Quotes & Sayings About Ethnic Minorities

The most significant moment will be when we stop referring to the hiring of qualified women (and racial, ethnic and religious minorities) as significant. In other words, when qualified people are hired without regard to race, gender, ethnicity, religious or other differentiating characteristics, that will be the most significant, indeed momentous, event of all. — Amy Trask

Nationalist conflicts and ethnic-racial tensions were greatly intensified by the territorial settlement of Europe that followed the First World War. The architects of the Versailles Treaty in 1919, however good their intentions, faced insuperable problems in attempting to satisfy the territorial demands of the new countries formed out of the wreckage of the old empires. Ethnic minorities formed sizeable parts of most of the new states in central, eastern and south-eastern Europe, offering a potential base for serious political disturbance. Almost — Ian Kershaw

Many ethnic minorities chafed at the postcolonial nationalism of India and Pakistan, and some rebelled. — Pankaj Mishra

The time is long overdue to stop looking for progress through racial or ethnic leaders. Such leaders have too many incentives to promote polarizing attitudes and actions that are counterproductive for minorities and disastrous for the country. — Thomas Sowell

Here is the full list of the banned words I used: active homosexual; career women; Third World; blacks; Asians; Australasia; Bangalore; primitive African tribes; crippled; in a wheelchair; hare lip; ethnic minorities; handicapped; spinster; committed suicide; gypsies; Bombay; illegitimate daughter; air hostess; Siamese twins; Calcutta; deaf ears; illegal asylum seeker; province of Northern Ireland; grandmother; bachelor. — Rod Liddle

There are many, many communities, many ethnic minorities, many civilizations that have been brutalised by others and you have to move on. You cannot perpetually stay in that place of blame, otherwise it's just a downward spiral. — David Oyelowo

There is a profound hypocrisy - and deep historical ignorance - when Europeans complain about the problems posed by the ethnic and religious minorities in their midst, for that is exactly what European colonial rule meant for peoples around the world. — Martin Jacques

After centuries of marginalization and neglect, we need to cast our own movements, projects, and ideas as a battle for relevancy in the face of historical manipulation, exploitation, and oppression. We need to fight, tooth and nail, for equity in all areas of social life. One point to make clear, ethnic and racial minorities are not looking for scraps or a handout from the old paternalistic system but an equitable, stable, and leveled playing field. — Martin Guevara Urbina

Syria is the proud heir of an ancient civilization that has a unique spectrum of minorities that encompasses Muslims and Christians of various denominations. There are at least ten such ethnic and religious groups. — Ahmed Zewail

We libertarians are not the spokesmen for any ethnic or economic class; we are the spokesmen for all classes, for all of the public; we strive to see all of these groups united, hand-in-hand, in opposition to the plundering and privileged minority that constitutes the rulers of the State. — Murray Rothbard

The massive ethnic communities that make up the mosaic of American society cannot be adequately described as "minorities." There is no "majority." The — Thomas Sowell

Iran's continued, widespread persecution of ethnic minorities, human rights defenders and political prisoners is a disgrace and stands as a shameful indictment of Iran's leaders. — William Hague

There are a host of ethnic minorities in China, but they often have a weak sense of identity and are relatively small in total number. History has taught the Han that other groups will and should ultimately be absorbed and assimilated as Han. There is a belief that the Han enjoy a superior and far more advanced culture. — Martin Jacques

The argument on the other side of special rights is completely bogus. It's bogus because you could make exactly the same claim about racial or ethnic or religious minorities. — Tom Allen

Canadians tend to be a bit more religious than most Europeans - though not more than the Poles or Ukrainians. Most important, their attitude to immigration and ethnic minorities is more positive than that of most Europeans. — Timothy Garton Ash

Ethnic minorities were 10 times more likely than whites to eat at a table where they were the only representative of their race. — Rebekah Nathan

Experience shows that great enterprises seldom end with a tidy and satisfactory flourish. Together, we are doing our best to re-establish peace and civil order in the Gulf region, and to help those members of civil and ethnic minorities who continue to suffer through no fault of their own. If we succeed, our military success will have achieved its true objective. — Queen Elizabeth II

The Western concept of democracy is based on the idea that the loser of an election has the possibility next time round of being the winner. But in the case of an ethnically or religiously divided country, in which minorities don't live peacefully together, this necessary balance can't be properly guaranteed by democracy. When each ethnic group arms itself, it is not surprising that the army of a new state is viewed by part of the population as an ideological militia. — Henry A. Kissinger

French, for example, is declining as an international language, but Spanish, Mandarin and Arabic are all languages of the future. Ethnic minority groups in the UK may well prove to be a major asset in this effort. — David Graddol

In modern societies, some members of ethnic minority groups do not want to feel compelled to heed the voices of their communities when participating as citizens. — Michael Kenny

The ultimate goal of radical politics is gradually to displace the limit of social exclusions, empowering the excluded agents (sexual and ethnic minorities) by creating marginal spaces in which they can articulate and question their identity. Radical politics thus becomes an endless mocking parody and provocation, a gradual process of reidentification in which there are not final victories and ultimate demarcations — Slavoj Zizek

Low-income people, racial or ethnic minorities, pregnant women, seniors, people with special needs, people in rural areas - they all have a much harder time accessing a dentist than other groups of Americans. — Bernie Sanders

Our leaders increasingly see fit to lecture the ethnic minorities on the need to integrate, including of course the need to speak English. What about the need, though, for Britain to integrate with the rest of the world? — Martin Jacques

There are around 100 million people in China who are not Han. They belong instead to fifty-five officially recognised ethnic minorities scattered mainly across the borderlands: a vast area that takes up almost two-thirds of the country, much of which was absorbed into China relatively recently. There are another 400 or so groups with fewer than the 5,000 people needed for them to be acknowledged formally as minorities by the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP). — David Eimer

In Stalin's Russia racial persecution was often disguised as class warfare. More than 1.5 million members of ethnic minorities died as a result of forced resettlement. — Niall Ferguson

Holocaust Memorial Day is intended as an inclusive commemoration of all the individuals and communities who suffered as a result of the Holocaust - not only Jews, but also Gypsies, Slavs, homosexuals, political prisoners and dozens of ethnic and other minorities. — Jack Straw

Our expanding ethnic diversity of this century, a time when we will all be minorities, offers us an invitation to create a larger memory of who we are as Americans and to re-affirm our founding principle of equality. Let's put aside fears of the disuniting of America and warnings of the clash of civilizations. As Langston Hughes sang, Let America be America, where equality is in the air we breathe. — Ronald Takaki

Zillah Eisenstein uses the term 'decoy' to describe the way in which 'imperialist democracy' covers over its structural sins with a thin veneer of representational respectability: 'The manipulation of race and gender as decoys for democracy reveals the corruptibility of identity politics.'4 Getting women and ethnic minorities into positions of power is not necessarily going to improve the lives of women and ethnic minorities in general, and certainly hasn't so far. — Nina Power

If you are white, racism is too easily ignored and forgiven, regarded as of burning concern only to the ethnic minorities, and therefore of relatively marginal significance. — Martin Jacques

I am the leader of one country which has two alphabets, three languages, four religions, five nationalities, six republics, surrounded by seven neighbours, a country in which live eight ethnic minorities. — Josip Broz Tito

No other country in the world imprisons so many of its racial or ethnic minorities. The United States imprisons a larger percentage of its black population than South Africa did at the height of apartheid — Michelle Alexander