Lynn

“Nobody of sound mind can dispute that there is something fundamentally wrong, and intrinsically corrupt, about a legal system that encourages police officers and prosecutors to do everything in their power to persuade you and your children (no matter how young or old) to “do the right thing” and talk—when they tell their own children the exact opposite.”
― James Duane, You Have the Right to Remain Innocent

“RACE AS WE KNOW IT IN THE US IS CLOSELY INTEGRATED with our economic system. The system of racism functioned primarily as a justification for the barbaric act of chattel slavery and the genocide of Indigenous peoples. You cannot put chains around the necks of other human beings or slaughter them wholesale, while maintaining social rules that prohibit such treatment, without first designating those people as somewhat less than human. And later, the function of racism was somewhat repurposed as a way of dividing lower classes, still with the ultimate goal of the economic and political supremacy of white elites.”
― Ijeoma Oluo, So You Want to Talk About Race

“The model minority myth fetishizes Asian Americans—reducing a broad swath of the world’s population to a simple stereotype. The model minority myth places undue burdens and expectations on Asian American youth and erases any who struggle to live up to them. The model minority myth erases religious minorities, it erases refugees, it erases queer Asian Americans. The model minority myth gives a pretty blanket for society to hide its racism against Asian Americans under, while separating them from other people of color who suffer from the same white supremacist system. The model minority myth is active racism that is harming Asian Americans, and we need to talk about it.”
― Ijeoma Oluo, So You Want to Talk About Race

“Everywhere I looked, I saw students who could listen to an hour-long lecture, asking intelligent questions and writing things down. They turned in homework assignments on time, correctly done. They took a textbook and lecture notes and did something they called “studying.” They were then able to do well on exams. I had no idea how to do any of this. If you’ve never felt this way, it’s hard to express how awful it is.”
― Scott Kelly, Endurance: A Year in Space, A Lifetime of Discovery