In America one drop of black ancestry makes you black. In Brazil, it's almost as if one drop of white ancestry makes you white.

In America there is institutional racism that we all inherit and participate in, like breathing the air in this room - and we have to become sensitive to it.

The story of the African-American people is the story of the settlement and growth of America itself, a universal tale that all people should experience.

The first step toward tolerance is respect and the first step toward respect is knowledge.

The thing about black history is that the truth is so much more complex than anything you could make up.

In Ethiopia, the black people became Christians 1700 years ago, hundreds of years before Northern Europe turned to Christianity... And here, most of the saints are black.

We can revolutionize the attitude of inner city brown and black kids to learning. We need a civil rights movement within the African-American community.

I want to be a figure for prison reform. I think that the criminal justice system is rotten.

Censorship is to art as lynching is to justice.

Wherever you go in the history of America, there have been Black people making contributions, but their contributions have been obscured, lost, buried.

Well, certainly one of the ironies of the success of affirmative action is that the middle class within the black community no longer lives within 'black community' by and large.

Since good days don’t always last, make sure that you’ve made the best of those days while you still have them.

I'm alive now, but I don't know if I will be tomorrow. The state of being alive is not guaranteed, but should I let that stop me from living?

The generation now coming out of Western schools is unable to distinguish good from bad. Even those words are unacceptable. This results in impaired thinking ability.

I lived in Detroit until I was six. My older sister was living with us, and she listened to the Ohio Players and Stevie Wonder, so I grew up listening to stuff like that.

Because there is no man who can be true and just judge of himself, so much will self-love deceive him.

The command of custome is great.

I'll get kicked around for saying it, but men and women are just different. They're not equal. The same way that you and I are not equal.

How can I tell them that I love them if I'm no longer there?

No matter how dry and tame and nice we live, we will die. We will also suffer along the way. Living wild is it's own reward.

I'm hooked on gin and tonics like your mama's Hooked on Phonics.