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Sun Yung Shin QUOTES

Sun Yung Shin QUOTES

1 " Before America, I was not Black. I was not adrift in a sea of White that I constantly had to come to terms with, against which my very humanity is measured--by Whites, Blacks, the world, and even myself. Black exists only because America is White. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

2 " Before moving to America, I did not see the world through a "Black" lens...We had doctors, teachers, wealthy men. Indeed, we had successful men of all stripes. We did not have Black doctors, Black businessmen, or any so-called role models. We had people doing things we children knew we could just as easily do when we grew up. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

3 " Tell me the truth of the matter. When I don't understand, I will not protest or judge or correct, I will simply listen harder. I am here to recognize you as my fellow human being with a story. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

4 " Most white Minnesotans have forgotten that they were strangers here once. Or that they are not native to this land. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

5 " Because it is psychological. I see the boys in the park, the young boys, smoking and playing basketball when they should be in school. I couldn't understand why when I first arrived. Now, I am starting to see. It is because they have been told in school, in their community, on the street, that they are nothing, and so they have started to believe it. Once that happens, it is over. You can't be a man, a husband, a father. You can't do anything, once you start to believe that. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

6 " So what do you do if you are imprisoned for your race and ethnicity? The message is, Those are your crimes. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

7 " Niceness is not fairness.
Peace (or the absence of open conflict) is not justice.
Comfort is not guaranteed.
Until we dismantle this system, we will insist, in words and actions: Change is necessary. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

8 " if little is expected from someone, everything is a win and a cause for celebration. We are wired this way, as human beings; when the goal is low, most of us fall to it rather than set our aim beyond. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

9 " Passing meant people thought a person’s identity was just a coat, not a shackle, as if the passer had the key to run free from oppression. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

10 " When I first moved to Minnesota, most folks didn’t say they were white. They proclaimed their heritage. Germans, Swedes, Norwegians, French. Strange, I thought. When did they become white? Maybe winter changes people into colors. I waited to see. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

11 " In the Land of Sky Blue Waters, they teach their young to listen, then coat the truth, so that it causes no harm. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

12 " Life is wealth and relationships are wealth. Domination, subjugation, exploitation, and the luxury of looking away is a poverty of the soul. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

13 " When a social media campaign #NativeLivesMatter launched, it was met with marked and at times unpleasant, even uninformed resistance from people associated with Black Lives Matter. That I also understand. A people on fire has no time to fan other people’s flames. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

14 " The Korean word for tree rose in his mind, surprising him, like a fish breaking the surface of a calm pond. "

― Sun Yung Shin , Cooper's Lesson

15 " The problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

16 " The culture of Minnesota Nice has meant that the face of discrimination has almost always been much more subtle here. But the kind of subtlety that underlies Minnesota Nice—extreme and highly nuanced—only makes racism harder to fight. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

17 " Tell me the truth of the matter. When I don’t understand, I will not protest or judge or correct, I will simply listen harder. I am here to recognize you as my fellow human being with a story. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

18 " If living in Minnesota has taught me one thing, it is that people will lash out at whoever tries to show what sits behind the appearance of things, especially if their own bias is the culprit. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

19 " I longed for the Confederate flags of the South, because at least the South had clear lines of demarcation and warning. In Minnesota, there were only smiling faces, open classroom doors, and a stinging persistent coldness that let me know that I was in a new, different place that wasn’t really welcoming—and that this place was resistant to me calling it home. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota

20 " Black exists only because America is White. "

― Sun Yung Shin , A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota