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Racism Quotes

Browse 3161 quotes about Racism.

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Racism Quotes

“Solving the population problem is not going to solve the problems of racism, of sexism, of religious intolerance, of war, of gross economic inequality. But if you don't solve the population problem, you're not going to solve any of those problems. Whatever problem you're interested in, you're not going to solve it unless you also solve the population problem. Whatever your cause, it's a lost cause without population control.”

IfsWarProblemLostCausesReligiousEconomicRacismPopulationSolveInequalitySexismIntoleranceGrossReligious IntoleranceEconomic InequalityOverpopulationPopulation ControlLost CausePopulation Problem
Author:Paul R. Ehrlich
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“Sometimes we say we want an end to hate or racism or sexism. But we all participate in keeping these structures alive. If everyone decided to relinquish the past what would happen to people who feel that there hasn't been proper atonement made to them? And what happens to the person who feels that the constant atonement is their identity?”

PeopleIfsWantFeelsPersonsMadeEndsSometimesHappensPastHateAliveIdentityRacismDecidedStructureConstantSexismAtonement
Author:Chris Abani
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“I received a most amusing postcard the other morning. Unfortunately, it was not signed in a readable manner so I cannot answer it privately. But it comes from Moblie, Ala., and says: 'Dear Mrs. Roosevelt: You have not answered my question, the amount of Negro blood you have in your veins, if any.' I am afraid none of us know how much nor what kind of blood we have in our veins, since chemically it is all the same. And most of us cannot trace our ancestry more than a few generations.”

IfsKnowsKindAnswersMorningKnow HowGenerationsBloodAmountRacismDearVeinsAmusingAncestryPostcards
Book:Eleanor Roosevelt's My Day: First lady of the world, her acclaimed columns, 1953-1962
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“in race relations, the single gesture and the single individual are more often than not doomed to failure. Only the group and the long-term, undeviating policy make much headway. ... if you want to make the world a better place, the first thing you must accept is the fact that you cannot transcend your limitations as an individual.”

IfsWorldWantFirstsLongFactsIndividualTermRaceAcceptingGroupsPolicyRacismRelationLimitationLong TermGesturesDoomedBetter PlaceRace Relations
Book:Color blind: a white woman looks at the Negro
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“For me white privilege has turned out to be an elusive and fugitive subject. The pressure to avoid it is great, for in facing it I must give up the myth of meritocracy. If these things are true, this is not such a free country; one's life is not what one makes it; many doors open for certain people through no virtues of their own.”

PeopleIfsGivingCountryLife IsCertainWhiteVirtueDoorsSubjectsGiving UpRacismPressurePrivilegeMythElusiveWhite PrivilegeFugitiveMeritocracyFree Country
Author:Peggy McIntosh
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“I don't like that word 'discovery.' ... Sinatra was the first one to call Ray Charles a genius, he spoke of 'the genius of Ray Charles.' And after that everybody called him a genius. They didn't call him a genius before that though. He was a genius but they didn't call him that. ... If a white man hadn't told them, they wouldn't've seen it. ... Like, you know, they say Columbus discovered America, he didn't discover America.”

IfsKnowsMenFirstsAmericaWhiteLike YouGeniusRacismDiscoverySpokesRaysWhite ManColumbus
Author:Gayl Jones
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“Blacks are supposed to rejoice whenever our way of life becomes more mainstream. We seldom do. For we see in it a sanctioning that can only be granted by white society. In other words: If you're white, it's all right. If you're black, step back.”

IfsWayBlackWhiteStepsRacismGrantedRejoiceMainstream
Book:It's the Little Things: Everyday Interactions that Anger, Annoy, and Divide the Races
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“In America, racism exists but racists are all gone. Racists belong to the past. Racists are the thin-lipped mean white people in the movies about the civil rights era. Here's the thing: the manifestation of racism has changed but the language has not. So if you haven't lynched somebody then you can't be called a racist. If you're not a bloodsucking monster, then you can't be called a racist. Somebody has to be able to say that racists are not monsters.”

PeopleIfsMeanAbleAmericaPastLanguageWhiteGoneRightsHavensChangedRacismMonstersCivil RightsErasManifestationRacist
Author:Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
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“I felt pretty good growing up. I didnt feel a lot of prejudice or racism. But I do remember, if there was going to be a movie or a television show with Asian characters, I would go out of my way to avoid them, because they portrayed all Asians as either ridiculously good or ridiculously bad; you know, the whole Charlie Chan-Fu Manchu thing.”

IfsKnowsWayFeelsWholeCharacterShowsRememberFeltGrowing UpGrowingTelevisionRacismPrejudiceMy WayAsianCharlieTelevision Shows
Author:David Henry Hwang
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“It's so hard for me to even acknowledge America without talking about race. If you look at our society, if you look at the prisons, if you look at the poverty and which side of the line the majority of people are, we have to acknowledge how we divide ourselves up, that there's racism alive in this country. And it's not in the law. It's in our minds. And that's what we have to actively battle.”

