“If you’re a white American who has racist ideas, and you’ve perpetuated those ideas… you were simultaneously a victim and a victimizer.
“[Throughout history] you had so many powerful Americans trying to convince [everyone] that black people were inferior, [because this belief served] their own self-interest. … Poor whites whose poverty was directly the result of the riches of white slave-holders became [convinced that] it should be this way! And so then those people [in power] were able to get richer and richer.
“People have been tricked, they’ve been manipulated, they’ve been hoodwinked, and that’s what I want people to realize.”
-Ibram X. Kendi, via Unlocking Us (Brené Brown)