---
title: "56 Racism Quotes By Bell Hooks"
description: "Racism quotes by Bell Hooks on race, class, white expectations, and love."
image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/9f7/bell-hooks-464_black_i-think-black-people-need-to-take-self-e_3134091.jpg"
---

> [I think Black people need to take self-esteem seriously.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/i-think-black-people-need-to-take-self-esteem-seriously/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/9f7/bell-hooks-464_black_i-think-black-people-need-to-take-self-e_3134091.jpg)

> [Blacks who lack a proper killing rage are merely victims.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/blacks-who-lack-a-proper-killing-rage-are-merely-victims/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/f85/bell-hooks-464_blacks_blacks-who-lack-a-proper-killing-rage-ar_2114510.jpg)

> [“black identities are diverse and complex…”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/black-identities-are-diverse-and-complex/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/071/bell-hooks-464_identity_black-identities-are-diverse-and-complex_1004363.jpg)

> [America is a country that would rather talk about race than class.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/america-is-a-country-that-would-rather-talk-about-race-than-class/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/670/bell-hooks-464_america_america-is-a-country-that-would-rather-t_1342413.jpg)

> [Certainly we can end racism with love. We can demand that the federal government change its emphasis on racial distinction.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/certainly-we-can-end-racism-with-love-we-can-demand-that-the-federal/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/007/bell-hooks-464_certainly_certainly-we-can-end-racism-with-love-we_2058838.jpg)

> [I've written 18 books, mostly dealing with issues of social justice, ending racism, feminism, and cultural criticism.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/i-ve-written-18-books-mostly-dealing-with-issues-of-social-justice/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c4e/bell-hooks-464_book_i-ve-written-18-books-mostly-dealing-wit_763322.jpg)

> [Until the legacy of remembered and reenacted trauma is taken seriously, black America cannot heal.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/until-the-legacy-of-remembered-and-reenacted-trauma-is-taken/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/b8d/bell-hooks-464_america_until-the-legacy-of-remembered-and-reena_942911.jpg)

> [What had begun as a movement to free all black people from racist oppression became a movement with its primary goal the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/what-had-begun-as-a-movement-to-free-all-black-people-from-racist/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/6c7/bell-hooks-464_black_what-had-begun-as-a-movement-to-free-all_853136.jpg)

> [Whether we're talking about race or gender or class, popular culture is where the pedagogy is, it's where the learning is.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/whether-we-re-talking-about-race-or-gender-or-class-popular-culture/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7dd/bell-hooks-464_class_whether-we-re-talking-about-race-or-gend_2803849.jpg)

> [The greatest movement for social justice our country has ever known is the civil rights movement and it was totally rooted in…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/the-greatest-movement-for-social-justice-our-country-has-ever-known/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/d12/bell-hooks-464_civil-rights_the-greatest-movement-for-social-justice_2119105.jpg)

> [It is crucial for the future of the Black liberation struggle that we remain ever mindful that ours is a shared struggle,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/it-is-crucial-for-the-future-of-the-black-liberation-struggle-that-we/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f8/bell-hooks-464_black_it-is-crucial-for-the-future-of-the-blac_1436802.jpg)

> [To counter the fixation on a rhetoric of victimhood, black folks must engage in a discourse of self-determination.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/to-counter-the-fixation-on-a-rhetoric-of-victimhood-black-folks-must/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/f76/bell-hooks-464_black_to-counter-the-fixation-on-a-rhetoric-of_2193533.jpg)

> [“In a racially imperialist nation such as ours, it is the dominant race that reserves for itself the luxury of dismissing racial…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/in-a-racially-imperialist-nation-such-as-ours-it-is-the-dominant-race/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/d97/bell-hooks-464_racial-identity_in-a-racially-imperialist-nation-such-as_691174.jpg)

> [Why is it so difficult for many white folks to understand that racism is oppressive not because white folks have prejudicial feelings…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/why-is-it-so-difficult-for-many-white-folks-to-understand-that-racism/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/bd8/bell-hooks-464_difficult_why-is-it-so-difficult-for-many-white-fo_1232535.jpg)

> [If we move away from either/or thinking, and if we think, okay, every day of my life that I walk out of…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/if-we-move-away-from-either-or-thinking-and-if-we-think-okay-every/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/56f/bell-hooks-464_class_if-we-move-away-from-either-or-thinking_818235.jpg)

