We have to think about affirmative action and craft it in such a way where some of our children, who are advantaged, aren't getting more favorable treatment than a poor white kid who struggled more.
The toughest part is that when your kid's upset, you're upset. You're rocked until they're not upset. Even when they're not upset, you're like, "I hope that doesn't happen, down the line." You're always nervous because you want your kid to be happy.
I'd like to have a kid, and I'd like to be driving around. I know a kid is going to be a big part of my life. I can trust my kid. I know my kid would be in the backseat of my car, and when I say You wanna get some ice-cream? he's going to be happy. My brother has kids. I see that trick work, the ice cream trick.
You can leave a kid alone and it will learn to fend for itself, how to work the remote, a tin opener, and the microwave. I see the holidays as a chance for kids to learn self-sufficiency.
Libraries have a special role to play in our knowledge economy. Your institutions have been and should be a place where parents and children come to read together and learn together. We should take our kids there more.
We are all creative, but by the time we are three of four years old, someone has knocked the creativity out of us. Some people shut up the kids who start to tell stories. Kids dance in their cribs, but someone will insist they sit still. By the time the creative people are ten or twelve, they want to be like everyone else.
We made America more respected around the world, took on the mantle of leadership in the fight to protect this planet for our kids, and much, much more.
How do we in the African American community build a culture in which we are saying to our kids, "Here's what it takes to succeed. Here's the sacrifices you need to make to be able to get ahead. Here's how we support each other. Here's how we look out for each other."
The difference when you have kids comes up when someone wants to meet you out after 9:30 at night. You consider that giant sacrifice. You're like, "Do I do this? Do I stay out until 10:30 and be angry, all of tomorrow?
I really love sharing my gift with others. At the same time, I'm just a normal kid having fun and that's what life is all about-having fun at the same time as helping people.
My hope would be that, as we're moving through the world right now, we're able to get that psychological or emotional peace by seeing very concretely our kids doing better and being more hopeful and having greater opportunities.
[Oscar Wilde's Salome screenplay] is not autobiographical in a sense where you go to my house and see my kids and stuff like that, but that's why I guess it's semi-autobiographical.