A Quote by Cornel West

I'm not romanticizing black people, because we've got gangsters like everybody else. — © Cornel West
I'm not romanticizing black people, because we've got gangsters like everybody else.
Black is confusing. Where does the line start and stop with what is black and what isn't black? People that are mixed-race, or, imagine being from Sri Lanka or Bangladesh, people might say you're black but your features are so non-black, like you've got straight hair, you've got like a sharper nose, or such.
Farrakhan got everybody together for the Million Man March and everything. But Farrakhan don't like the Jews. Which is bugged. I get my hair cut on Dekalb Avenue. I never been in a barbershop and heard a bunch of brothers talking about Jews. Black people don't hate Jews. Black people hate white people! We don't got time to dice white people up into little groups. I hate everybody! I don't care if you just got here. "Hey, I'm Romanian." "You Romanian cracker!"
I would like to be called an inspiration to people, not a role model - because I make mistakes like everybody else. When I'm offstage, I'm just like everybody else.
You can't have anything valuable in your house. Niggers will break in and take it all! Everything white people don't like about black people, black people don't like about black people. It's like our own personal civil war. On one side, there's black people. On the other, you've got niggers. The niggers have got to go. I love black people, but I hate niggers. I am tired of niggers. Tired, tired, tired.
Black players had an issue with Joe Torre. They weren't treated like everybody else. Even I got called out in a couple of meetings that I thought was unfair.
I am, like everybody else, hurt when the thing I've done is misunderstood or attacked but I've gotten old enough to realize that if you do something, not everybody's got to like it. And if everybody likes it, it's probably not that interesting.
Most rappers are black men. If you're a black man, you owe something to the community that you came from. If you're rapping about the community that you came from, and you're romanticizing parts of it for the entertainment of people who don't look like you, you certainly owe something to the community.
Don't hate me because I can't remember some person immediately. Especially when they look like everybody else, and talk and dress and act like everybody else.
A lot of my friends are gangsters. Not like gangsters - well, yeah, all sorts of levels of criminality - but not the types that are preying on innocent people. I have no interest in the type of criminality that has no respect for collateral damage.
I got into DJ'ing because I started to listen to New York radio a lot. Obviously, I knew the stuff everybody knew, like Beastie Boys and Public Enemy, but I heard "Who Got the Props" by Black Moon, and I went up to this kid in my school with the Walkman on and was like, "What is this? You must tell me how I can get this now." Because there was no Shazam or googling lyrics.
I have no interest in romanticizing poor black people, having been one of them myself in our beloved hometown of Detroit.
I was a very shy character, always feeling uncomfortable because everybody was stronger than I, and always afraid I would look like a sissy. Everybody else played baseball; everybody else did all kinds of athletic things.
It's the people who work hard and earn big that keep the machine tipping for everybody else. If everybody else was equal down the bottom rung of a ladder, nobody would be on the ladder at all because it would break and everybody would fall off backwards. So you need people at the top to help pull those people up from the bottom. You can't take that and swing to the right. You can't have everybody living in the same ordinary $60,000 house because you may as well live in Russia, Bulgaria or some other Eastern block Communist nation.
You have to have quarterbacks who can keep up with everybody else. And I'm not saying that just black quarterbacks can do that, but more black quarterbacks are given a chance because they fit the mold.
I'd like to do a number of films. Westerns. Genre pieces. Maybe another film about Italian Americans where they're not gangsters, just to prove that not all Italians are gangsters.
It was rough being dark. I got heat from my own people more than anyone else. I remember going to my mom and saying, 'Why am I so black?' And she said, 'Because I'm black. You just gotta always work harder than the average bear.'
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