Frankie Boyle Quotes

The thing is that it's always a constant reminder of how violent this country has been, always has been, you know. I'm still frustrated with these conversations: [Barack] Obama is black so that means this, that things are better, or it means that you voted for him because he's black.

We have to undo the millions of little white lies that America told itself and the world about the American Black man.

The core of the culture is racism and how black men are viewed. They've always been demonized and seen as threats in our culture. Another holdover from slavery. We've got to deal with that core root of racism and demonization of the upbringing of black men. Black women are not exempt by any means.

It’s no disgrace to be black, but it’s often very inconvenient.

I've witnessed racism all my life. And of course there's racism and discrimination in Hollywood. You go for a part and they say, 'Oh, we really liked her, she's amazing, but we wanted to go with something more traditional'. As if I'm not a traditional American!

There are many cases and layers of racist behavior in the US - from police treatment to the issues of education and job opportunities. In America, however, such cases are being discussed publically.

We have not ended racial caste in America, we have merely redesigned it.

I think the sad fact is, there's a long history in this country at looking at African-American as subhuman. And I think that's reflected in the fact that, when we have problems that really are problems of employment, that are really problems of mental health, that are really problems of drugs, our answer is the police.

Why are they picking on boxing? It's because the black men are so superior in boxing that they want to stop it. Well, the black man's so hungry he's got to fight.

I think this mythology - that we're all beyond race, of course our police officers aren't racist, of course our politicians don't mean any harm to people of color - this idea that we're beyond all that (so it must be something else) makes it difficult for young people as well as the grown-ups to be able to see clearly and honestly the truth of what's going on. It makes it difficult to see that the backlash against the Civil Rights Movement manifested itself in the form of mass incarceration, in the form of defunding and devaluing schools serving kids of color and all the rest.

I think that one of the hardest things in the world to be is a black male. I mean everyone hates your guts. White men are afraid of you. White women are afraid of you. The cops hate you. The government wants you dead. Your own people want to shoot you for what you got. You just can't get over it. And even if you are able to get over it you're forced to do it on the white guy's terms.

I never have a problem with being black. I have a problem with the easy association of what that means to some people.

When people like me, they like me "in spite of my color." When they dislike me; they point out that it isn't because of my color. Either way, I am locked in to the infernal circle.

Black people in America have to, for their own protection, develop a defense mechanism, and I just grew terribly tired of it. When you sustain that kind of affront, and sustain it and sustain it and sustain it, something happens to you. You try to steer a course in American society that's not self-destructive. But America is a country that inflicts injury. It does not like to see anything that comes in response, and accuses one of anger as if it were an unnatural response. For anyone who is not white in America, the affronts are virtually across the board.

... all Americans are the prisoners of racial prejudice.

Racism is so extreme and so pervasive in our American society that no black individual lives in an atmosphere of freedom.

I would think black people think everything is about race. They are the ones who are on the outside of the game. They are the ones who face it every day.

The patterns have become unmistakable and undeniable. ... We have to come to terms with some hard truths about race and justice in America.

I think that one of the positions we have taken around the question of race, is that we already know. We know. We know. We know. And so we don't need to look at it again. And yet everybody is still upset. Everybody is still being driven by their outrageous imagination to the point of killing people because they feel that a black man in front of them is a demon, or the Incredible Hulk.

White liberals are the most racist people there are, because they put blacks in a box and insist that they think one way - and if they don't, they attack them as illegitimate, all the while denying that their policies destroy blacks.

But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America - to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.

Telling me that I’m obsessed with talking about racism in America is like telling me I’m obsessed with swimming when I’m drowning.

The problem is that America is still so racist - I guess it's hard to find another word for it ­ - that they still, the press in general and many people, perceive only white women as feminists. They think black women are black.

It's too easy to say this or that is "race," and that has been a vehicle for an incredible amount of wrong in the world.

The issue, perhaps, boils down to one of how perceptions or misperceptions of racial difference impact various 'individuals', or groups of 'individuals', experience of freedom in America. Some would argue that it goes beyond hampering their "pursuit of happiness" to outright obliterating it.