PeopleIfsMindLooksCountryHardAmericaLawSidesLinesRaceTalkingPovertyAliveBattleRacismMajorityPrisonAcknowledgeOur SocietyDivides
Author:Dave Matthews
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“It is said that the Negro is ignorant. But why is he ignorant? It comes with ill grace from a man who has put out my eyes to makea parade of my blindness,--to reproach me for my poverty when he has wronged me of my money.... If he is poor, what has become of the money he has been earning for the last two hundred and fifty years? Years ago it was said cotton fights and cotton conquers for American slavery. The Negro helped build up that great cotton power in the South, and in the North his sigh was in the whir of its machinery, and his blood and tears upon the warp and woof of its manufactures.”

IfsMenYearsHas BeensSaidTwoEyeLastsFightingPoorPovertyGraceBloodTearsRacismHundredYears AgoSlaverySouthIllIgnorantConquerFiftyEarningBlindnessSighMachineryParadesCottonReproachWrongedWarpAmerican Slavery
Author:Frances Harper
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“It is up to us to take care of this planet, it is our only home. To betray nature is to betray us. To save nature is to save us. Because whatever you're fighting for, racism or poverty. Feminism, gay rights or any type of equality. It won't matter in the least. Because if we don't all work together to save the environment, we will be equally extinct.”

IfsHeartSoulMatterHomeCareTogetherFightingRealizingPovertyEnvironmentRightsFeminismPlanetsTypeGayRacismClimateWarmTake CareWorking TogetherBetrayGay RightsSave The EnvironmentSave Nature
Author:Prince Ea
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“Few if any political philosophers have had the courage of tackling the Cold War. Even the best of them have kept silent or have stated some bromides glossing over the serious shortcomings of "our" side, such as racism, social injustice, extreme income disparities, the exploitation of the Third World, and environmental degradation.”

IfsWorldWarPoliticalSocialSidesSeriousColdRacismThirdsSilentEnvironmentalInjusticePhilosopherExtremesIncomeExploitationCold WarShortcomingsDegradationThird WorldDisparityTacklingEnvironmental DegradationSocial Injustice
Author:Mario Bunge
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“If anti-Semitism is a variety of racism, it is a most peculiar variety, with many unique characteristics. In my view as a historian, it is so peculiar that it deserves to be placed in a quite different category. I would call it an intellectual disease, a disease of the mind, extremely infectious and massively destructive.”

IfsMindDifferentViewsDiseaseUniqueIntellectualRacismDeserveVarietyCharacteristicsDestructiveCategoriesHistorianPeculiarAnti SemitismUnique Characteristics
Author:Paul Johnson
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“Even if, personally, I'm in a place of contentment or solidity, I feel like it's hard not to look out into American culture and see vast inequity, widespread institutionalized violence and racism and transphobia and environmental destruction. It's hard to be in this world and feel a sense of innate satisfaction at all. There's plenty of things to feel unsettled about.”

IfsWorldFeelsLooksHardCultureViolenceThis WorldRacismDestructionEnvironmentalSatisfactionPlentyContentmentInnateAmerican CultureSolidityEnvironmental Destruction
Author:Carrie Brownstein
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“I went back to a small town in Poland where my dad grew up. It was a very traumatic experience for me as a young man to know that my father's family were killed by Nazis, killed by Hitler. And that left, you know, if not intellectually, at least an emotional part of me which said, God, we have got to do everything we can to end this kind of horrific racism or anti-Semitism. And I have spent much of my life trying to fight that.”

IfsKnowsMenTryingKindSaidEndsYoungFightingFatherLeftEmotionalGrewDadGrew UpRacismTownsMy DadYoung ManNaziSmall TownPolandAnti SemitismHorrificTraumatic Experiences
Author:Bernie Sanders
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“It is notable how little empathy is cultivated or valued in our society. I put this down to our traditional racism and obsessive sectarianism. Even so, one would think that we would be encouraged to project ourselves into the character of someone of a different race or class, if only to be able to control him. But no effort is made.”

IfsThinkingLittlesMadeDifferentCharacterWould BeAbleEffortRaceClassProjectsEmpathyRacismTraditionalOur SocietyNotableObsessiveSectarianismBe EncouragedDifferent Races
Book:Screening history
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“America is supposed to pride itself on freedom of religion, race, and class. It's something that is carried on from ignorance and territorialism. I don't know if it's a transcendental pre-colonial mentality but I don't see too many other races of people trippin' about who is coming in and coming out. I think it's primarily racism disguised as class wars.”

PeopleIfsThinkingKnowsWarAmericaRaceClassIgnorancePrideRacismComing OutMentalityTranscendentalFreedom Of Religion
Author:Myka 9
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“If racism is not the whole of the Tea Party, it is in its heart, along with blind hatred, a total disinterest in the welfare of others, and a full-flowered self-rationalizing refusal to accept the outcomes of elections, or the reality of democracy, or the narrowness of their minds and the equal narrowness of their public support.”

IfsMindHeartSelfWholeRealityPartyAcceptingSupportDemocracyEqualRacismHatredElectionBlindTeaWelfareOutcomesRefusalTea PartyDisinterest
Author:Keith Olbermann
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