American culture Quote by James Baldwin

“Every white person in this country-and I do not care what he or she says-knows one thing. They may not know, as they put, "what I want",but they know they would not like to be black here. If they know that, then they know everything they need to know, and whatever else they say is a lie.” quote by James Baldwin — Download Open image

““Every white person in this country-and I do not care what he or she says-knows one thing. They may not know, as they put, "what I want",but they know they would not like to be black here. If they know that, then they know everything they need to know, and whatever else they say is a lie.””

James Baldwin

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 2.6 out of 5 (7 ratings)

American culture

More by James Baldwin

“In any case, white people, who had robbed black people of their liberty and who profited by this theft every hour that they lived,…

James Baldwin

Image

“The South is very beautiful but its beauty makes one sad because the lives that people live, and have lived here, are so ugly…

James Baldwin

Image

“All cultures have, furthermore, an economic, social, and political base, and no culture can continue to live if its political destiny is not in…

James Baldwin

Image

“I remembered that life in that room seemed to be occuring beneath the sea, time flowed past indiffrently above us, hours and days had…

James Baldwin

Image

“No. It would help if I were able to feel guilty.But the end of innocence is also the end of guilt”

James Baldwin

Image

“Perhaps now, though, he had hit bottom. One thing about the bottom, he told himself, you can't fall any further. He tried to take…

James Baldwin

Image

“What kind of friendship have you had? Or for that matter...what kind of love affairs?”

James Baldwin

Image

“For these are all our children, we will all profit by or pay for what they become.”

James Baldwin

Image

“Every society is really governed by hidden laws, by unspoken but profound assumptions on the part of the people, and ours is no exception.”

James Baldwin

Image

“In those days my mother was given to the exasperating and mysterious habit of having babies.”

James Baldwin

Image

“He was suggesting that all Negroes were held in a state of supreme tension between the difficult, dangerous relationship in which they stood to…

James Baldwin

Image

“In the beginning—and neither can this be overstated—a Negro just cannot believe that white people are treating him as they do; he does not…

James Baldwin

Image

Explore all 312 James Baldwin quotes

More American culture quotes

“Medical studies have shown that cursing reduces levels of stress and pain. Repressing your anger is not healthy. It's much better to verbalize it,…

Oliver Markus Malloy

Image

France has not only built a bureaucratic barrier against American culture, it has constructed a notorious intellectual case against it as well. The French…

Tyler Cowen

Image

“Every twenty minutes on the Appalachian Trail, Katz and I walked farther than the average American walks in a week. For 93 percent of…

Bill Bryson

Image

The Soviet Union is like the Cross without Christ, while American culture is like Christ without the Cross.

Fulton J. Sheen

Image

“information, in a stream-of-consciousness soliloquy that revealed the extent to which he had internalised the adversarial fragmentation of American culture and made it a…

Salman Rushdie

Image

[If] we can celebrate that in a way that celebrates our love for New England as well as our love for the Italian culture…

Mario Batali

Image

I think in American culture, we put value on economic success but tell people you don't have to be economically successful to be happy.

John Hodgman

Image

The most important thing about Jazz at Lincoln Center is the fact that it's the first time that perhaps the most important art form…

Rafael Vinoly

Image

And certainly in British culture, as I'm sure it's the same with American culture, we warm to cultures where people can make fun of…

Omid Djalili

Image

Canada could have enjoyed: English government, French culture, and American know-how. Instead it ended up with: English know-how, French government, and American culture.

Anonymous