Quotes About Inclusion

Importing foreign labor has always been the American way, beginning with 4 million slaves from Africa. Later came the Jews and Poles, the Hungarians, Italians and Irish, the Chinese and Japanese - everything you learned in sixth grade social studies about the great American melting pot.

When I came back to Canada after my graduate studies, I founded the first organization in Canada focused on political under-representation and trying to change that, and to support a whole new generation of public policy leaders from marginalized groups.

I was the first black director on 'Dallas.' I drove my car into the studio lot and the guard asked me who I was delivering to.

If a studio sees that a female can bring in audiences, then they're going to make movies with that person.

We're told that independent film lovers... folks that are used to watching art house films, won't come out and see a film with black people in it - I've been told that in rooms, big rooms, studio rooms, and I know that's not true.

I don't understand why there aren't more powerful female directors. I don't have the answers, but I hope that things may start to shift and that studios will employ more women to handle strong and interesting material.

The studios aren't lining up to make films about black protagonists, black people being autonomous and independent.

I'd like to see more female heads of studios because what's also being crucially lost is the female perspective: 50% of the population are not having their stories told.

What I get from my study of the Bible is that we're all in Christ, that we're all the same in God's eyes.

Growing up, I thought I was white. It didn't occur to me I was Asian-American until I was studying abroad in Denmark and there was a little bit of prejudice.

As a black woman I always felt growing up I had to do above and beyond stuff to be noticed, to feel like I could hang with everybody else.

We aren't handicapped in any way except by what other people think. Focus on people's abilities. I can't be on 'American Idol,' but there's all kinds of stuff I can do.

How can people in other countries who are trying to grasp our plan of democracy avoid stumbling over our logic when we deny the first steps in democracy to our women?

If a kid is reading a book about someone who looks like them but doesn't talk like them, we stunt their growth by dissing them.

My parents moved around Stockton and Lodi. I had a lot of anxiety about jumping into another classroom. They were always putting me in special ed. But I was smart; I wasn't like these kids in the special-ed classes. But it would make me feel a little bit stupid.

I remember once being told by a casting person, years ago, that I shouldn't pursue a career in the business because of the color of my skin. The fact that I remember it today means it stuck with me. I thought that was really stupid advice and advice nobody should ever give someone.

I was always playing very stupid people, or the fat mate of the main girl.

Repeating third grade at a new school, after having been asked to leave my old one for hitting kids who made fun of my perceived stupidity, I was placed in the 'dummy class.'

I don't think I ever felt an outsider when I had a stutter.

The object of the Gay Games is not competition, but to promote gay and lesbian life styles.

It's great to see Latino music coming to the mainstream, but at the same time, there are also a lot more styles to explore: African music, Indian music, Chinese music.

Codes and signals are as important as explicit messages, and the two are linked. The bore pressing someone to tell them 'where they're really from' will see themselves as different to the aggressive stranger barking at someone to 'get back to their own country,' but the subconscious, if not explicit, message is the same.

When the scary subject of race is finally broached, kids want to talk and talk. It's very satisfying.

I was raised in Holland, where race and homosexuality are not a subject matter but rather a part of life.