> [“The "we" evoked here is all of us, black people/people of color, who are daily bombarded by a powerful colonizing whiteness that…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/the-we-evoked-here-is-all-of-us-black-people-people-of-color-who-are/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/f82/bell-hooks-464_black-people_the-we-evoked-here-is-all-of-us-black-pe_2007016.jpg)

> [“White people who want people of color to do the work for them, who want us to draw the map and then…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/white-people-who-want-people-of-color-to-do-the-work-for-them-who/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c19/bell-hooks-464_racism_white-people-who-want-people-of-color-to_491468.jpg)

> [“Whether they are able to enact it as lived practice or not, many white folks active in anti-racist struggle today are able…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/whether-they-are-able-to-enact-it-as-lived-practice-or-not-many-white/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/108/bell-hooks-464_anti-racist_whether-they-are-able-to-enact-it-as-liv_158077.jpg)

> [All too often we think of community in terms of being with folks like ourselves: the same class, same race, same ethnicity,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/all-too-often-we-think-of-community-in-terms-of-being-with-folks-like/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/906/bell-hooks-464_challenges_all-too-often-we-think-of-community-in-t_2547155.jpg)

> [I believe that this nation can only heal from the wounds of racism if we all begin to love blackness. And by…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/i-believe-that-this-nation-can-only-heal-from-the-wounds-of-racism-if/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/256/bell-hooks-464_able_i-believe-that-this-nation-can-only-heal_3117236.jpg)

> [The notion that black folks have nothing to learn from scholarship that may reflect racial or racist biases is dangerous. It promotes…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/the-notion-that-black-folks-have-nothing-to-learn-from-scholarship/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/682/bell-hooks-464_african-american_the-notion-that-black-folks-have-nothing_2987799.jpg)

> [..the struggle to end sexist oppression that focuses on destroying the cultural basis for such domination strengthens other liberation struggles. Individuals who…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/the-struggle-to-end-sexist-oppression-that-focuses-on-destroying-the/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c25/bell-hooks-464_bases_the-struggle-to-end-sexist-oppression-th_2698931.jpg)

> [Another response to racism has been the establishment of unlearning racism workshops, which are often led by white women. These workshops are…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/another-response-to-racism-has-been-the-establishment-of-unlearning/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e74/bell-hooks-464_acknowledge_another-response-to-racism-has-been-the_1488417.jpg)

> […“white supremacy” is a much more useful term for understanding the complicity of people of color in upholding and maintaining racial hierarchies…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/white-supremacy-is-a-much-more-useful-term-for-understanding-the/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/53d/bell-hooks-464_apartheid_white-supremacy-is-a-much-more-useful-te_3114069.jpg)

> [“A shift in class values occurs in black life when integration comes and with it the idea that money is the primary…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/a-shift-in-class-values-occurs-in-black-life-when-integration-comes/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/48e/bell-hooks-464_individual-success_a-shift-in-class-values-occurs-in-black_2347687.jpg)

> [Patriarchy, like any system of domination (for example, racism), relies on socializing everyone to believe that in all human relations there is…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/patriarchy-like-any-system-of-domination-for-example-racism-relies-on/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7f5/bell-hooks-464_acceptable_patriarchy-like-any-system-of-domination_1012748.jpg)

> [“Even in the face of powerful structures of domination, it remains possible for each of us, especially those of us who are…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/even-in-the-face-of-powerful-structures-of-domination-it-remains/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/472/bell-hooks-464_negotiation_even-in-the-face-of-powerful-structures_2015852.jpg)

> [I think the invitation offered the non-black reader is to join us in this expression of our familiarity and via that joining,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/i-think-the-invitation-offered-the-non-black-reader-is-to-join-us-in/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/af6/bell-hooks-464_able_i-think-the-invitation-offered-the-non-b_3078243.jpg)

> [“Within neo-colonial white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, the black male body continues to be perceived as an embodiment of bestial, violent, penis-as-weapon hypermasculine…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/within-neo-colonial-white-supremacist-capitalist-patriarchy-the-black/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/ef3/bell-hooks-464_commoditization_within-neo-colonial-white-supremacist-ca_1935940.jpg)

> [“Often black people, especially non-gay folk, become enraged when they hear a white person who is gay suggest homosexuality is synonymous with…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/often-black-people-especially-non-gay-folk-become-enraged-when-they/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/ac5/bell-hooks-464_bigotry_often-black-people-especially-non-gay-fo_2700101.jpg)

