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“Most people write me off when they see me.
They do not know my story.
They say I am just an African.
They judge me before they get to know me.
What they do not know is
The pride I have in the blood that runs through my veins;
The pride I have in my rich culture and the history of my people;
The pride I have in my strong family ties and the deep connection to my community;
The pride I have in the African music, African art, and African dance;
The pride I have in my name and the meaning behind it.
Just as my name has meaning, I too will live my life with meaning.
So you think I am nothing?
Don’t worry about what I am now,
For what I will be, I am gradually becoming.
I will raise my head high wherever I go
Because of my African pride,
And nobody will take that away from me.”
― idowu koyenikan, Wealth for all Africans: How Every African Can Live the Life of Their Dreams

“In the interests of separation, Black women have been taught to view each other as always suspect, heartless competitors for the scarce male, the all-important prize that could legitimize our existence. This dehumanizing denial of self is no less lethal than the dehumanization of racism to which it is so closely allied.”
― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches

“Mingo went toward his cabin, but turning at the door, he looked back at George. “Hear me, boy! You thinks you’s sump’n special wid massa, but nothinâ€� don’t make no difference to mad, scared white folks! Don’t you be no fool anâ€� slip off nowhere till this blow over, you hear me? I mean don’t!”
― Alex Haley, Roots: The Saga of an American Family

“I am not 'African American' —I am black American.”
― John McWhorter

“[I] would argue that native-born blacks are so vastly less "African" than actual Africans that calling ourselves 'African American' is not only illogical but almost disrespectful to African immigrants. Here are people who were born in Africa, speak African languages, eat African food, dance in African ways, remember African stories, and will spiritually always be a part of Africa -and we stand up and insist that we, too, are 'African' because Jesse Jackson said so?”
― John McWhorter

“Richard Wright and his Negro intellectual colleagues never realized the plain truth that no one in the United States understood the revolutionary potential of the Negro better than the Negro's white radical allies. They understood it instinctively, and revolutionary theory had little to do with it. What Wright could not see was that what the Negro's allies feared most of all was that this sleeping, dream-walking black giant might wake up and direct the revolution all by himself, relegating his white allies to a humiliating second-class status. The negro's allies were not about to tell the Negro anything that might place him on the path to greater power and independence in the revolutionary movement than they themselves had. The rules of the power game meant that unless the American Negro taught himself the profound implications of his own revolutionary significance in America, it would never be taught to him by anybody else. Unless the Negro intellectuals understood that in pursuit of this self-understanding, they would have to make their own rules, by and for themselves, nationalism would forever remain--as it was for Wright-- "a bewildering and vexing question.”
― Harold Cruse

“The practice of alchemizing suffering into meaningful art as well as social and political advancements has been one of African Americansâ€� greatest gifts to humanity. Many have followed their lead in this regard and that practice can make a lot of positive difference during this time of renewal and re-weaving.”
― Aberjhani, These Black and Blue Red Zone Days

“[Speaking with John McWhorter]
I take umbrage at the lionisation of lightweight, empty-suited, empty-headed motherfuckers like Ibram X. Kendi. Who couldn't carry my book bag. He hasn't read a fucking thing. If you ask him what Nietzsche said, he would have no idea. He's an unserious, superficial, empty-suited, lightweight - he's not our equal, not even close.”
― Glenn C. Loury

“In America, the materio-economic conditions relate to a societal, multi-group existence in a way never before know in world history. American Negro nationalism can never create its own values, find its revolutionary significance, define its political and economic goals, until Negro intellectuals take up the cudgels against the cultural imperialism practiced in all of its manifold ramifications on the Negro within American culture. But this kind of revolution would have to be predicated on the recognition that the cultural and artistic originality of the American nation is founded, historically, on the ingredients of a black aesthetic and artistic base.”
― Harold Cruse, The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual: A Historical Analysis of the Failure of Black Leadership

“While stationed in Fort Jackson, I experienced racial prejudice for the first time and came to the understanding that humans are not born with prejudice, but learn prejudice. Back home in South Dakota, I only knew one black American. The Scandinavians in my community treated him just like any other Swede; my family considered him a friend. My parents taught me, and I believed that all men are equal because God created all men in His image.

One day during a week end furlough, I boarded a crowded city bus. As I walked down the aisle, I looked for an open seat. Looking towards the rear of the bus, I noticed three huge, young black men sitting on a bench in the back. I decided to squeeze onto the bench with them. As I sat down, a woman said in a very loud voice, "What is that white soldier doing in our part of the bus?"

