Affirmative Quotes

• You have to give access to people with disabilities but there is no requirement to hire them. What I mean by affirmative obligation is that producers must take the necessary steps to include opportunities for people with disabilities and a vast majority of them do.

  Richard Masur

  Mean, Opportunity, People

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• The third fallacy is that affirmative action doesn't work.

  Harold Washington

  Action, Fallacy, Thirds

  Harold Washington, Alton Miller (1988). “Climbing a Great Mountain: Selected Speeches of Mayor Harold Washington”

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• You know, I love all kinds of activism. I certainly think blacks deserve to have something whether it is affirmative action or an opportunity that should be opened up to them. But at the same time I believe that people of color are not the only poor people in America and all over the world.

  Russell Simmons

  Believe, Opportunity, Thinking

  "More Questions with Russell Simmons". content.time.com. May 3, 2007.

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• In the final analysis courage is nothing but an affirmative answer to the shocks of existence, to the shocks which it is necessary to bear for the sake of realizing one's own nature.

  Kurt Goldstein

  Courage, Bravery, Finals

  "Human Nature in the Light of Psychopathology".

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• I regard affirmative action as pernicious - a system that had wonderful ideals when it started but was almost immediately abused for the benefit of white middle-class women.

  Camille Paglia

  Class, White, Benefits

  "Interview with the Vamp". Interview with Virginia Postrel, reason.com. August/September 1995.

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• Well, certainly one of the ironies of the success of affirmative action is that the middle class within the black community no longer lives within 'black community' by and large.

  Henry Louis Gates

  Class, Community, Black

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• And affirmative action is a very nice term for racial discrimination against better-qualified white people in jobs, employment, promotions and scholarships, and college admittance.

  David Duke

  Jobs, Nice, College

  "David Duke's View Of An Obama Presidency". Interview with Michel Martin, www.npr.org. October 31, 2008.

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• I was critical of race-based affirmative action early on in my career and I've changed my mind. And I've publicly acknowledged that I was wrong.

  Alan Dershowitz

  Careers, Race, Mind

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• Affirmative action is an effort to include every aspect of society in the decision making.

  Andrew Young

  Effort, Decision, Action

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• You can't be a minority in this society without having someone express disapproval about affirmative action.

  Sonia Sotomayor

  Minorities, Action, This Society

  "Justice Sotomayor prefers "Sonia from the Bronx"". Interview with Scott Pelley, www.cbsnews.com. January 29, 2013.

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• Whether or not the world would be vastly benefited by a total banishment from it of all intoxicating drinks seems not now an open question. Three-fourths of mankind confess the affirmative with their tongues, and I believe all the rest acknowledge it in their hearts.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Believe, Heart, Would Be

  Abraham Lincoln (1842). “An Address Delivered by Abraham Lincoln: Before the Springfield Washingtonian Temperance Society at the Second Presbyterian Church, Springfield Illinois, on the 22d Day of February, 1842”, p.12

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• Blacks who have not succumbed to the victim culture have been, are and will be doing quite well - all on their own, without handouts, affirmative action and other patronizing measures

  Tammy Bruce

  Culture, Action, Victim

  Tammy Bruce (2003). “The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left's Assault on Our Culture and Values”, Prima Lifestyles

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• It is always easier to believe than to deny. Our minds are naturally affirmative.

  John Burroughs

  Believe, Optimism, Mind

  John Burroughs (1900). “Writings: The light of day”

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• What is so remarkable about the success of affirmative action is that it has been accomplished despite the Justice Department and the policies of the federal government.

  Harold Washington

  Congratulations, Government, Justice

  Harold Washington, Alton Miller (1988). “Climbing a Great Mountain: Selected Speeches of Mayor Harold Washington”

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• If you don't like affirmative action, what is your plan to guarantee a level playing field of opportunity?

  Maynard Jackson

  Opportunity, Level Playing Field, Guarantees

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• There's a lot of Americans, black and white, who think that we've arrived where we need to be and nothing else needs to be done and affirmative action needs to be dismantled.

  Spike Lee

  Black And White, Thinking, Needs

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• My views on everything from welfare to a balanced budget to affirmative action can be traced to what Buddy and Helen Watts taught me as a young boy growing up poor but proud in Eufaula.

  J. C. Watts

  Growing Up, Boys, Views

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• I'm not one that believes that affirmative action should be based on one's skin color or one's gender, I think it should be done based on one's need, because I think if you are from a poor white community, I think that poor white kid needs a scholarship just as badly as a poor black kid.

  J. C. Watts

  Believe, Kids, Thinking

  "J.C. Watts exits political arena". Interview with Paul Begala, www.cnn.com. November 15, 2002.

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• Affirmative action was never meant to be permanent, and now is truly the time to move on to some other approach.

  Susan Estrich

  Moving, Time To Move On, Action

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• White... is not a mere absence of colour; it is a shining and affirmative thing, as fierce as red, as definite as black... God paints in many colours; but He never paints so gorgeously, I had almost said so gaudily, as when He paints in white.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Flower, Color White, Shining

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• The call of death is a call of love. Death can be sweet if we answer it in the affirmative, if we accept it as one of the great eternal forms of life and transformation.

  Hermann Hesse

  Sympathy, Death, Sweet

  Hermann Hesse (2013). “Hermann Hesse: A Pictorial Biography”, p.218, Macmillan

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• Affirmative action has a negative effect on our society when it means counting us like so many beans and dividing us into separate piles.

  John Kasich

  Mean, Negative, Our Society

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• Affirmative action was always racial justice on the cheap.

  Joe Klein

  Justice, Action, Racial Justice

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• With my academic achievement in high school I was accepted rather readily at Princeton and equally as fast at Yale, but my test scores were not comparable to that of my classmates. And that's been shown by statistics, there are reasons for that - there are cultural biases built into testing, and that was one of the motivations for the concept of affirmative action to try to balance out those effects.

  Sonia Sotomayor

  Motivation, School, Yale

  "Videotaped remarks shed light on Sotomayor" by Charlie Savage, www.sfgate.com. June 11, 2009.

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• I am a product of affirmative action. I am the perfect affirmative action baby. I am Puerto Rican, born and raised in the south Bronx. My test scores were not comparable to my colleagues at Princeton and Yale. Not so far off so that I wasn't able to succeed at those institutions.

  Sonia Sotomayor

  Baby, Yale, Perfect

  "Sotomayor Praises Affirmative Action". "Hannity" with Sean Hannity, www.foxnews.com. June 12, 2009.

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