“You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.”

Segregations, by which I mean people living in a certain area, was a planned system.

I am not asking you as a white person to see yourself as an enslaver.

The unearned skepticism of one group of humans joined to the unearned sympathy for another.

Often ironic and self-deprecating – are always spoken that take on other meanings when uttered by others.

I would flip this the other way and say over 90 percent of African-Americans voted against Donald Trump.

The essence of American racism is disrespect.

What sets black people apart is not some deficit in personal responsibility. It’s the weight on our shoulders. That is what’s actually different. We have the weight and burden of history.

Addressing the moral failings of black people while ignoring the centuries-old failings of their governments amounts to a bait and switch.

You don’t just get the good part. You get the bad part, too. You get all of it.

Barack Obama is the president of the United States of America.

What it is is that Barack Obama was raised by a white mother and two white grandparents who, A, told him he was black and that there was nothing wrong with being black.

It was a week after Donald Trump had won. And initially he was still optimistic. He felt that things would be OK ultimately. And I have to tell you, this is the area where, you know, I see, you know, some degree of contradiction.

[Donald Trump] went on to, you know, otherize Muslims, otherize Latinos, otherize women, that he built out from that. And it can be true that a unique, you know, individual like Barack Obama can succeed in spite of that and still be the case that that force is quite, quite strong.

Any time you have, you know, upwards of 90 percent of a demographic voting against somebody, that’s a statement.

It was made that way. And what you have is a system in which people are there to be exploited.

[Winning the White House was an achievement], but as an African-American, [Barack Obama], I think the symbolism is in how he conducted himself.

I’ve always preferred mythology to history. History is truth that becomes an illusion. Mythology is an illusion that becomes reality.

Failure is simply the non-presence of success. But a fiasco is a disaster of mythic proportions.

She was a siren, mythical and mystical but somehow still real.

Because philosophy arises from awe, a philosopher is bound in his way to be a lover of myths and poetic fables. Poets and philosophers are alike in being big with wonder.

The myth of the strong black woman is the other side of the coin of the myth of the beautiful dumb blonde.

Myths are fun, as long as you don’t confuse them with the truth.

Myths which are believed in tend to become true.

All things fade and quickly turn to myth.