Quotes About Prejudice

For the first 42 years of my life, I was the guy who wouldn't be caught dead doing yoga.

Originally, when I was introduced to yoga, I kept resisting. I kept saying that I wouldn't be caught dead doing yoga.

I was the guy from the Jersey Shore, Springsteen country. We don't do yoga there. And we made fun of anybody who did.

I've worked in the gay clubs in Moscow, and the big cities. They're much more tolerant. It's the small cities where you get the prejudice. Kind of like America. Here in New York City, or San Francisco, it's great. But, like, in Tennessee or down South, it gets harder. It's that situation. But it was really bad in Russia because of law enforcing.

When I first started out, being from the South and going to New York or Chicago, people kept telling me to get voice lessons and 'lose that stupid accent you got.' And I'm like, 'Well, where I come from, you have the stupid accent.'

I don't have to really be in the 60s. Every time I hail a cab in New York, and they pass me by and pick up the white person, then I get a dose of it. Or when they don't want to take you to Harlem. I grew up with that.

People don't talk about small-town racism in Illinois or upstate New York. They're like, 'It's the South.' And it is. It's there. But it's everywhere. But everywhere, there are also amazing people.

I find it funny how people from Boston and New York hate each other because of pro teams. But, like, everyone on the Red Sox is a random millionaire athlete from somewhere else.

If you write chick lit, and if you're a New Yorker, and if your book becomes the topic of pop-culture fascination, the paper might make dismissive and ignorant mention of your book. If you write romance, forget about it. You'll be lucky if they spell your name right on the bestseller list.

How could a New Yorker possibly take something called the Hollywood String Quartet seriously?

We live in a society that wants to label you with a color, sexuality, religion, or ethnicity. It divides us, but it also allows us to find pride in our identity.

I think you can make fun of anything except things people can't help. They can't help their race or their sex or their age, so you ridicule their pretension or their ego instead. You can ridicule ideas - ideas don't have feelings. You can ridicule an idea that someone holds without hurting them.

A guy friend and I went to California Pizza Kitchen, and a group of pretty girls came over to us and said, 'You guys are gay, right?'

If Adam Sandler does a bad movie, he doesn't bring down the whole white race. But if Tyler Perry does, it's like, 'See what you guys do?' and that type of thing.

There is definitely that thing here a little where people are like 'Oh that Broadway girl has come to Nashville' and I'm like 'Listen you guys, I was singing country before I even got a Broadway show. And I'm from Kentucky.'

I've had experiences where people say, 'I hated jazz before I heard you guys!' I'm like, 'You didn't hate jazz before you heard us; you hated the idea of jazz.'

In England we burnt redheads at the stake, because we thought they were witches. There are still young redheads in Britain getting ripped for having red hair. 'Oy, Ginger!'

We beg you to save young America from the blight of race prejudice. Do not bind the children within the narrow circles of your own lives.

The fact is, in the minds of many, Trayvon Martin received the appropriate punishment for a true crime: He was black, male and dared to walk outside. In life, young Trayvon was just a teenager; in death, he has been transformed into a scary, lurking, suspicious, prone-to-violence spook.

There are a lot of limitations and stigmas that are placed on young actors, specifically young black actors.

I thought I'd been condescended to as an Indian - that was nothing compared to the condescension for writing young adult literature.

I had never heard of 'young adult novels,' which I guess are about teenage gangs and the new boy in town or something.

I think so much of young adult literature sort of gets ghettoized - the title 'young adult' makes people immediately discount it. And just like with books that get written for adults, there is plenty of young adult literature that is bad. But there is also plenty of young adult literature that is brilliant.

Young adult author Richelle Mead holds the distinction to perhaps be the only author ever to have a book banned... before it was even written.