Identity Control Quotes

I have a Twitter account. I own my name, but I've never tweeted.

I think black people have to be in control of their own image because film is a powerful medium. We can't just sit back and let other people define our existence.

I think it's somebody else's job to decide what my image is.

It's not nice to be called a nutter, because it dismisses the input I've had into my own destiny over the years.

In America, to be ID'd - sorted, tagged, and permanently filed - is to lose a bit of one's soul. To die a little. This sounds like a subtle, poetic notion. It's not. In American legal and cultural tradition, one essential privilege of citizenship is not having to prove it on demand.

You own your identity; it is important to feel that way.

Who controls the images? Ultimately, we don't control the images. This is the minimum we're allowed to ask for: we don't get to control most of the media. We fight to have some say in the ways we're represented. At the bare minimum, don't insult us in person. That's all we ask! Let us at least be able to function freely in the world.

I realised that if you get yourself labeled as the funny one, people don't look any further. I've used that as I've got older. It's controlling: I decide what part of my personality you're seeing. I don't want you to look at me, I really don't. I don't want you to comment on my clothes, my hair or the way I look.

I don't want people to know me. I want them to believe my version.