants in high regard. But let’s say, at every single one of these places, every now and then throughout the meal, at random moments, the waiter comes over and punches any women at the table right in the face. And people of color and/or LGBT folks as well! Now, most of the white straight cis guys who eat there, they have no problem–after all, the waiter isn’t punching them in the face, and the non-white, non-cis, non-straight, non-guys who love this cuisine keep coming back so it can’t be that bad, can it? Hell, half the time the white straight cis guys don’t even see it, because it’s always been like that and it just seems like part of the dining experience. Granted, some white straight cis guys have noticed and will talk about how they don’t like it and they wish it would stop.Every now and then, you go through a meal without the waiter punching you in the face–they just give you a small slap, or come over and sort of make a feint and then tell you they could have messed you up bad. Which, you know, that’s better, right? Kind of?Now. Somebody gets the idea to open a restaurant where everything is exactly as delicious as the other places–but the waiters won’t punch you in the face. Not even once, not even a little bit. Women and POC and LGBT and various combinations thereof flock to this place, and praise it to the skies.And then some white, straight, cis dude–one of the ones who’s on record as publicly disapproving of punching diners in the face, who has expressed the wish that it would stop (maybe even been very indignant on this topic in a blog post or two) says, “Sure, but it’s not anything really important or significant. It’s getting all blown out of proportion. The food is exactly the same! In fact, some of it is awfully retro. You’re just all relieved cause you’re not getting punched in the face, but it’s not really a significant development in this city’s culinary scene. Why couldn’t they have actually advanced the state of food preparation? Huh? Now that would have been worth getting excited about.”Think about that. Seriously, think. Let me tell you, being able to enjoy my delicious supper without being punched in the face is a pretty serious advancement. And only the folks who don’t get routinely assaulted when they try to eat could think otherwise.
Ann Leckie
People didn't call blacks names anymore, at least not to their faces. Italians weren't wops or dagos, and there were no more kikes, Japs, chinks, or spics in polite conversation. Everybody had a group to protest and stick up for them. But women were still being called names by men. Why? Where was our group? It's not fair.
Fannie Flagg
The white feminist becomes the CEO. The black feminist becomes the exiled rebel. The white feminist speaks about teaching literacy like i should thank her, hold her hand, kiss her for teaching children of darker skin. The black feminist should be grateful. The black feminist wears her natural hair, she is called ‘too rebellious’. The white feminist cuts her hair, she is brave. The white feminist gets featured on TIME. The black feminist is the fine print.
Ijeoma Umebinyuo
I no longer want to believe these problems are too complex for us to make sense of them.
Roxane Gay
I’m not advocating a competition for who has it toughest. The caste systems of sex and race are interdependent and can only be uprooted together. It’s time to take equal pride in breaking all the barriers.
Gloria Steinem
As bell hooks wrote in a 1998 essay, "Naked Without Shame," about black women's bodies and politics, "Marked by shame, projected as inherent and therefore precluding any possibility of innocence, the black female body was beyond redemption." She points out that since the time of U.S. slavery, men have benefited from positioning black women as naturally promiscuous because it absolves them of guilt when they sexually assault and rape women of color. "[I]t was impossible to ruin that which was received as inherently unworthy, tainted, and soiled," hooks wrote. Women of color, low-income women, immigrant women- these are the women who are not seen as worthy of being placed on a pedestal. It's only our perfect virgins who are valuable, worthy of discourse and worship.
Jessica Valenti
Advertising and marketing philosophies that thrive on emphasizing 'natural' differences don't stay in the realm of advertising and marketing--they spill into how we justify sexism and racism at every life stage.
Andi Zeisler
The insidious reasons for a brown girl’s self-loathing won’t be surprising to any woman of color. I cannot rightly compare my own struggles to those of another minority, as each ethnicity comes with its own baggage and the South Asian experience is just one variation on the experience of dark-skinned people everywhere. As parents and grandparents often do in Asian countries, my extended family urged me to avoid the sun, not out of fear that heatstroke would sicken me or that UV rays would lead to cancer, but more, I think, out of fear that my skin would darken to the shade of an Untouchable, a person from the lowest caste in Indian society, someone who toils in the fields. The judgments implicit in these exhortations—and what they mean about your worth—might not dawn on you while you’re playing cricket in the sand. What’s at stake might not dawn on you while, as a girl, you clutch fast to yourself your blonde-haired, blue-eyed doll named Helen. But all along, the message that lighter skin is equivalent to a more attractive, worthier self is getting beamed deep into your subconscious. Western ideals of beauty do not stop at ocean shores. They pervade the world and mingle with those of your own country to create mutant, unachievable standards.
Padma Lakshmi
The theft of brown women's narratives is not only an injustice placed on them, but also one extended to their male counterparts; by insisting they need to be liberated from their 'barbaric' civilization, Laura [Bush] summoned the colonial assertion that brown women need saving from brown men, when, in actuality, brown women have suffered at the hands of white men more than at those of any other oppressor in history.
