Quotessence
Home / Topics / Racism Quotes

Racism Quotes

Browse 3161 quotes about Racism.

Related topics

PeopleWhiteBlackThinkingIfsKnowsSexismRaceCountryAmericaMenWorldWayProblemDiscriminationWantPersonsBelieveColorHumansStillsPrejudiceBigotryHateHas BeensPoliticalAfrican AmericanHomophobiaFeelsFormMeanPovertyDifferentFightingChildrenLongLooksShouldWarJusticeAnti RacismCommunityCultureEndsKindStatesIssuesNeedsViolenceBlack PeopleHatredMadeSlaveryYearsEvilTryingWellsDoeGroupsFirstsSocialBlack RacismCapitalismIgnoranceSocial JusticeAnti RacistEconomicNationsOppressionClassHeartIndividualKidsRightsTodayWhite RacismFactsGivingMindReasonSeemsSometimesCenturyFacesIdeasMaySkinsSouthXenophobiaCertainImportantInjusticeLittlesMatterPresidentReligiousUnited StatesMightUnitedVictimmore

Racism Quotes

“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
Create image

“I'M INTROSPECTIVE, because sometimes I want to take "our" side without looking at the facts in situations like these. Sometimes I feel like it's us against them. Sometimes I'm just as prejudiced as people I point fingers at. And that's not right. How can I look at white skin and make assumptions but not want assumptions made about me? That's not right.”

PeopleWantFeelsLooksMadeSometimesFactsSidesWhiteSituationRacismSkinsFingersAssumptionIntrospectiveWhite Skin
Book:Under Our Skin: Getting Real about Race. Getting Free from the Fears and Frustrations that Divide Us.
Create image

“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
Create image

“You should be able to criticize civil servants for what you think is wrongdoing without being painted as a cop-hater. I don't feel the police are all corrupt, however I do feel they are suffering from institutional racism and there needs to be a top-to-bottom examination of the way they practice and the way they criminalize young black and brown males. The fact that they seem to have backed off from it seems to suggest they realize they overreacted on me and it looks bad.”

ThinkingWayNeedsFeelsShouldLooksFactsSeemsAbleYoungSufferingBlackRealizingPracticeRacismPoliceMalesBottomServantBrownCriticizeCopExaminationWrongdoingCivil ServantsInstitutional Racism
Author:Quentin Tarantino
Create image

“When you look at the Justice Department's report talking about the Ferguson Police Department's rampant pattern of discrimination and its excessive use of force against African-American citizens, it's hard to try to rationalize how this cesspool of racism doesn't spill over onto the individual officers.”

TryingLooksHardUseIndividualForceJusticeTalkingCitizensRacismPolicePatternsDiscriminationAfrican AmericanDepartmentReportsOfficersSpillsAmerican CitizensRationalizeUse Of ForceFergusonPolice Department
Author:Benjamin Crump
Create image

“The fact that there's a more open discussion about everything from feminism to racism ... I look at my two boys ... this is their future I'm talking about. When I'll be long gone, it'll be them and their kids. I know that sometimes the darkest times are followed by the lightest. Sometimes bad things have to happen for good things to happen. At the very worst, we're having very open discussions, discussions about things we didn't even know f-king existed. I talk to my friends about it and they are absolutely shocked. They didn't even know.”

KnowsLooksLongTwoSometimesFactsHappensKidsTalkingBoysGoneFeminismWorstKingsRacismMy FriendsGood ThingsDiscussionBad ThingsShockedDarkest Times
Author:Michael Buble
Create image

“Part of the reason might be that I was born in 1954 and I look upon my youth with great fondness, like many old men. And, though my work doesn't focus much on good things, I see that period as America's heyday. True, we had many problems, like racism and Vietnam, but we still weren't quite as nuts as we seem to be now.”

MenLooksStillsReasonProblemSeemsMightAmericaBornFocusYouthPeriodsRacismGood ThingsLook UpOld ManNutsVietnamFondnessHeyday
Author:Donald Ray Pollock
Create image

“When people are not sure about their future, when their economies are suffering, when their personal fortunes are flagging, we have often in this country turned to nativism and xenophobia and racism and anti-immigrant sensibilities and passions to express our sense of outrage at what we can't control - and to forge a kind of fitful solidarity that turns out to be rather insular - we look inward and not outward.”

PeopleLooksKindCountrySufferingTurnsPassionEconomyRacismFortuneNot SureImmigrantsInwardSensibilitySolidarityOutrageXenophobia
Author:Michael Eric Dyson
Create image

“Never mind that from the 1600s until the late twentieth century the population the United States was 85% white, 12% black, and there have been changes demographically in the United States since the days of its founding. So they're trying to tell you that the United States' greatness happened because of diversity. Well, go back and look at the days the country was founded, and they do. When they do that, they see how racist and bigoted this country was. they see the seeds for bigotry and racism and discrimination were sown at the founding, is how it's now taught.”

TryingMindWellsLooksHas BeensCountryStatesBlackWhiteUnitedUnited StatesHappenedCenturyGreatnessTaughtDiversityLateRacismPopulationSeedsDiscriminationRacistBigotryFoundingTwentieth Century
Author:Rush Limbaugh
Create image

“I grew up in traditional black patriarchal culture and there is no doubt that I’m going to take a great many unconscious, but present, patriarchal complicities to the grave because it so deeply ensconced in how I look at the world. Therefore, very much like alcoholism, drug addiction, or racism patriarchy is a disease and we are in perennial recovery and relapse. So you have to get up every morning and struggle against it.”

