Black Experiences Quotes

“I wish BET did more to represent the full spectrum of black experiences in a balanced manner. If you watch BET, you get the sense that the only way black people succeed is through professional sports, music, or marrying/fucking/being a baby mama of someone who is involved with professional sports or music.”
― Roxanne Gay

“Denver kept her eyes on the road in case they were whitemen; in case she was walking where they wanted to; in case they said something and she would have to answer them. Suppose they flung out at her, grabbed her, tied her. They were getting closer. Maybe she should cross the road-now. Was the woman who half waved at her still there in the open door? Would she come to her rescue, or, angry at Denver for not waving back, would she withhold her help? Maybe she should turn around, get closer to the waving woman's house.”
― Toni Morrison, Beloved

“That anybody white could take your whole self for anything that came to mind. Not just work, kill, or maim you, but dirty you. Dirty you so bad you couldn't like yourself anymore. Dirty you so bad you forgot who you were and couldn't think it up.”
― Toni Morrison

“Whites might dirty her all right, but not her best thing, her beautiful, magical best thing-the part of her that was clean. No undreamable dreams about whether the headless, feetless torso hanging in the tree with a sign on it was her husband or Paul A; whether the bubbling-hot girls in the colored-school fire set by patriots included her daughter; whether a gang of whites invaded her daughter's private parts, soiled her daughter's thighs and threw her daughter out of the wagon. *She* might have to work in the slaughterhouse yard, but not her daughter.”
― Toni Morrison, Beloved