Racism Quotations

Our true nationality is mankind.

The really important victory of the civil rights movement was that it made racism unpopular, whereas a generation ago at the turn of the last century, you had to embrace racism to get elected to anything.

As I often say, we have come a long way from the days of slavery, but in 2014, discrimination and inequality still saturate our society in modern ways. Though racism may be less blatant now in many cases, its existence is undeniable.

Sexual, racial, gender violence and other forms of discrimination and violence in a culture cannot be eliminated without changing culture.

Just as we reject racism, sexism, ageism, and heterosexism, we reject speciesism. The species of a sentient being is no more reason to deny the protection of this basic right than race, sex, age, or sexual orientation is a reason to deny membership in the human moral community to other humans.

You don't fight racism with racism, the best way to fight racism is with solidarity.

As long as you hate, there will be people to hate.

Racism and discrimination of any kind have no place in football.

As the global expansion of Indian and Chinese restaurants suggests, xenophobia is directed against foreign people, not foreign cultural imports.

I say to you quite frankly that the time for racial discrimination is over.

I was literally the black sheep of the family, and there were definitely moments of discomfort while my grandmother was working through her racism.

The Holocaust illustrates the consequences of prejudice, racism and stereotyping on a society. It forces us to examine the responsibilities of citizenship and confront the powerful ramifications of indifference and inaction.

A racially integrated community is a chronological term timed from the entrance of the first black family to the exit of the last white family.

Racism is taught in our society, it is not automatic. It is learned behavior toward persons with dissimilar physical characteristics.

Racism oppresses its victims, but also binds the oppressors, who sear their consciences with more and more lies until they become prisoners of those lies. They cannot face the truth of human equality because it reveals the horror of the injustices they commit.

I think that the roots of racism have always been economic, and I think people are desperate and scared. And when you're desperate and scared you scapegoat people. It exacerbates latent tendencies toward - well, toward racism or homophobia or anti-Semitism.

First there was racism. Then liberals created institutional racism and coded racism. You can only hear it with a dog whistle.

I look at an ant and I see myself: a native South African, endowed by nature with a strength much greater than my size so I might cope with the weight of a racism that crushes my spirit.

Racism is if there are spectators or, outside the field of play, there are movements to discrimination, but, on the field of play, I deny that there is racism.

Racism is still with us. But it is up to us to prepare our children for what they have to meet, and, hopefully, we shall overcome.

The reason people think it's important to be white is that they think it's important not to be black.

Ageism is as odious as racism and sexism.

Everybody's scared for their ass. There aren't too many people ready to die for racism. They'll kill for racism but they won't die for racism.

The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line.

African Americans know about racism, but I don't think we really know the causes. I decided it's first of all a family problem.

Education in this country is about how to maintain the status quo and to perpetuate racism.

A group of white South Africans recently killed a black lawyer because he was black. That was wrong. They should have killed him because he was a lawyer.

I'm not going to sit here now and say 'do this,' or 'do that.' But you must - must - expunge any vestige of racism.

Comedy can always be taken the wrong way. If I do a bit that is meant to diffuse racism or sexism, Im not going to avoid it on the chance that a small portion of the audience might take it the wrong way.

Many voted in 2008 with the desire to see racism and racists humiliated by having a qualified black man elected president.

One of the worst things about racism is what it does to young people.

I never doubted my ability, but when you hear all your life you're inferior, it makes you wonder if the other guys have something you've never seen before. If they do, I'm still looking for it.

I know I'm breaking a taboo by using the term antiwhite racism, but I do so intentionally, because it's the reality some of our fellow citizens live with, and remaining quiet about it only aggravates their trauma.

Weakness is what brings ignorance, cheapness, racism, homophobia, desperation, cruelty, brutality, all these things that will keep a society chained to the ground, one foot nailed to the floor.

Using the power you derive from the discovery of the truth about racism in South Africa, you will help us to remake our part of the world into a corner of the globe on which all - of which all of humanity can be proud.

When I wrote 'The Giver,' it contained no so-called 'bad words.' It was set, after all, in a mythical, futuristic, and Utopian society. Not only was there no poverty, divorce, racism, sexism, pollution, or violence in the world of 'The Giver'; there was also careful attention paid to language: to its fluency, precision, and power.

The worst moment in my life was when I was seven years old and I discovered that there was a thing such as racism. You don't know you're different until someone lets you know.

The policemen or soldiers are only a gun in the establishments hand. They make the racist secure in his racism.

Slavery has never been abolished from America's way of thinking.

I've seen racism in my audiences. For example, I've seen people laugh at every other group, but then clam up when it comes to their community. You can't laugh at everyone else and then not laugh at yourself. You shouldn't be at my show if you can't laugh at yourself.

Racism cannot be cured solely by attacking some of the results it produces, like discrimination in housing or in education.

If I was in a room with a bunch of skinheads talking about racism, then I would be disturbed, but after we finished a take, we were normal people again.

We African Americans have now spent the major part of the 20th Century battling racism

If we talk about the environment, for example, we have to talk about environmental racism - about the fact that kids in South Central Los Angeles have a third of the lung capacity of kids in Santa Monica.

The soldiers never explained to the government when an Indian was wronged, but reported the misdeeds of the Indians.

Racism is always there underneath, but usually it is exploited in these times of economic crisis, and it's hard to find out when one slides into another.

Using a big word like 'plagiarism'... always causes some damage. It will always do lasting damage, like accusations of racism.

The Black skin is not a badge of shame, but rather a glorious symbol of national greatness.

However, while we should certainly celebrate the demise of overt official racism, we must also critically examine where we are at this historical moment, recognize the many challenges ahead and reaffirm our commitment to making Brown v. Board a reality.