> [“Concurrently, the growing class power and public voice of conservative and liberal well-to-do black folks easily obscures the class cruelty these individuals…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/concurrently-the-growing-class-power-and-public-voice-of-conservative/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/23a/bell-hooks-464_gangsta-rap_concurrently-the-growing-class-power-and_234105.jpg)

> [“But artists aren’t the only marginalized folks controlling real estate. Think about the colonizing role that wealthy white gay men have played…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/but-artists-aren-t-the-only-marginalized-folks-controlling-real/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e5a/bell-hooks-464_art_but-artists-aren-t-the-only-marginalized_2055395.jpg)

> [“In the early years of contemporary feminist movement, solidarity between women was often equated with the formation of "safe" spaces where groups…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/in-the-early-years-of-contemporary-feminist-movement-solidarity/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/b94/bell-hooks-464_dissent_in-the-early-years-of-contemporary-femin_1067831.jpg)

> [“The growing number of gated communities in our nation is but one example of the obsession with safety. With guards at the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/the-growing-number-of-gated-communities-in-our-nation-is-but-one/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/d7b/bell-hooks-464_ask-questions_the-growing-number-of-gated-communities_3138842.jpg)

> [Assumptions that racism is more oppressive to black men than black women, then and now ... based on acceptance of patriarchal notions…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/assumptions-that-racism-is-more-oppressive-to-black-men-than-black/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/ea4/bell-hooks-464_acceptance_assumptions-that-racism-is-more-oppressi_172746.jpg)

> [As we search as a nation for constructive ways to challenge racism and white supremacy, it is absolutely essential that progressive female…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/as-we-search-as-a-nation-for-constructive-ways-to-challenge-racism/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/d12/bell-hooks-464_challenges_as-we-search-as-a-nation-for-constructiv_3010799.jpg)

> [We all may have prejudices, but we're not all part of a system that reinforces, reinvents and reaffirms itself every day of…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/we-all-may-have-prejudices-but-we-re-not-all-part-of-a-system-that/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4ce/bell-hooks-464_every-day_we-all-may-have-prejudices-but-we-re-not_1569309.jpg)

> [In general, the mass media tell us that black people are not loving, that our lives are so fraught with violence and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/in-general-the-mass-media-tell-us-that-black-people-are-not-loving/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/cd5/bell-hooks-464_aggression_in-general-the-mass-media-tell-us-that-b_3042199.jpg)

> [Like many white liberals, Ken sees the whiteness of his social life as more an accident of circumstance than a choice. He…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/like-many-white-liberals-ken-sees-the-whiteness-of-his-social-life-as/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/339/bell-hooks-464_accidents_like-many-white-liberals-ken-sees-the-wh_666507.jpg)

> [“Whether or not any of us become racists is a choice we make. And we are called to choose again and again…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/whether-or-not-any-of-us-become-racists-is-a-choice-we-make-and-we/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4ec/bell-hooks-464_anti-racist_whether-or-not-any-of-us-become-racists_1975842.jpg)

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- [Maya Angelou 35 quotes](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/racism/maya-angelou/)

