When they reached their ship, Ed gazed out at the bay. It was black. The sky was black, but the bay was even blacker. It was a slick, oily blackness that glowed and reflected the...

Communism forgets that life is individual. Capitalism forgets that life is social, and the kingdom of brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis....

During his hajj, Malcolm [Malcolm X] fell into a new Islam with the same blind faith that he had given to Elijah. Since he lived just a year after his hajj, Mecca became the neatly...

I want to yell so loud that Baby Girl can hear me that dirty ain’t a color, disease ain’t the Negro side a town. I want to stop that moment from coming – and it...

When I recall memories, it all seems like a film, not a reality.

Let’s make justice a process, not an afterthought

People who insist on dividing the world into ‘Us’ and ‘Them’ never contemplate that they may be someone else’s ‘Them’.

In this country American means white. Everybody else has to hyphenate.

Standing still is never an option so long as inequities remain embedded in the very fabric of the culture.

Looking out the window, Moist saw a small swarm of goblins leave the train and at first he thought, ha! Trust the buggers to run away, and then he mentally corrected himself: that was storybook...

Racism negates two aspects of man’s life: reason and choice, or mind and morality, replacing them with chemical predestination.

for both parties to take up recognition that racism exists.

Not long ago, having expressed some disagreements in print with an old comrade of long standing, I was sent a response that he had published in an obscure newspaper. This riposte referred to my opinions...

The Cold Within”Six humans trapped in happenstanceIn dark and bitter cold, Each one possessed a stick of wood, Or so the story’s told.The first woman held hers backFor of the faces around the fire,She noticed...

If you believe that I’m a cop killer, you believe David Bowie is an astronaut.

the Government is not liable under the Federal Tort Claims Act for injuries to servicemen where injuries arise out of or are in the course of activity incident to service” (U.S. Supreme Court 1950). Federal...

But here in my hometown, history was like a fine dust that settled out on everything. There was nothing to counter it. The culture had been hardened by a religion suspect of joy, yet fascinated...

Concerning non-violence: it is criminal to teach a man not to defend himself when he is the constant victim of brutal attacks.

May 20, ’95 – Mississippi calls. She says, “All my working life I have done things to help black people. I can drive into the black part of town where no white person would dare...

Everybody granted that if “Tom” were white and free it would be unquestionably right to punish him–it would be no loss to anybody; but to shut up a valuable slave for life–that was quite another...

While America will always, I think, feel foreign to me, New York City is my home. This is where I can construct my own identity freely and reject labels imposed on me.

I believe in the freedom of expression, for to speak up against any form of oppression is Justice.But I cannot speak the same way for all when motives are to be measured.We must also accept...

Any concept of one person being superior to another can lead to racism.

It is when you start to have the interest of people in your heart that when you start to make a change.

On my more difficult days, I’m not sure what’s more of a pain in my ass — being black or being a woman. I’m happy to be both of these things, but the world keeps...

Suspicion of Abuse gets to your toes before you see it in your face.

Slavery stands as an affront to human dignity.

Raising Black children — female and male — in the mouth of a racist, sexist, suicidal dragon is perilous and chancy. If they cannot love and resist at the same time, they will probably not...

There’s a strange uniformity in the vocabulary European soccer fans use to hate black people. The same primate insults get hurled. Although they’ve gotten better over time, the English and Italians developed the tradition of...

The other thing you can do is write a strong personal essay which lets admissions people inside your life, your heart, and your world….Anyway, it can be hard to figure out what to write about,...

His (Lincoln’s) patriotism was saved from idolatry by the overwhelming sense of the sovereignty of God.

I am first of all a white man, and only then a socialist.

Poor health was not just the result of random acts, bad luck, bad behavior or unfortunate genetics. Deliberate public policy decision about housing, education, parks and streets were the key drivers of racial differences in...

Eventually, some black thinkers believe, this “separation” may be the shortest route to an authentic communication at some future date when blacks and whites can enter into encounters in which they truly speak as equals...

Unwed white girls who became pregnant in the postwar years were considered psychologically disturbed but treatable, whereas their black counterparts were presumed to be biologically hypersexual and deviant. Historian Rickie Solinger demonstrates that in the...

I even felt a vicarious guilt, like a German meeting Jewish people in Poland who had never heard of the Holocaust, or that there were Jews in America, and trying to explain it to them....

The worlds within and without the Veil of Color are changing, and changing rapidly, but not at the same rate, not in the same way; and this must produce a peculiar wrenching of the soul,...

It’s the easiest thing in the world to be kind to someone, to show love, to forgive. You are born with this instinct – it should be your first reaction. NOT violence, anger and hatred!...

A coward’s gun is emptied when fear pulls the trigger, and hate is the ammunition of choice.

Although I have always rejected this fear of the other, and the racism that it inevitably fuels, I have learned from experience that it is a deeply rooted need in the human psyche. at the...

From other stories that have been handed down to me I know that my people, like many others in the slave states, went to church with their slaves, were baptized with them, and presumably expected...

Conquest occurred through violence, and over-expolitation and oppression necessitate continued violence, so the army is present. There would be no contradiction in that, if terror reigned everywhere in the world, but the colonizer enjoys, in...

Racism is taught in our society, it is not automatic. It is learned behavior toward persons with dissimilar physical characteristics.

Since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, historians have become both more accurate and more honest—fractionally more brave, one might say—about that ‘other’ cleansing of the regions and peoples that were ground to...

Degradation and exploitation is found from the air above to the soil below.Those unfortunates caught in between are all enslaved by masters who proudly proclaim this just happens to be the “natural” order of things.

Privilege is when you contribute to the oppression of others and then claim that you are the one being discriminated against.

The Internet has provided small communities for racism online, and people feel free to do it. Ultimately, there should be some consequence – if you promote your racism online then there should be a consequence.

Black is bountiful. White is witful. Together they are beautiful.

…The straitjackets of race prejudice and discrimination do not wear only southern labels. The subtle, psychological technique of the North has approached in its ugliness and victimization of the Negro the outright terror and open...

It was a roadblock, manned by an officer and several other soldiers. Sivaram and the trishaw driver were ordered out of the vehicle, and I was told to stay where I was. The soldiers held...