Ishmael Reed Quotes

I'm not gonna ruin my reputation with the blacks no more.

Historically it has been a touchy subject, especially in the south where I am from, people don't really talk about it. If they do talk about it, it is often talked about negatively. Nowadays in light of the Black Lives Matter movement I think people should pay attention to these lives also. I think the Black community will really embrace the film [Moonlight]. It is about us. It is real.

I would say except when I have been attacked the black community has seldom seen fit to even mention the gay aspect. And since when I have been attacked I have usually been defended by the black community, I would say that the black newspapers have played it very straight. If I was attacked they simply published that I was attacked, if I was defended they simply said I had been defended. But I don't think they have taken any effort at maligning me or maligning gays or making any effort to give to people anything that wasn't news.

We ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get in back, when brown can stick around... when yellow will be mellow... when the red man can get ahead, man; and when white will embrace what is right.

Within the lesbian community I am Black, and within the Black community I am a lesbian. Any attack against Black people is a lesbian and gay issue, because I and thousands of other Black women are part of the lesbian community. Any attack against lesbians and gays is a Black issue, because thousands of lesbians and gay men are Black. There is no hierarchy of oppression.

I believe in human beings, and that all human beings should be respected as such, regardless of their color.

Gay people are born into, and belong to, every society in the world. They are all ages, all races, all faiths. They are doctors and teachers, farmers and bankers, soldiers and athletes. And whether we know it or whether we acknowledge it, they are our family, our friends, and our neighbors. Being gay is not a Western invention. It is a human reality.

I really respond to diversity, a broader landscape, with actors of different ages and races and backgrounds.

I find myself frequently introducing myself to someone, saying that, you know, I've grown up black and biracial in the United States.

Diversity doesn't mean black and white only.

And my point was one I think that you'd agree with, which is there's no room in America for a black racist, a Latino racist, or a white racist, or an Asian racist, or a Native American racist. Now, we're either color blind or we're not color blind.

African-Americans are not a monolithic group. So, we tend to talk about the black community, the black culture, the African-American television viewing audience, but there are just as many facets of us as there are other cultures.

We call each other colored people, black people, but not negro…

The average white person now feels that anti-white bias is a bigger problem than other forms of racial discrimination.

One of the things that Americans, as a multiracial society, feel is a tremendous sensitivity to racial comments of all kinds.

You can't avoid the conversation of diversity and remembering that diversity goes beyond race and culture. It goes into gender and sexual orientation and all sorts of things.

I have no bigger goal than to eradicate racism, to grant Americans who have a different color of skin the right to disagree against the Left's style of orthodoxy.

My 'Vogue' is about being inclusive; it's about diversity. Showing different women, different body shapes, different races, class. To be tackling gender.

I don't get this shitty attitude that only gays should care about gay issues and only women should care about women's issues.

Pride became this dogma which meant you couldn't criticize anything gay - if you were the least bit critical of gay culture or people or any gay person doing any gay thing, that was an insufficient display of pride. You were suffering from internalized homophobia. As opposed to external homophobia.

They always try to make it like jocks discriminate against gay people. I've been a big proponent of gay marriage for a long time, because as a black person, I can't be in for any form of discrimination at all.

Discrimination at any level sends a harmful message to youth, gay or straight alike, and that discrimination has no place in Scouting.

The white, the Hispanic, the black, the Arab, the Jew, the woman, the Native American, the small farmer, the businessperson, the environmentalist, the peace activist, the young, the old, the lesbian, the gay and the disabled make up the American quilt.

I oftentimes receive the question, "What do you think is the most important social issue to focus on?" Or, "What's the most important component of identity? Is it gay rights or race or feminism?" And I'm like, "Well, they're all intertwined. It's all one conversation at the end of the day. You can't just pick one." I mean, people experience all kinds of prejudice because of all different parts of themselves. And that doesn't make one part more important than the other.

It's okay in this country to be sexist. It's certainly not okay to be racist.