## More by Bell Hooks

> [Right now, for many Americans, class is being foregrounded like never before because of the economic situation. It doesn't mean that race doesn't matter,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/right-now-for-many-americans-class-is-being-foregrounded-like-never/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [“Most folks believe we are hardwired biologically to long for sex but they do not believe we are hardwired to long for love. Almost…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/most-folks-believe-we-are-hardwired-biologically-to-long-for-sex-but/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [... we need to interrogate "reverence," for idolization can be another way one is objectified and not really taken seriously.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/we-need-to-interrogate-reverence-for-idolization-can-be-another-way/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [Couples who rarely or never have sex can know lifelong love.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/couples-who-rarely-or-never-have-sex-can-know-lifelong-love/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [The power of patriarchy has been to make maleness feared and to make men feel that it is better to be feared that to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/the-power-of-patriarchy-has-been-to-make-maleness-feared-and-to-make/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [“I feel enormously blessed to be a successful black woman writer in this culture, but I have found my small fame, such as it…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/i-feel-enormously-blessed-to-be-a-successful-black-woman-writer-in/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [Language is also a place of struggle.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/language-is-also-a-place-of-struggle/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [In this culture, the phrase 'black woman' is not synonymous with 'tender,' or 'gentle.' It's as if those words couldn't possibly speak to the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/in-this-culture-the-phrase-black-woman-is-not-synonymous-with-tender/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [It's interesting to look at all the aspects where everyday Americans, many of whom are not college educated, are thinking deeply now about our…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/it-s-interesting-to-look-at-all-the-aspects-where-everyday-americans/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [The true teacher is within us. A good teacher is someone who can help you to go back and touch the true teacher within,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/the-true-teacher-is-within-us-a-good-teacher-is-someone-who-can-help/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [“Advancing the notion that there can be many "feminisms" has served the conservative and liberal political interests of women seeking status and privileged class…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/advancing-the-notion-that-there-can-be-many-feminisms-has-served-the/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [I love my family, even as I critique their dysfunctionalities.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/i-love-my-family-even-as-i-critique-their-dysfunctionalities/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [You must have courage to love, you have to have a profound will to do what is right to love, and it does not…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/you-must-have-courage-to-love-you-have-to-have-a-profound-will-to-do/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [To truly love we must learn to mix various ingredients - care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, and trust, as well as honest and open…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/to-truly-love-we-must-learn-to-mix-various-ingredients-care-affection/)

[Bell Hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

> [“Often emphasis on identity and lifestyle is appealing because it creates a false sense that one is engaged in praxis. However, praxis within any…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bell-hooks/often-emphasis-on-identity-and-lifestyle-is-appealing-because-it/)

[bell hooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bell-hooks/)