Amani Al-Khatahtbeh
If your social consciousness seems stuck in 1975, 2014 is gonna be a rough ride.
John Scalzi
The Black female is assaulted in her tender years by all those common forces of nature at the same time she is caught in the tripartite crossfire of masculine prejudice, white illogical hate and Black lack of power.The fact that the adult American Negro female emerges a formidable character is often met with amazement, distaste and even belligerence. It is seldom accepted as an inevitable outcome of the struggle won by survivors and deserves respect if not enthusiastic admiration.
Maya Angelou
In light of my distanced telescopic exposure to the mayhem, I refused to plagiarise others’ personal tragedies as my own. There is an authorship in misery that costs more than empathy. Often I’d found myself dumbstruck in failed attempts to simulate that particular unfamiliar dolour. After all, no one takes pleasure in being possessed by a wailing father collecting the decapitated head of his innocent six year old. Even on the hinge of a willing attempt at full empathy with those cursed with such catastrophes, one had to have a superhuman emotional powers. I could not, in any way, claim the ability to relate to those who have been forced to swallow the never-ending bitter and poisonous pills of our inherited misfortune. Yet that excruciating pain in my chest seemed to elicit a state of agony in me, even from far behind the telescope. It could have been my tribal gene amplified by the ripple effect of the falling, moving in me what was left of my humanity.
Asaad Almohammad
In the mantra of shared hatred and placing the blame on Israel, our cowardice to face the barbarity of our heads of states was replaced with a divine purpose. Contemplating the manifestation of the eradication of hatred I often concluded, the entirety of the Middle East’s theocracies and dictatorships would be replaced by total anarchy. We would be left with nothing, as our brotherhood of hatred was the only bond known to us. Enculturated in the malarkey of that demagoguery, forces beyond our control and comprehension seem to deceive us into a less harmful and satisfactory logic as opposed to placing some blame on ourselves and thus, having to act to reverse that state of affairs.
Asaad Almohammad
I have to stress that my duties towards victims of all sorts, be it helping, taking their side, or caring, ends the moment their status becomes a bargaining chip. The moment the victim becomes a righteous sufferer. For in my short time on this planet, history and on-going affairs are full of those competing in victimhood.
Asaad Almohammad
He was there below me, and, upon my word, to look at him was as edifying as seeing a dog in a parody of breeches and a featherhat, walking on his hind legs.
Joseph Conrad
You are there and to their ears, being a Syrian sounds like you’re unclean, shameful, indecent; it’s like you owe the world an apology for your very existence.
Asaad Almohammad
The blind faith in some half-assed conspiracy theories lines up with the logic of having to believe in something with no questions asked. It gives us peace and comfort. As simple as I was, I found that resorting to this absolute nonsense was the root of all our problems. It was a road of willingly-learned helplessness, for no action could make a difference, thereby no action was needed.
Asaad Almohammad
Racism, Dr. Sam. I worry for my kids about racism. Racism doesn't appear to take holidays or time off. What can I do about this stuff?
Allan Dare Pearce
We pass hatred and prejudice on to our children, as though they were heirlooms of humanity. We cling to traditions that keep us bound to a way of life that no longer works and arguably never has. Those who can glean the wisdom of the old traditions, but put away the ignorance and prejudices interwoven into them by the generations to come before, have always played a vital role in our global community; though their actions are usually met with resistance. We—all of us—must be assured that change can come without loss of identity. There are certain things we can leave along the roadside without becoming less than we are—certain heirlooms that, when let go, free us to move forward into a healthier future.
L.M. Browning
Man kept control over the machines he created, I wish God would have done the same with the man he created.
Amit Kalantri
Nothing is as unique as sex in nature; it is full of enjoyment, pleasure and happiness. There is no discrimination, no exclusion, no inequality and no racism.
M.F. Moonzajer
When they reached their ship, Ed gazed out at the bay. It was black. The sky was black, but the bay was even blacker. It was a slick, oily blackness that glowed and reflected the moonlight like a black jewel. Ed saw the tiny specks of light around the edges of the bay where he knew ships must be docked, and at different points within the bay where vessels would be anchored. The lights were pale and sickly yellow when compared with the bright blue-white sparkle of the stars overhead, but the stars glinted hard as diamonds, cold as ice. Pg. 26.
Clark Zlotchew
Fiction has been maligned for centuries as being "false," "untrue," yet good fiction provides more truth about the world, about life, and even about the reader, than can be found in non-fiction.
Clark Zlotchew
No one is an outside observer of nature,We're defined by our environment and our interaction with that environment -- by our ecology. And that ecology is necessarily relative, historical and empirical.
