Petra Collins Quotes

If more stories are told about marginalized communities, subcultures, and minorities, the less marginalized they will be.

I grew up watching cinema in my country that wasn't telling stories about us, and we had to find a way to connect, and our references, our role models had nothing to do with us. And I'm so glad that it's changing.

Creating more characters that represent historically marginalized and historically disenfranchised people in television and film is certainly important.

I think the crux of this urgent and real conversation about representation and diversity in art-making and storytelling both behind and in front of the camera ultimately has to do with simply seeing more human perspectives.

When marginalized people gain voice and center their own experiences, things begin changing. And we see this in all kinds of grassroots movements.

There is still so much acceptance, representation and visibility needed for trans women of color and gender non-conforming people of color.

For me, I want to see diversity in storytelling sources because we live in a very diverse society, and the stories are for the whole society. That's really important. For me, as a female filmmaker, when I was out on the festival circuit on 2006, I felt like such a freaking anomaly - an oddity.

I don't know what issues concerning identity have helped contemporary fiction evolve to what it is now. All I know is that the range of voices that are being heard and published is a lot more diverse than when I was coming up.

I know one of the reasons I first started making Youtube videos was because no one looks like me.

My writing is often a way of 'bearing witness' for others who lack the education and the opportunity to tell their own stories, so I hope that my writing won't be affected too much by my personal life.

Just by the nature of making the choice to be true to who I am, I'm political. Sometimes that's all you need to do: Show up and be black, gay and Christian in America and actually say it out loud. And refuse to let anything or anybody take that away from you.

Readers are hungry to have their stories in the world, to see mirrors of themselves if the stories are about people like them, and to have windows if the stories are about people who have been historically absent in literature.

We must make sure #MeToo breaks the race, class, gender, and faith lines that make it so hard for marginalized people to be heard.

For me, I actively look for projects that showcase people of color.

I just want different narratives for people of color, especially women of color. I just want something that's different. I don't want us to be put in a box. I want it to be kind of a redefinition of who were are. If I can even achieve that in a tiny way, I'll be good. I'll be good.

I want to be in everything, but that's because I haven't seen someone who looks like me in everything. I want to play a superhero. I want to be the love interest. I want to write my own stuff and create my own projects. I want to be in French films.

I want women and girls of African descent and of color to be able to not have to keep searching for stories about themselves.

In Hollywood, there is one dominant voice. It is a white, male, straight gaze. When I talk about positive portrayals of black people and women, I'm saying complexity. I'm not saying goody-two-shoes, everything's okay. No. The positive view of me is to see me as I am: the 'good,' the 'bad,' the gray. That is a positive portrayal.

We know there needs to be diversity in storytellers telling their own stories. I think there's a beautiful forward movement in that direction with McQueen telling '12 Years A Slave,' with Coogler telling 'Fruitvale,' and with Daniels telling 'The Butler.'

Awards shows are being pushed to shed their genteel limousine liberalism and embrace the race-gender-sexual identity agenda in full.

The only thing that's serious to me about music is making sure marginalized people are included in the story.

I wrote 'Redefining Realness' because not enough of our stories are being told, and I believe we need stories that reflect us so we don't feel so isolated in our apparent 'difference.'

We, as communities that are marginalized, need to open up our minds and realize that we should be asking and advocating for more of everyone. Let's get more gay black men; let's get more trans women.

All the excuses that people in power used to make for not telling diverse stories or including diverse people, they've proven to be false.

I'm proud to carry that torch and be like, 'I'm gay! I'm black! Hang your dreams on me. Hang your hopes on me. I'll carry them to the best of my ability.'