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                        "text": "If we move away from either/or thinking, and if we think, okay, every day of my life that I walk out of my house I am a combination of race, gender, class, sexual preference and religion or what have you, what gets foregrounded?",
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                        "text": "“The \"we\" evoked here is all of us, black people/people of color, who are daily bombarded by a powerful colonizing whiteness that seduces us away from ourselves that negates that there is beauty to be found in any form of blackness that is not imitation whiteness.”",
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                        "text": "“White people who want people of color to do the work for them, who want us to draw the map and then carry them on our back down the road that ends racism are still playing out the servant/served paradigm.”",
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                        "text": "“Whether they are able to enact it as lived practice or not, many white folks active in anti-racist struggle today are able to acknowledge that all whites (as well as everyone else within white supremacist culture) have learned to overvalue “whiteness” even as they simultaneously learn to devalue blackness.”",
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                        "text": "All too often we think of community in terms of being with folks like ourselves: the same class, same race, same ethnicity, same social standing and the like..I think we need to be wary: we need to work against the danger of evoking something that we don’t challenge ourselves to actually practice.",
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                        "text": "I believe that this nation can only heal from the wounds of racism if we all begin to love blackness. And by that I don't mean that we love only that which is best within us, but that we're also able to love that which is faltering, which is wounded, which is contradictory, incomplete.",
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                        "text": "The notion that black folks have nothing to learn from scholarship that may reflect racial or racist biases is dangerous. It promotes closed-mindedness and a narrow understanding of knowledge to hold that \"race\" is such an overwhelming concept that it negates the validity of any insights contained in a work that may have some racist or sexist aspects.",
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                        "text": "..the struggle to end sexist oppression that focuses on destroying the cultural basis for such domination strengthens other liberation struggles. Individuals who fight for the eradication of sexism without struggles to end racism or classism undermine their own efforts. Individuals who fight for the eradication of racism or classism while supporting sexist oppression are helping to maintain the cultural basis of all forms of group oppression.",
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                        "text": "Another response to racism has been the establishment of unlearning racism workshops, which are often led by white women. These workshops are important, yet they tend to focus primarily on cathartic individual psychological personal prejudice without stressing the need for corresponding change in political commitment and action. A woman who attends an unlearning racism workshop and learns to acknowledge that she is racist is no less a threat than one who does not. Acknowledgment of racism is significant when it leads to transformation.",
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                        "text": "…“white supremacy” is a much more useful term for understanding the complicity of people of color in upholding and maintaining racial hierarchies that do not involve force (i.e slavery, apartheid) than the term “internalized racism”- a term most often used to suggest that black people have absorbed negative feelings and attitudes about blackness. The term “white supremacy” enables us to recognize not only that black people are socialized to embody the values and attitudes of white supremacy, but we can exercise “white supremacist control” over other black people.",
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                        "text": "“A shift in class values occurs in black life when integration comes and with it the idea that money is the primary marker of individual success, not how one acquires money. Adopting that worldview changed the dynamics of work in black communities. Black men who could show they had money (no matter how they acquired it) could be among the powerful. It was this thinking that allowed hustlers in black communities to be seen as just as hardworking as their Wall Street counterparts.”",
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                        "text": "Patriarchy, like any system of domination (for example, racism), relies on socializing everyone to believe that in all human relations there is an inferior and a superior party, one person is strong, the other weak, and that it is therefore natural for the powerful to rule over the powerless. To those who support patriarchal thinking, maintaining power and control is acceptable by whatever means.",
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                        "text": "“Even in the face of powerful structures of domination, it remains possible for each of us, especially those of us who are members of oppressed and/or exploited groups as well as those radical visionaries who may have race, class, and sex privilege, to define and determine alternative standards, to decide on the nature and extent of compromise.”",
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                        "text": "I think the invitation offered the non-black reader is to join us in this expression of our familiarity and via that joining, come to understand that when black people come together to celebrate and rejoice in black critical thinking, we do so not to exclude or to separate, but to participate more fully in world community. However, we must first be able to dialogue with one another, to give one another subject-to-subject recognition that is an act of resistance that is part of the decolonizing, anti-racist process.",
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                        "@type": "Quotation",
                        "text": "“Within neo-colonial white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, the black male body continues to be perceived as an embodiment of bestial, violent, penis-as-weapon hypermasculine assertion. Psychohistories of white racism have always called attention to the tension between the construction of black male body as danger and the underlying eroticization that always then imagines that body as a location for transgressive pleasure. It has taken contemporary commodification of blackness to teach the world that this perceived threat, whether real or symbolic, can be diffused by a process of fetishization that renders the black masculine ‘menace’ feminine through a process of patriarchal objectification.”",
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                        "text": "“Often black people, especially non-gay folk, become enraged when they hear a white person who is gay suggest homosexuality is synonymous with the suffering people experience as a consequence of racial exploitation and oppression. The need to make gay experience and black experience of oppression synonymous seems to be one that surfaces much more in the minds of white people. Too often it is a way of minimizing or diminishing the particular problems people of color face in a white supremacist society, especially the problems ones encounter because they do not have white skin. Many of us have been in discussions where a non-white person – a black person – struggles to explain to white folks that while we can acknowledge that gay people of all colors are harassed and suffer exploitation and domination, we also recognize that there is a significant difference that arises because of the visibility of dark skin. Often homophobic attacks on gay people of all occur in situations where knowledge of sexual preference is established – outside of gay bars, for example. While it in no way lessens the severity of such suffering for gay people, or the fear that it causes, it does mean that in a given situation the apparatus of protection and survival may be simply not identifying as gay. In contrast, most people of color have no choice. No one can hide, change or mask dark skin color. White people, gay and straight, could show greater understanding of the impact of racial oppression on people of color by not attempting to make these oppressions synonymous, but rather by showing the ways they are linked and yet differ. Concurrently, the attempt by white people to make synonymous experience of homophobic aggression with racial oppression deflects attention away from the particular dual dilemma that non-white gay people face, as individuals who confront both racism and homophobia.”",