WorldLooksCultureBlackMorningStruggleDoubtGrewDrugDiseaseGrew UpRacismAddictionGravesTraditionalRecoveryGet UpNo DoubtUnconsciousEvery MorningPatriarchyAlcoholismDrug AddictionComplicityRelapse
Book:Breaking Bread: Insurgent Black Intellectual Life
Create image

“Our love of lockstep is our greatest curse, the source of all that bedevils us. It is the source of homophobia, xenophobia, racism, sexism, terrorism, bigotry of every variety and hue, because it tells us there is one right way to do things, to look, to behave, to feel, when the only right way is to feel your heart hammering inside you and to listen to what its timpani is saying.”

WayFeelsLooksHeartSourceRacismTerrorismVarietyCurseBehaveBigotrySexismRight WayOur LoveHomophobiaXenophobiaHue
Book:Loud and Clear
Create image

“I do the very best I can to look upon life with optimism and hope and looking forward to a better day, but I don't think there is anything such as complete happiness. It pains me that there is still a lot of Klan activity and racism. I think when you say you're happy, you have everything that you need and everything that you want, and nothing more to wish for. I haven't reached that stage yet.”

ThinkingWantNeedsLooksStillsI CanPainWishStageHavensPositiveActivityRacismOptimismLook UpLooking ForwardBetter DaysOptimism And HopeComplete Happiness
Author:Rosa Parks
Create image

“The problem is that white people see racism as conscious hate, when racism is bigger than that. Racism is a complex system of social and political levers and pulleys set up generations ago to continue working on the behalf of whites at other people's expense, whether whites know/like it or not. Racism is an insidious cultural disease. It is so insidious that it doesn't care if you are a white person who likes Black people; it's still going to find a way to infect how you deal with people who don't look like you.”

PeopleIfsKnowsWayLooksPersonsStillsProblemCarePoliticalHateSocialBlackWhiteDealsGenerationsLike YouDiseaseRacismConsciousBiggerComplexesLikesExpensesBlack PeopleBehalfInsidiousLeversComplex SystemsPulleys
Author:Scott Woods
Create image

“Yes, racism looks like hate, but hate is just one manifestation. Privilege is another. Access is another. Ignorance is another. Apathy is another, and so on. So while I agree with people who say no one is born racist, it remains a powerful system that we're immediately born into. It's like being born into air: you take it in as soon as you breathe.”

PeopleLooksHateBornPowerfulAirIgnoranceRacismAgreeRemainsPrivilegeBreatheAccessManifestationJust OneRacistApathy
Author:Scott Woods
Create image

“Look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin.”

PeopleLooksCharacterDreamKidsRightsColorJudgingKingsSpeechRacismSkinsEqualityDiscriminationAfrican AmericanJudgedAmerican DreamDiverseAmerican HistoryCivil Rights MovementStrength Of CharacterI Had A DreamMulticulturalUnity In DiversityOregonSkin ColorBeing EqualHappy ChildrenIntegrity And CharacterIntegrity CharacterEquality Of PeopleEquality For AllI Have A Dream SpeechKings SpeechKings And LoveBeing JudgedGood KingsSocial EqualityPeaceful ProtestInspirational CharacterSlave OwnersAmerican CharacterInjustice And OppressionInspirational DiversityBlack SkinRacism And PrejudiceAfrican American Civil RightsJudge Of CharacterGreat ConservativeBrown SkinMarch On WashingtonRace And ColorDeep DisappointmentTrue EqualityAfrican RacePreschool Children
Author:Martin Luther King, Jr.
Create image

“Herman Cain is probably well liked by some of the Republicans because it hides the racist elements of the Republican Party. Conservative movement and tea party movement... People like Karl Rove liked to keep the racism very covert. And so Herman Cain provides this great opportunity say you can say ‘Look, this is not a racist, anti-immigrant, anti-female, anti-gay movement. Look we have a black man!'” Garofalo hypothesized. “Look he’s polling well and won a straw poll!”

PeopleMenWellsLooksOpportunityBlackPartyStupidMovementRepublicanGayElementsRacismFemaleConservativeTeaRacistImmigrantsRepublican PartyPollsTea PartyStrawsGreat OpportunityCainStupidestCovertPollingAnti GayTea Party Movement
Author:Janeane Garofalo
Create image

“I am not ashamed to use the word class. I will also plead guilty to another charge. The charge is that people belonging to my class think they're better than other people. You're damn right we're better. We're better because we do not shirk our obligations either to ourselves or to others. . . .we live by our lights, we die by our lights, and whoever the high gods may be, we'll look them in the eye without apology.”

PeopleThinkingLooksMayUseLightEyeDiesClassRacismObligationGuiltyDamnAshamedLive ByBelongingApologyShirk
Book:The Moviegoer
Create image

“The first who attracts the eye, the first in enlightenment, in power and in happiness, is the white man, the European, man par excellence; below him appear the Negro and the Indian. These two unfortunate races have neither birth, nor face, nor language, nor mores in common; only their misfortunes look alike. Both occupy an equally inferior position in the country that they inhabit; both experience the effects of tyranny; and if their miseries are different, they can accuse the same author for them.”

IfsMenFirstsLooksTwoDifferentCountryEyeFacesLanguageWhiteCommonRaceEffectsPositionBirthRacismEnlightenmentMiseryExcellenceTyrannyIndianMisfortunesUnfortunateInferiorsWhite Man
Book:Democracy in America
Create image