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B Quotes

Browse famous quotes beginning with B. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.

All B Quotes

“Black music has always known, and not been afraid to acknowledge just how high the stakes of Black thought are. To summarize the final soliloquy of Clay, the protagonist in LeRoi Jones’ (aka Amiri Baraka’s) play Dutchman. You’d better be glad Charlie Parker could play him some horn and Bessie Smith could sing, because if they didn’t make music they might murder you. One would be hard pressed to find another group of people on this planet whose music is a surrogate for murder. One would be hard pressed to another group of people on this planet whose life is a proxy for death.”

PeopleIfsHardPlayMightWould BeLife IsBlackKnownGroupsPlanetsMusic IsMurderFinalsGladAcknowledgeStakesClayHornsCharlieProtagonistsSurrogatesProxyBlack MusicAka
Author:Frank B. Wilderson III
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“Black people ALL are fightin' you all for freedom, justice and equality. One believes that intermarriage is gonna solve it, and 200 years from now we all will be a beautiful cream color. He really believes it. One believe that gittin' some rifles and shootin' up the country is gonna solve it, another believes that education. One day we'll be the president. One believe that we gotta git into the white man's pockets and get all the money.”

PeopleMenYearsBelieveCountryBeautifulBlackPresidentJusticeWhiteColorOne DaySolvePocketsBlack PeopleCreamWhite ManRiflesEquality And JusticeIntermarriage
Author:Muhammad Ali
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“Black people are dying in this country because we have a criminal justice system which is out of control, a system in which over 50% of young African American kids are unemployed. It is estimated that a black baby born today has a one in four chance of ending up in the criminal justice system.”

PeopleCountryKidsTodayYoungBlackBornJusticeChanceFourDyingBabyCriminalsAfrican AmericanBlack PeopleUnemployedJustice SystemCriminal JusticeCriminal Justice SystemOver 50Baby Born
Author:Bernie Sanders
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“Black people are expected by the white world to be strong but not angry. Pain must be hidden. Daily slights are to be borne with grace, humility, even gratitude. Weakness is intolerable. Vulnerability must wait until the day is done and the mask can come off in the privacy of our won homes. And by then we are too tired or too stiff to feel it. This is not just true for black people living in Europe or America. It is also true, in a different form in Africa and the Caribbean, where black people are the majority. People in former European colonies must see their lives in relation to the lives of white people. As communities, as individuals, we have been told we are inferior. Our economies, our livelihoods, are reliant on Western economies, white people's livelihoods.”

EmotionsWhite SupremacyColonizationBlack In America
Author:Nadia Owusu
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“Black people are just constantly immature in their thinking, undisciplined, and we suffer as a people. This is not about race in the sense that black people got to get something better than whites or Latinos or Asians. This is just basically that we keep complaining about what we don't have and what we can't do, and then, when we get in positions to do stuff, we fight amongst ourselves like savages.”

PeopleThinkingSufferingFightingStuffBlackRacePositionComplainingBlack PeopleSavagesLatinoSomething BetterImmatureUndisciplined
Author:KRS-One
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“Black people are the magical faces at the bottom of society's well. Even the poorest whites, those who must live their lives only a few levels above, gain their self-esteem by gazing down on us. Surely, they must know that their deliverance depends on letting down their ropes. Only by working together is escape possible. Over time, many reach out, but most simply watch, mesmerized into maintaining their unspoken commitment to keeping us where we are, at whatever cost to them or to us (Bell).”

PeopleKnowsLifeWellsSelfTogetherFacesBlackChangeWhiteLevelsWatchesSocietySelf EsteemDependsCostCommitmentGainsSocial JusticeBottomEsteemLive LifeReachingWorking TogetherBlack PeopleReach OutBellsRopeMaintainingPoorestEscapingDeliveranceUnspokenGazingWatch MeChallenging The Status QuoMesmerizingMesmerized
Author:Derrick Bell
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“Black people in America have to, for their own protection, develop a defense mechanism, and I just grew terribly tired of it. When you sustain that kind of affront, and sustain it and sustain it and sustain it, something happens to you. You try to steer a course in American society that's not self-destructive. But America is a country that inflicts injury. It does not like to see anything that comes in response, and accuses one of anger as if it were an unnatural response. For anyone who is not white in America, the affronts are virtually across the board.”

PeopleTryingKindCountryBlackTiredResponseProtectionThings HappenInjuryBlack People
Author:Randall Robinson
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“Black people in the US are told all the time, from all aspects, that they're nothing, that they're less than. And of course that bears fruit, but no one wants to shoulder part of the blame. A lot of people here can't see around their own family's history. They don't want to see that where they come from and the people they surround themselves with might have played a role in all this. This is all part of our national myth about the individual. We think that a lack of success comes from the individual not working hard enough. A lot of people in this country really believe that.”

PeopleThinkingBelieveCountryEnoughIndividualBlackBlameMythSurroundBlack People
Author:Jesmyn Ward
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“Black people loving and losing is something we don’t see enough of. We’re always in these heightened situations like something big is happening, something funny or something violent. And you know what? Sometimes we die of breast cancer or a broken heart. Things happen that are just not being explored cinematically. It’s time we reinvigorated that type of film.”

PeopleKnowsHeartSometimesEnoughBigsHappensFilmDiesBlackSituationBrokenTypeLosingHappeningsCancerThings HappenViolentBreastsBlack PeopleLike SomethingBreast Cancer
Author:Ava DuVernay
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