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                        "text": "“Concurrently, the growing class power and public voice of conservative and liberal well-to-do black folks easily obscures the class cruelty these individuals enact both in the way they talk about underprivileged blacks and the way they represent them. The existence of that class cruelty and its fascist dimensions have been somewhat highlighted by the efforts of privileged-class blacks to censor the voices of black youth, particularly gangsta rappers who are opposing bourgeois class values by extolling the values of street culture and street vernacular. Significantly, the attack on urban underclass black youth culture and its gangster dimensions (glamorization of crime, etc.) is usually presented via a critique of sexism. Since most privileged-class blacks have shown no interest in advancing feminist politics, the only organized effort to end sexism and sexist oppression, this attack on sexism seems merely gratuitous, a smoke screen that deflects away from the fact that what really disturbs bourgeois folks is the support of rebellion, unruly behavior, and disrespect for their class values. In reality, they and their white counterparts fear the power these young folks have to change the minds and life choices of youth from privileged classes. If only underclass black folks were listening to gangsta rap, there would be no public effort to silence and censor this music. The fear is that it will generate class rebellion.”",
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                        "text": "“But artists aren’t the only marginalized folks controlling real estate. Think about the colonizing role that wealthy white gay men have played in communities of color; they’re often the first group to gentrify poor and working-class neighborhoods. Harlem is a good example. Gays have moved in and driven up rents, as have renegade young white students, who want to be cool and hip. This is colonization, post-colonial-style. After all, the people who are “sent back” to recover the territory are always those who don’t mind associating with the colored people! And it’s a double bind, because some of these people could be allies. Some gay white men are proactive about racism, even while being entrepreneurial. But in the end, they take spaces, redo them, sell them for a certain amount of money, while the people who have been there are displaced. And in some cases, the people of color who are there are perceived as enemies by white newcomers.”",
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                        "text": "“In the early years of contemporary feminist movement, solidarity between women was often equated with the formation of \"safe\" spaces where groups of presumably like-minded women could come together, sharing ideas and experiences without fear of silencing or rigorous challenges. Groups sometimes disintegrated when the speaking of diverse opinion lead to contestation, confrontation, and out-and-out conflict. It was common for individual dissenting voices to be silenced by the collective demand for harmony. Those voices were at times punished by exclusion and ostracization. Before it became politically acceptable to discuss issues of race and racism within feminist circles, I was one of those \"undesirable\" voices. Always a devout advocate of feminist politics, I was, and am, also constantly interrogating and, if need be, harsh in my critique. I learned powerful lessons from hanging in there, continuing to engage in feminist movement even when that involvement was not welcomed. Significantly, I learned that any progressive political movement grows and matures only to the degree that it passionately welcomes and encourages, in theory and in practice, diversity of opinion, new ideas, critical exchange, and dissent.”",
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                        "text": "“The growing number of gated communities in our nation is but one example of the obsession with safety. With guards at the gate, individuals still have bars and elaborate internal security systems. Americans spend more than thirty billion dollars a year on security. When I have stayed with friends in these communities and inquired as to whether all the security is in response to an actual danger I am told “not really,\" that it is the fear of threat rather than a real threat that is the catalyst for an obsession with safety that borders on madness. Culturally we bear witness to this madness every day. We can all tell endless stories of how it makes itself known in everyday life. For example, an adult white male answers the door when a young Asian male rings the bell. We live in a culture where without responding to any gesture of aggression or hostility on the part of the stranger, who is simply lost and trying to find the correct address, the white male shoots him, believing he is protecting his life and his property. This is an everyday example of madness. The person who is really the threat here is the home owner who has been so well socialized by the thinking of white supremacy, of capitalism, of patriarchy that he can no longer respond rationally. White supremacy has taught him that all people of color are threats irrespective of their behavior. Capitalism has taught him that, at all costs, his property can and must be protected. Patriarchy has taught him that his masculinity has to be proved by the willingness to conquer fear through aggression; that it would be unmanly to ask questions before taking action. Mass media then brings us the news of this in a newspeak manner that sounds almost jocular and celebratory, as though no tragedy has happened, as though the sacrifice of a young life was necessary to uphold property values and white patriarchal honor. Viewers are encouraged feel sympathy for the white male home owner who made a mistake. The fact that this mistake led to the violent death of an innocent young man does not register; the narrative is worded in a manner that encourages viewers to identify with the one who made the mistake by doing what we are led to feel we might all do to “protect our property at all costs from any sense of perceived threat. \" This is what the worship of death looks like.”",
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                        "text": "Assumptions that racism is more oppressive to black men than black women, then and now ... based on acceptance of patriarchal notions of masculinity.",
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                        "text": "As we search as a nation for constructive ways to challenge racism and white supremacy, it is absolutely essential that progressive female voices gain a hearing.",
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                        "text": "We all may have prejudices, but we're not all part of a system that reinforces, reinvents and reaffirms itself every day of our lives, systemically.",
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                        "text": "In general, the mass media tell us that black people are not loving, that our lives are so fraught with violence and aggression that we have no time to love.",
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                        "text": "Like many white liberals, Ken sees the whiteness of his social life as more an accident of circumstance than a choice. He would welcome greater diversity in the neighbourhood. However, he does not consciously do enough work either in his social life or in the larger community to make that diversity possible.",
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                        "text": "“Whether or not any of us become racists is a choice we make. And we are called to choose again and again where we stand on the issue of racism at different moments in our life.”",
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