WATCH: The late Toni Morrison on racism: “If you can only be tall because somebody’s on their knees, you have a serious problem”

Nobel laureate and Pulitzer Prize-winner Toni Morrison, the author of such acclaimed works as Song of Solomon, Beloved, Jazz, The Bluest Eye, Paradise,, and Love, had some of the most insightful things to say about racism that I have ever heard.
I saw the documentary Toni Morrison: Pieces of Me at ArcLight in Hollywood and was especially struck by portions of a 1993 interview Morrison did with Charlie Rose. I posted the entire interview on the 89th anniversary of her birth last year but it is so worth watching again. Please share it with people.

Morrison spoke of racism: “People who practice racism are bereft. There is something distorted about their psyche. … It’s like a profound neurosis that nobody examines for what it is. It feels crazy. It is crazy.”

She asks of the racist person: “Who are you without racism? Are you any good? Are you still strong? Are you still smart? Do you still like yourself? If you can only be tall because somebody’s on their knees, you have a serious problem. And my feeling is white people have a very, very serious problem, and they should start thinking about what they can do about it.”

Her powerful comments come at the 37:00 mark.