Beau Lotto
You maintain hope for humanity as an infinite skeptic of gossip and slander. In all mankind's desires for entertainment and exaggeration and sensationalism, when it comes to gossip, the individual always sounds worse than he really is. This is why adhering to gossip subtly affects the mental state of the listener - he goes on holding shady opinions regardless of where the realities of their lights and darknesses may stand.
Criss Jami
Robinson Crusoe, the first capitalist hero, is a self-made man who accepts objective reality and then fashions it to his needs through the work ethic, common sense, resilience, technology, and, if need be, racism and imperialism.
Carlos Fuentes
We need to develop courage, and we need to develop it in small ways first..... You develop a little courage, so that if you decide, "I will not stay in rooms where women are belittled; I will not stay in company where races, no matter who they are, are belittled; I will not take it; I will not sit around and accept dehumanising other human beings: - if you decide to do that in small ways, and you continue to do it - finally you realize you've got so much courage. Imagine it - you've got so much courage that people want to be around you. They get a feeling that they will be protected in your company.
Maya Angelou
Racism and violence were non-existent in this world, When people were aware to fight for identity'- Terzanelle for Octavia Estelle Butler, Poem by Marieta Maglas
Marieta Maglas
The world seems to be witnessing a deluge of 'haterisms', and racist propaganda because evil's pain was born to die, and it's time of tyranny is near the end. Don't get caught up by the souls of wickedness; this ain't your fight. ~T.F. Hodge
T.F. Hodge
This is God's universe and he is the master gardener of all. If we were to eliminate all colors in his garden,then what would be a rainbow with only one color? Or a garden with only one kind of flower? Why would the Creator create a vast assortment of plants, ethnicities, and animals, if only one beast or seed is to dominate all of existence?
Suzy Kassem
I got a number of very thoughtful responses to the email I sent out last night, most of which I don’t have time to respond to right now. Thanks everyone for the encouragement, questions, criticism. Daniel’s response was particularly inspiring to me and deserves to be shared. The resistance of Israeli Jewish people to the occupation and the enormous risk taken by those refusing to serve in the Israeli military offers an example, especially for those of us living in the United States, of how to behave when you discover that atrocities are being commited in your name. Thank you.
Rachel Corrie
The principle victims of British policies are Unpeople—those whose lives are deemed worthless, expendable in the pursuit of power and commercial gain. They are the modern equivalent of the ‘savages’ of colonial days, who could be mown down by British guns in virtual secrecy, or else in circumstances where the perpetrators were hailed as the upholders of civilisation.
Mark Curtis
Many people in this country who want to see us the minority, and who don’t want to see us taking too militant or too uncompromising a stand, are absolutely against the successful regrouping or organising of any faction in this country whose thought and whose thinking pattern is international rather than national… There’s a world wide revolution going on, it goes beyond Mississippi, it goes beyond Alabama, it goes beyond Harlem. What is it revolting against? The power structure. The American power structure? No. The French power structure? No. The English power structure? No. Then, what power structure? An international Western power structure.
Malcolm X
I had begun to see a new map of the world, one that was frightening in its simplicity, suffocating in its implications. We were always playing on the white man's court, Ray had told me, by the white man's rules. If the principal, or the coach, or a teacher, or Kurt, wanted to spit in your face, he could, because he had power and you didn't. If he decided not to, if he treated you like a man or came to your defense, it was because he knew that the words you spoke, the clothes you wore, the books you read, your ambitions and desires, were already his. Whatever he decided to do, it was his decision to make, not yours, and because of that fundamental power he held over you, because it preceded and would outlast his individual motives and inclinations, any distinction between good and bad whites held negligible meaning.
Barack Obama
Communities that can't read and translate what the powers are putting out will always be tricked.
Darnell Lamont Walker
The act of claiming an identity can be transformational. It can provide healing and empowerment. It can weld solidarity within a community. And, perhaps most importantly, it can diminish power from an oppressor, a dominant group.
Simon Tam
The black world was expanding before me, and I could see now that that world was more than a photonegative of that of the people who believe they are white. "White America" is a syndicate arrayed to protect its exclusive power to dominate and control our bodies. Sometimes this power is direct (lynching), and sometimes it is insidious (redlining). But however it appears, the power of domination and exclusion is central to the belief in being white, and without it, "white people" would cease to exist for want of reasons.
Ta-Nehisi Coates
Superior, do you understand me? These are white people. They are not like you, or me or us. They have the power to hurt you ... and sometimes it's fun to them when they do. Their power is not because they are smart ... it's because ... something happened sometime ... started somewhere and they got on top of the world. They got the power. The only power you got is to learn to live with them, learn to read their minds ... til you can do better. They don't treat each other right ... so don't you look to be treated right. You hear me? Sometimes there's good white people ... but don't you act like that til you know that.
J. California Cooper

Related Topics

The Soul
Quotes
Things
Quotes
Supreme Court
Quotes
Discipleship
Quotes
The Hague
Quotes
Lawlessness
Quotes
1960S
Quotes
Different
Quotes