Bell Hooks Quotes

I think, as a white person, I do not want to speak for a black person.

[Civil right leaders]themselves in their pronouncements will tell you they need white allies, they need white help, they need white this.

As we search as a nation for constructive ways to challenge racism and white supremacy, it is absolutely essential that progressive female voices gain a hearing.

It is only through the opposition of ideas that we can learn to be self-critical, to work towards intellectual humility.

The antidote to white fragility is ongoing and lifelong and includes sustained engagement, humility, and education.

I'd ask people to keep in mind the idea that if you really understand something, it's even more important for you to consider the possibility of your wrongness. Even if it takes someone dumber than you to point that out.

If we could create the conditions that make racism difficult, or discourage it, then there would be less stress and less need for affirmative action programs. One of those conditions would be an economic policy that would create tight labor markets over long periods of time. Now does that mean that affirmative action is here only temporarily? I think the ultimate goal should be to remove it.

I think it's important for people like me to evaluate and reevaluate.

I doubt about myself. I think doubts are good in life. The people who don't have doubts I think only two things-arrogance or not intelligence.

I am disappointed that after all of the struggles that we have had in this country for such a long time, trying to get through and beyond racism and bigotry and discrimination - I think it is sad. It just tells us the kind of work that we have to do as - as America, as a nation.

When serious people of good faith disagree, they've got to go back into the narratives and come at it again. One of the problems in the church is that people are not willing to do that. People have arrived at a place where they think they have got the answer.

That is an extremely important role: how white brothers and sisters laterally spread knowledge, insight, and challenge in a way that white brothers and sisters will not hear it from a person like me, necessarily.

Katherine Johnson never complained, it just was what it was. She just said, "I just wanted to go to work and do my numbers." And she stopped right there. I think about that as a Black woman in Hollywood when I'm asked about diversity. I hate when people say diversity because the first thing you jump to is Black and white. When you talk about diversity, you're talking about women being hired in front of and behind the camera. You are talking about people with disabilities, the LGBTQ community...so I hate when people think about diversity.

Be eager to lend a patient ear to the opinions of others and think long and hard whether whoever finds fault has reason or not to censure you. And if the answer is yes, correct the fault. If no, give the impression that you have not heard him, or if he is a man whom you respect, explain to him why he is mistaken.

It's hard to do, but I think it's really important to go back and watch yourself.

Absolutely the greatest challenges in dealing with discrimination are with the larger group who needs to consider how they think and act in everyday life. It remains the possibility of the majority to accept the call to change.

Nothing is better for my playing than teaching because when you teach, you have to think and you have to listen what other people do. And then all of a sudden, you play yourself and then you say, my goodness, I don't need a teacher. I'm my own teacher. Then I can react to what I'm doing immediately. It really improves.

Well, I really think that shatters the myth of white supremacy once and for all.

Often in life, the most important question we can ask ourselves is: do we really have the problem we think we have?

I got a letter from this lady of Russian and Jewish descent. She asked me if I was a racist because I didn't do any White people. I was shocked, because my mandate is to do Black studies. It would have never occurred to me if this lady hadn't written this letter. We decided we were going expand the brand and do everybody.

I was very proud to be part of the Million Man March. I think it's one of the best things that I ever did. Just the fact that, you know, at the time I didn't pay close enough scrutiny to some of the other things that he was saying. You know, that's something I just live and learn.

The liberation of Blacks is not for Blacks only.

I don't mind the job of saying to white people, "Yes, this is what I think you need to know, this is what I think you've been missing." And it's my job to educate white folks every day.

Once I was, yes. But now I have turned my direction away from anything that's racist.

The student's job is to stay open-minded, to quell the knee-jerk defensiveness we all possess in the face of suggestions for improvement, and to maintain patience when faced with a process that is often slow, confusing, and frustrating.