My kids are the reason I continue to strive for something better. They know - as kids who are Muslim, Somali, black Americans - that they've always been part of a struggle and that change isn't easy.
I knew that the black struggle wasn't my struggle. But I felt like it was my-struggle-adjacent, you know? I've always said that if you turn the dial in one direction, a Muslim is a Jew is an East Asian person is a Native American and so on. I feel very much that all of these struggles are kind of the same and - Hillary Clinton actually said this recently - when you get rid of one barrier, it opens up the gates for a whole bunch of people you didn't even know would benefit from it. So not fighting for the black struggle is like not fighting for the Muslim struggle.
I went to a public high school and most of the comedy was coming from the black kids and the Asian kids and the Hispanic kids. And, the coolest kids to me where always the black kids. They were always fashion forward and they always dressed the coolest. They were always the best dancers, and just the coolest people.
I know black kids who don't even know any other black kids except their cousins. And that's enough. You wouldn't look at these kids and say that they are Uncle Toms or self-hating or fleeing or trying to be white, given the culture in which they live, which is very natural to them as kids.
I have black friends, but I don't just hang out with black kids. I might pull up with Indian kids, white kids, black kids, whatever.
I wish we could do a better job of understanding what we're doing to kids, because it can be better. It's unfair to give up on these young black kids. We don't do that to white kids.
I realize that I'm black, but I like to be viewed as a person, and that's everybody's wish... I try to be a role model for black kids, white kids, yellow kids, green kids. This is what I felt was good about my personality.
Our situation is more psychological than people will admit.
Black kids kill Black kids for the same reason cops do.
They see no value.
I think kids in Europe have developed a deeper knowledge of music and of black music in particular. You go to Europe, and these kids know about all this obscure funk and soul that kids over here wouldn't know. I think it's getting better in the States, though, with the age of the Internet.
When I was younger, living in an all-black neighborhood the other kids thought I was better than them because of my light skin and straight hair. Then we moved to an all-white neighborhood and that was a culture shock ... I'd been used to being around all black kids.
Being Somali, being Muslim, it's always something I've been very proud of.
Part of the American ethos is that you want to leave something better for your kids than you had and I know that my parents felt that way and I know that my grandparents felt that way and everybody worked hard so that their kids had a better chance. I just don't want to be the first generation that doesn't do that.
The easy answer is to say that it's a part for black people to see black heroes, but to me it's important to young Mexican kids to see a black hero.
When you bring kids in to the world it's a big responsibility, you're responsible for taking care of those kids and providing for the kids and whatnot. It's been a huge change in my life; it's been a great experience for me.
We know that families and kids are going to be an important part of our audience, so we've always made sure that we've picked subject matter that was appropriate for kids. But I think if you try to target a movie to kids, you're going to fail.
My aim is helping kids. Kids are the future. I love children. I'm thinking of my own childhood. I know where I'm from. If I wanted something, I couldn't get it. Life wasn't easy.
A lot of people who don't write for kids think it's easy, because they think kids aren't as smart as they are, or that you have to dumb down what you would normally write for kids. But I think you have to work harder when you write for kids, to make sure every word is right, that it's there for the right reason.