Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Quotes

We've come a long way from the days where there was state-enforced segregation. But we still have a way to go.

However, while we should certainly celebrate the demise of overt official racism, we must also critically examine where we are at this historical moment, recognize the many challenges ahead and reaffirm our commitment to making Brown v. Board a reality.

It's hard to say when or if we will actually arrive at that place called 'post-racial', or, better yet, post-racism.

If white America is ready to extend complete democratic rights to colored people, there will be no race, no racial tension and no racial prejudice on either side, but we can be sure that any movement 'back to normalcy' in race relations will be bitterly resisted by colored people. It is now up to white America to make its choice...

What I remember about race relations in the 1990s is that you showed your awareness by saying you didn't see race, that you were colour-blind.

I was born in the 1960s. I came up in the 1970s. I know how race relations were. The thing is, I want to advance the ball and never return to those days again. I want to keep the topic going. I'm going to discuss it. And we're going to make America better. It's my job as a citizen, and I demand it.

I know that so many of us hoped that, by electing our first black president, we had turned the page on this chapter in our history. But, despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America's long struggle with race is far from finished.

Racial problems can't be easily reconciled with a pat account about racism and discrimination that lets us sort of relax into saying when we finally get this right, when we get rid of racism, when we reach the post-racial society, everything is going to be okay. Well, no, because along the way here, as we've not yet been in this racial nirvana, facts on the ground have been created.

People are very comfortable when race relations get looked at retrospectively. Slavery, the civil rights movement, etc.

The country has come a long way in race relations, but the pendulum swings so far back. Everyone wants to be so sensitive.

Few whites are ready to actively promote civil rights for blacks.

Certainly we can end racism with love. We can demand that the federal government change its emphasis on racial distinction.

Accordingly, one race is neither superior nor inferior to another.

Race in America is not a problem you can go over, or around or under. You've got to go through it.

By the 1960s, many of us believed that the Civil Rights Movement could eliminate racism in America during our lifetime. But despite significant progress, racism remains.

The issue of race could benefit from a period of benign neglect.

The relation between the white and colored people of this country is the great, paramount, imperative, and all-commanding question for this age and nation to solve

In approaching this problem [school desegregation], we cannot turn the clock back...

I am not sure the issue of race in America will ever be completely solved.

We need to have a more thoughtful, two-sided conversation about racial issues in this country.

I'll stop talking about race when people stop being racist.

The unified message in this fight against systemic racism and racial inequality is something that our entire Association is united to fight against.

Barack Obama being President of the United States doesn't mean racism has disappeared. It's all a process, and we have to be aware that the work never ends.

I think "post-racial" is a dangerous trap. You can fall into complacency and give your complicity a much more dangerous character.

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.