Quotes About Race

My parents never let the color of our skin be an excuse for why we did not succeed.

Being a black person in America is exhausting.

I'm in the middle of an existential crisis in how I approach comedy about these big issues. I sometimes find, when I get drawn on the subject of race, it's too close to home for me and I can't articulate what I'm trying to get across.

Competition exists everywhere.

I feel like I'm put in a position where I have to engage with what people bring to my work, which is an expectation for me to talk about race because it's not normal for a black writer to be writing in the theatre.

I had no expectations of white people at all.

As a driver, you want to race every lap possible, especially when you've got a good car.

We also thought of ourselves in racial and largely ethnic terms.

My sons are black, and my daughter is Latina.

At various points in my own life, I have been laughed at scathingly for calling myself black.

The only way I get a leading role in a studio picture is if Ryan Gosling can't play it, which is clearly the case with 'Selma.' If this was a non-colour-specific character, it wouldn't be me. It just wouldn't.

LeBron had never interacted with white people before St. Vincent.

You shouldn't have to accept being seen as lesser or discriminated against because of your skin.

I used to get letters saying, 'I didn't know black children and white children were the same.'

Being under the lights makes any race track that much better.

If you got a hit and you're white, there are no limits to what you can do.

I don't think there's a whole lot of class literature at all. I think most of that has become racially based, and people don't think of it as being class literature.

We couldn't get the car back until well after the end of the race and we had very little time for repairs.

I grew up playing for Manhasset High on Long Island on a team with six black guys.

Today in America we are no more 'post-racial' than we are 'post-partisan.' We have a long way to go.

The team came together. We're looking forward to the next race.

I've been an NBA player, and a black man, for a long time, and I know how to take a loss.

I am black in a predominantly white industry, and I have been luckier than most.

I only became an actor to get your attention, to challenge the archetype of an African American male; I can't be anything else in this lifetime than an African American man.