Racism is a way to gain economic advantage at the expense of others. Slavery and plantations may be gone, but racism still allows us to regard those who may keep us from financial gain as less than equals.

Racism is a moral catastrophe, most graphically seen in the prison industrial complex and targeted police surveillance in black and brown ghettos rendered invisible in public discourse.

Violence and racism are bad. Whenever they occur they are to be condemned and we should not turn a blind eye to them.

Even if I don't always behave as I should, this still doesn't explain why so many people have something against me. But you know how it is. A lot of people vent themselves by coming to the stadium to yell at me. I hope it's not racism. I tell myself that it's not racism; it's because I'm tough, and I repeat this to myself.

I grew up in the Deep South, where sexism, racism, and homophobia were and still are alive and well. I have early, early memories of words and actions of this type being very painful.

My encounters with racism are sort of second-hand situations where I might be standing around with a group of white friends and someone makes a comment that they wouldn't make at my family reunion.

People know about the Klan and the overt racism, but the killing of one's soul little by little, day after day, is a lot worse than someone coming in your house and lynching you.

Any concept of one person being superior to another can lead to racism.

There's a lot of racism still alive and still active.

Racism, in the first place, is a weapon used by the wealthy to increase the profits they bring in by paying Black workers less for their work.

Sexism, like racism, goes with us into the next century. I see class warfare as overshadowing both.

Black reporters are as capable of racism as anyone else.

There's always someone who's going to interpret my material as racist, but it's not. Racism comes from intent and power. A racist will tell a joke about a group of people only when they're not in the room. I'll talk about a group of people only when they're in the room.

I sometimes feel that racism is getting worse.

You know why we're stuck with the myth that only black people have soul? Because white people don't let themselves feel things.

Racism is man's gravest threat to man - the maximum of hatred for a minimum of reason.

If you live in the elite world of dance, you find yourself in a world rife with racism. Let's face it.

Homophobia is like racism and anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry in that it seeks to dehumanize a large group of people, to deny their humanity, their dignity and personhood.

Antiwhite racism is developing in sections of our cities where individuals - some of whom have French nationality - contemptuously designate French people as gaulois on the pretext they don't share the same religion, color or origins.

No matter what vision one has of South Africa, the first thing that must be done is to destroy racism.

You can't delete racism. It's like a cigarette. You can't stop smoking if you don't want to, and you can't stop racism if people don't want to. But I'll do everything I can to help.

I - listen, racism - being a racist is the worst thing you can say about somebody. I mean, it is such a charged accusation. And I really think people should be very careful before they level that.

And the basis on which we agreed to operate with them involved a manifesto, where it states that we proceed from different ideologies and policies. One thing that we insisted on was that they should take an oath to reject racism and discrimination.

Black women are programmed to define ourselves within this male attention and to compete with each other for it rather than to recognize and move upon our common interests.

That's what is always fascinating about racism - how it is allowed, if not encouraged, to flourish freely in public spaces, the way racism and bigotry are so often unquestioned.

Racism tears down your insides so that no matter what you achieve, you're not quite up to snuff.

Anti-Semitism has no historical, political and certainly no philosophical origins. Anti-Semitism is a disease.

I swear to the Lord, I still can't see, why Democracy means, everybody but me.

Racism is an ism to which everyone in the world today is exposed; for or against, we must take sides. And the history of the future will differ according to the decision which we make.

We will live with racism for ever. But senses of self, senses of belonging, senses of us and of others? Those are up for grabs.

There's a lot more hypocrisy than before. Racism has gone back underground.

Slavery exists. It is black in the South, and white in the North.

I believe we should work to end all racism in American society and staunchly defend the inherent rights of every person.

The minute you understand racism, you're responsible for being racist. It's like eating from the tree of knowledge.

I love Canadians because I don't see very much racism in Canada.

Racism is an effect of slavery, not the other way around. Once slavery was abolished, not only did racism not disappear, neither did the economic system it upheld.

Most middle-class whites have no idea what it feels like to be subjected to police who are routinely suspicious, rude, belligerent, and brutal.

Racism is ridiculous no matter where it's coming from.

I came into this whole business by going to see Rock Against Racism gigs with the Clash.

Racism has been for everyone like a horrible, tragic car crash, and we've all been heavily sedated from it. If we don't come into consciousness of this tragedy, there's going to be a violent awakening we don't want. The question is, can we wake up?

The funniest racism is the racism between minorities. It's something you don't see dramatized, but almost every minority I know who's my age, they have these funny stories about their parents stereotyping other minorities.

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.

The hardest thing I had to overcome in life? I think racism. That's so difficult because I don't think anyone can ever understand it. It's not that people don't want to understand it, but they don't want to touch it.

Let me just say that to imagine racism does not exist is imagination. And to imagine that it does not create its own set of problems is true imagination. So let's not imagine that racism is gone, extinguished, because it's not. We are seeing this in the top levels of the political arena, and we are seeing it very, very plainly.

We must treat the disease of racism. This means we must understand the disease.

The word 'racism' is like ketchup. It can be put on practically anything - and demanding evidence makes you a 'racist.'

On the field, blacks have been able to be super giants. But, once our playing days are over, this is the end of it and we go back to the back of the bus again.

I couldn't adjust to the racism in Florida. It was so blatant... I had never been so described as Florida described me.

We Negro writers, just by being black, have been on the blacklist all our lives. Censorship for us begins at the color line.

Racism, xenophobia and unfair discrimination have spawned slavery, when human beings have bought and sold and owned and branded fellow human beings as if they were so many beasts of burden.

It is a great shock at the age of five or six to find that in a world of Gary Coopers you are the Indian.