Quotes by Tim Wise

About Tim Wise:

Timothy Jacob "Tim" Wise is an American anti-racism activist and writer. Since 1995, he has given speeches at over 600 college campuses across the U.S. He has trained teachers, corporate employees, non-profit organizations and law enforcement officers in methods for addressing and dismantling White racism in their institutions.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Standing still is never an option so long as inequities remain embedded in the very fabric of the culture.

Tim Wise

For people of color - especially African Americans - the idea that racist cops might frame members of their community is no abstract notion, let alone an exercise in irrational conspiracy theorizing. Rather, it speaks to a social reality about which ...

Tim Wise

Sadly, if President Obama is willing to ignore the pain of race-based discrimination and injustice so as to make whites comfortable - and this, after he has already been elected and the campaign is long over - then the likelihood he will ever speak t...

Tim Wise

When I got to college, the fake ID thing wasn't that important, since pretty much everyone could get away with drinking in New Orleans. But the drugs, well, that was a different story altogether, because drugs are every bit as illegal in New Orleans ...

Tim Wise

And let's just be honest, there is no such place called 'justice,' if by that we envision a finish line, or a point at which the battle is won and the need to continue the struggle over with. After all, even when you succeed in obtaining a measure of...

Tim Wise

So, in "Melting Pot" the children (about a third of whom were kids of color) sang the line, "America was the new world and Europe was the old," in one stroke eradicating the narratives of indigenous persons for whom America was hardly new, and any no...

Tim Wise

And in "Elbow Room" the cast sings the glories of westward expansion in the United States, which involved the murder of native peoples and the violent conquest of half of Mexico. Among the lines in the song is one that intones, "There were plenty of ...

Tim Wise

Our failure as a society to properly acknowledge and confront the psychological, social, and political effects of white privilege has perpetuated racial inequality and race-based political resentments.

Tim Wise

Jesus was not born in a manger in central Pennsylvania. He was a man of color. And the fact that we have represented him for centuries literally as a white man speaks to the entire history of white supremacy.

Tim Wise

Here's the reality. The image of a white Jesus has been used to justify enslavement, conquest, colonialism, the genocide of indigenous peoples. There are literally millions of human beings whose lives have been snuffed out by people who conquered und...

Tim Wise

If we don't figure out a way to create equity, real equity, of opportunity and access, to good schools, housing, health care, and decent paying jobs, we're not going to survive as a productive and healthy society.

Tim Wise

Children are free moral agents and have a right to be exposed to a range of beliefs well beyond the rigid doctrinal confines of their parent's faith, and we have an obligation to insist that they be so exposed, at least in public schools, if not else...

Tim Wise

I don't think the job of the antiracist is to convert the far-out heathen racist, or give them their 'come to Jesus' moment, as it's called. They'll either have those or they won't, and usually, when they have them, it's not because of something some...

Tim Wise

To believe that the United States is post-racial requires an almost incomprehensible inability or unwillingness to stare truth in the face.

Tim Wise

Being asked to describe what 'post-racial' means is a bit like being asked to describe a leprechaun, cold fusion or unicorns: we know what is meant, but, if we are willing to be honest, we also know that none of the four describe something real, some...

Tim Wise

It's hard to say when or if we will actually arrive at that place called 'post-racial', or, better yet, post-racism.

Tim Wise

As a writer, there are times when you have something to say, and yet no particular 'hook' upon which to hang the missive you are burning to release.

Tim Wise

When you allow racial disparity and institutional inequity to affect one part of the country, eventually it's coming back to get everyone.

Tim Wise

Mass media over-represents persons of color in negative ways, especially as criminals, relative to the share of crime actually done by such persons.

Tim Wise

Progress is always relative: to the oppressed, it can only be viewed as an all or nothing deal - if oppression continues, even in a modified form, then the system must still be attacked until that injustice is eradicated.

Tim Wise

Author Bio

  • NameTim Wise
  • DescriptionAnti-racist activist and writer
  • BornOctober 4, 1968
  • CountryUnited States Of America