"In America there is institutional racism that we all inherit and participate in, like breathing the air in this room - and we have to become sensitive to it."
"You notice patterns. White guests often are mortified - that word again - when they learn their ancestors owned slaves. But I've never had a black guest who was upset to learn about white ancestry that probably involved forced sexual relations."
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Source: Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. The Tavis Smiley Show, www.pbs.org. March 19, 2008.
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"I believe in the law. I think we have a great system of justice. But I do think that system of justice has been corrupted by racism and classism. I think it's difficult for 'poor people' - poor white people, brown people - to be treated fairly before the law in the same way that upper-class people are."
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