Neither my life experiences nor my education prepared me for what I experienced walking the streets of Fort Jackson. I saw water fountains for whites only, barbershops for blacks only, and separation for most aspects of Southern living. I discovered that the feelings of prejudice ran deeply amongst many of the people that we encountered. In fact, the blacks even trained separately from the whites during our military preparation, even though we all worked towards defending the United States of America.”
― Omanson, Oliver, Prisoner of War Number 21860: The World War II Memoirs of Oliver Omanson

“The blues is relevant today because when we look down through the corridors of time, the black American interpretation of tragicomic hope in the face of dehumanizing hate and oppression will be seen as the only kind of hope that has any kind of maturity in a world of overwhelming barbarity and bestiality. That barbarity is found not just in the form of terrorism but in the form of the emptiness of our lives - in terms of the wasted human potential that we see around the world. In this sense, the blues is a great democratic contribution of black people to world history.”
― Cornel West, Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against Imperialism

“If this society ascribes roles to Black men which they are not allowed to fulfill, is it Black women who must bend and alter our lives to compensate, or is it society that needs changing?”
― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches

“The penalty of death awaited me if I made a false move and I wondered if it was worth-while to make any move at all. The things that influenced my conduct as a Negro did not have to happen to me directly; I needed but to hear of them to feel their full effects in the deepest layers of my consciousness. Indeed, the white brutality that I had not seen was a more effective control of my behavior than that which I knew. The actual experience would have let me see the realistic outlines of what was really happening, but as long as it remained something terrible and yet remote, something whose horror and blood might descend upon me at any moment, I was compelled to give my entire imagination over to it, an act which blocked the springs of thought and feeling in me, creating a sense of distance between me and the wold in which I lived.”
― Richard Wright, Black Boy

“A national act of procrastination does not eliminate the debt.”
― William A. Darity Jr.

“I know there is a spirit among the slaves which would not much longer brook their degradation and their bondage. There are many Madison Washingtons and Nathaniel Turners in the South, who would assert their rights to liberty if you would take your feet from their necks and your sympathy and aid from their oppressors. (The Slaves Right to Revolt: An Address Delivered In Boston, Massachusetts, on 30 May 1848, Liberator June 9 1848)”
― Frederick Douglass, The Frederick Douglass Papers, Series 1, Vol. 3: Speeches, Debates, and Interviews, 1855-1863

“Vagrancy laws and other laws defining activities such as "mischief" and "insulting gestures" as crimes were enforced vigorously against blacks. The aggressive enforcement of these criminal offenses opened up an enormous market for convict leasing.”
― Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

“You have probably seen the order from Washington which cuts down the pay for colored troops from $13 to $10. Of course if this affects Massachusetts regiments, it will be a great piece of injustice to them, as they were enlisted on the express understanding that they were to be on precisely the same footing as all other Massachusetts troops. (excerpt from letter to MA Gov. John A. Andrew from Col. Robert G. Shaw, 2 July 1863)”
― Luis Fenollosa Emilio, History of the Fifty-Fourth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, 1863-1865

“It was more comforting to believe that a white powder was the cause of black anger, and that getting rid of the white powder would render black Americans docile and on their knees once again.”
― Johann Hari, Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs

“The Trump administration's willingness to put in place strong measures to curb illegal immigration despite the media and political backlash actually helps black Americans.”
― Horace Cooper, How Trump Is Making Black America Great Again: The Untold Story of Black Advancement in the Era of Trump

“The Democratic Party leadership has gone out of its way to develop programs (sanctuary cities. DACA, and the like) to attract Latino votes, literally at the expense of opportunities for African Americans.”
― Horace Cooper, How Trump Is Making Black America Great Again: The Untold Story of Black Advancement in the Era of Trump

“Reducing illegal immigration helps to prevent long-term multigenerational poverty among African Americans.”
― Horace Cooper, How Trump Is Making Black America Great Again: The Untold Story of Black Advancement in the Era of Trump

“A human wants only one thing: to be seen and received. But a woman is seen only when she is sexualized. A Black person is seen only when they fit a role. And a homeless person is not seen at all.”
― Sondra Charbadze

“Never since the days of the Spartan Helots has history recorded such brutality as has been ever since the war and as is now being perpetrated upon the Negro in the South. How easy for us to go to Russia and drop a tear of sympathy over the persecuted Jew. But a step across Mason's and Dixon's line will bring us upon a scene of horrors before which those of Russia, bad as they are, pale into insignificance! No irresponsible, blood-thirsty mobs prowl over Russian territory, lashing and lynching its citizens.”
― Lucy Parsons

“I shuddered to think that while we wanted that flag dragged into the mud and sullied beyond repair, we also wanted it pristine, its white stripes, summer cloud white. Watching it wave in the breeze of a distance made us nearly choke with emotion. It lifted us up with its promise and broke our hearts with its denial.”
― Maya Angelou, All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes