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" Much as banks don't care where your money's coming from, the Electoral College is all 'don't ask, don't care' when it comes to votes. "
John Ridley
Money
Electoral College
College
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" I'm John the Fourth, so I think there's a lot of things in life that have been truly handed to me by the hard work and the pain of others. "
John Ridley
Pain
Think
Work
" As far as superhero stories, what's appealing is of course that aspect of wish fulfillment. I mean, you start out reading them as a kid, and a couple things jump out at you - there are heroes out there, and you wish you could run into a phone booth and change your life, or be like Peter Parker and put on a mask and become a hero. "
John Ridley
Change
Hero
Life
" If art is singular expression, then by nature, the best art is controversial. But when art stirs debate for reasons besides its artistic integrity, that's when things get bent. "
John Ridley
Debate
Best
Art
" I've written films that are violent. I'm not big on sitting and watching violence. "
John Ridley
Films
Watching
Violence
" Gay marriage will be universally accepted in time. But if I may be so bold as to say to gays and lesbians, don't wait for that time to arrive. Just as my father and his generation did not 'wait' for their civil rights, nor should you. The toothpaste ain't going back in the tube. The tide has turned. "
John Ridley
Generation
Father
Marriage
" 'The Martin Show,' the 'Jamie Foxx show,' 'Living Single,' 'The Wayans Brothers,' 'Hanging with Mr. Cooper...' Some of these shows were good, some were typical television, but they facilitated a lot of work for blacks in front of as well as behind the camera. A lot of us in Hollywood thought it was the beginning of a real racial breakthrough. "
John Ridley
Beginning
Camera
Good
" Awards shows have devolved into self-parodies - liberals in limos, corny insider jokes delivered by the hosts among bad teleprompter reading from the some of the best thespians on the planet. "
John Ridley
Best
Corny
Jokes
" While most trudge through their days straight-jacketed in the social compact, living for others as much as or more than for themselves, a select few excel. "
John Ridley
Others
Through
Days
" I understand politicos gotta make bank. But cloistering with the Hollywood elite is not how you prove you're a man of the people. "
John Ridley
Understand
You
Prove
" In every election cycle that I can recall, there comes a moment - or a few - where charges of elitism and claims of commonness are wielded by presidential candidates like a sword and shield: 'Vote for me 'cause I'm one of you. It's the other guy who's out of touch.' "
John Ridley
You
Vote
Sword
" Just mention the idea of warrantless wiretaps and expect to get hit up with a congressional investigation. But give somebody an avatar and a URL, and he can't tweet, post or hyperlink enough personal information about himself to as many people as possible. "
John Ridley
Enough
Personal
Information
" I love graphic novels - I love reading them, I enjoyed writing them, I would love to go back and do them again. I hope I'm savvy enough to do them in the right way. "
John Ridley
Hope
Go
Enough
" People of color grow up steeped in 'white' culture. The reverse is not true. And, no, listening to hip-hop on the way to work does not count as immersion. "
John Ridley
Work
People
Listening
" I don't really have anything against the French except that, as an American, I've been bred to despise them with the same zeal as soccer and Renny Harlin films. "
John Ridley
American
Same
Soccer
" For children, diversity needs to be real and not merely relegated to learning the names of the usual suspects during Black History Month or enjoying south-of-the-border cuisine on Cinco de Mayo. It means talking to and spending time with kids not like them so that they may discover those kids are in fact just like them. "
John Ridley
History
Black
Children
" From the moment we were first dumped in Jamestown and had our teeth checked before getting sold off and later considered three-fifths of a human being, an abundance of 'likability' hasn't been something blacks have had to stockpile. Instead, it's been a centuries-long battle for respectability. "
John Ridley
Abundance
Teeth
Moment
" There's no disputing that for pols, the Internet is a great way to connect with people and raise some cash and post 'Sopranos' parodies or play your opponent's macaca moments. But in a 'net root' sense, it's pretty useless for getting someone elected. "
John Ridley
Internet
People
Play
" In the Everybody-Give-Me-A-Hug victim culture in which we live, the obese want a spot at the table along with those who face discrimination based on the way that God or Nature or our Intelligent Designer created us. "
John Ridley
God
Culture
Nature
" Reactionary conservatives are smiling through the racial apocalypse. To them, race baiting is a joke, as 'humorist' Rush Limbaugh will tell you when he's calling Mexicans 'stupid.' Or it's a matter of semantics when they claim that Sonia Sotomayor is a 'racialist' which, far as I can tell, is the smooth jazz version of being a racist. "
John Ridley
I Can
Smiling
Stupid
" I've never been much of a European traveler. London once on a book tour, and Italy because that's where Ferraris are from. That's about it. "
John Ridley
Italy
Because
Never
" It's not that white guys shouldn't be allowed to engage in discussions on race in America. But there's nothing more exhausting than white male liberals' dogmatisms on race that were clearly formed during a conversation they had with that one black guy they met back in college. "
John Ridley
Conversation
America
Black
" The hypocrisy and false piety of the deniers aside, the relationships of gays have no effect on heteros. Especially all the heteros who've done such a marvelous job of debasing marriage on their own all these many years. "
John Ridley
Relationships
Hypocrisy
Job
" There are any number of very hard working people in Hollywood who deserve recognition. Mostly its the artisans and crafts persons - the 'below the line' workers - whose only reward is to be pejoratively labeled 'below the line' workers. I say get them all on the next thing smoking to Vegas for an all expense paid weekend of whatever. "
John Ridley
People
Recognition
Smoking
" I'm sorry, but chick fights are sexy. If you don't think so, you're either an uptight woman or a lying man. "
John Ridley
Woman
Man
You
" Our touchstones of slavery are 'Song of the South,' 'Gone With the Wind' and 'The Birth of a Nation.' It's hard to separate the cinematic quality from the underlying themes. I appreciate the films, but the message was repugnant. "
John Ridley
Song
Wind
Appreciate
" Governmental intervention and personal responsibility are not mutually exclusive issues, but they do frame a 'do it ourselves' vs. 'what are you doing for us' debate. For the black community, that's a debate that's been raging at least as far back as the W.E.B. Du Bois, Booker T. Washington philosophical grudge matches. "
John Ridley
Black
Community
Debate
" I don't think I'm alarmist. I'm more disappointed by the euphemisms in some instances than outright bigotry. Now, to me, you walk around with a Klan hat on or you've got a swastika on you arm, you just look like a dope, you know what I mean? "
John Ridley
Think
Me
Walk
" If faux liberal white guys want to support and defend Obama, by all means please do so. But I would suggest they try to limit that support to matters of policy and not perspectives on race. "
John Ridley
Race
Limit
Support
" It is time to celebrate the New Black Americans - those who have sealed the Deal, who aren't beholden to liberal indulgence any more than they are to the disdain of the hard Right. It is time to praise blacks who are merely undeniable in their individuality and exemplary in their levels of achievement. "
John Ridley
Black
New
Achievement
" Bigots are actually funny to me in the way that people who still wear parachute pants give me a chuckle. "
John Ridley
Funny
Way
Me