Quotes About Race

I lived in Brooklyn from 2007 to 2012 but for the last few years have resided in Austin, Texas, where my world - especially the world of downtown - is predominantly white.

My father 'Pappy' who is black, is from Galveston and Fort Worth, Texas. My mother, who is white, is from San Diego.

The system in which I came up in was that every territory had to have a black, a white... if you went to Texas you had to have somebody that was a cowboy or one that was from Mexico. There wasn't that many Afro Americans in the business at the time so I moved around a lot. But every time I moved around, I made money.

This is what I have learned: Any white person living in the United States will develop opinions about race simply by swimming in the water of our culture. But mainstream sources - schools, textbooks, media - don't provide us with the multiple perspectives we need.

For 'Around the World in 80 Plates' we got to travel all over, having what was like a cross between a culinary competition and races. And in each country we had a chef Ambassador. We went to London, Barcelona, Bologna, Hong Kong, Thailand, Morocco... It was amazing.

The coaching life is like a relay race and I'm thankful for my turn and am confident as I pass the baton.

I'm thankful to be a mixed racial person in skateboarding. I'm part Japanese too, so when I go over to Japan everyone loves me there, when I go somewhere where there are a lot of Black people they'll love me there too.

Obama, he wouldn't have been in office without what happened to me and a lot of black people before me. He would never have been in that situation, no doubt in my mind. He would get there eventually, but it would have been a lot longer. So I am glad for what I went through. It opened the doors for a lot of people.

Obviously, there's more to aesthetic appearance than just race, but that is going to be the first thing that someone notices when they look at a picture.

I was bused to a school in Gerritsen Beach in Brooklyn in 1972. I was one of the first black kids in the history of the school.

I probably saved more black lives as mayor of New York City than any mayor in the history of this city. And I did it by having to use police officers in black areas where there was an astounding amount of crime. If that crime was in white areas, police officers would be in white areas.

The history of slavery in this country has affected not only how black people see themselves, but how white people see black people as well, and the roles they're meant to play... I'm aware of it, as a person of color.

I think it's important to understand the history of the Republican Party. It was founded in 1854 because of the moral collapse of the Whig Party, specifically around the question of race and the expansion of slavery into the western territories.

I rebel at the notion that I can't be part of other groups, that I can't construct identities through elective affinity, that race must be the most important thing about me. Is that what I want on my gravestone: Here lies an African American?

In the 1970s people were afraid to call me black because they thought it was an insult. They would say 'coloured.' Now it has gone full circle. It's not an issue. The intention is the most important thing.

Competition is one of the most important drivers of innovation because you have to stay in the race. You have to think of something new, and if you don't, well, of course you should leave the market.

I've said numerous times the hardest job in America isn't being a professional athlete. It's not being a matador or having some job that puts your life at risk. The hardest job in America is being black, because it's the one thing you can't outrun.

The one thing that always bothered me when I played in the NBA was I really got irritated when they put a white guy on me.

As important as the presidency is, that's not the only thing to take a look at in determining the racial health of the United States.

I have two little black boys. And a film like 'Do the Right Thing' can help illuminate the times for them with great storytelling.

It is mind-blowing to pause and think that a film as forward-facing and potent as 'Do the Right Thing' was released the same year as 'Driving Ms. Daisy.'

The originating sin of America is slavery, for which reparations should be paid and will never be paid; as a result, mini-reparations are paid daily, and the NBA remains, for me, reparations theater.

The man who raised me is black. Culturally, he made me who I am. He was a theatre director, so he also guided me artistically.

I always describe race as the final taboo in American theatre. There's a real reluctance to have that conversation in an open, honest way on the stage.