Posted on 12/18/2005 11:53:14 AM PST by wagglebee
Actor Morgan Freeman has a solution to the problem of racism – "Stop talking about it!"
In a CBS News' 60 Minutes profile of the Oscar-winning actor scheduled to air tonight, Freeman tells Mike Wallace labels like "white" and "black" are an obstacle to defeating racism.
"I am going to stop calling you a white man and I'm going to ask you to stop calling me a black man," he says. "I know you as Mike Wallace. You know me as Morgan Freeman. You wouldn't say, 'Well, I know this white guy named Mike Wallace.' You know what I'm saying?"
The actor also criticizes Black History Month, saying setting aside a special month actually segregates black history from American history. Calling the idea "ridiculous," Freeman notes there's no "white history month."
"You're going to relegate my history to a month?" Freeman asks Wallace. "I don't want a black history month. Black history is American history," he says.
Freeman, who won his first Oscar for his role in "Million Dollar Baby" last year, has starred in numerous films, including "The Shawshank Redemption," "Unforgiven," "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves," "The Bonfire of the Vanities," "Glory" and "Driving Miss Daisy."
"You're going to relegate my history to a month?" Freeman asks Wallace. "I don't want a black history month. Black history is American history," he says.
He makes perfect sense.
Ping.
This may be of interest, Kevin!
That can't happen, what will Jesse Jackson and Calypso Louis Farrakhan do for a living?
ALL RIGHT! Thank you Mr Freeman for the best Christmas Present I will ever get!(Short of John McCain retiring from the US Senate) NOW THAT is speaking truth to power!!!!
With all due respect on this count, I think it took brass huevos to say this and the man is precisely right.
I salute him for saying it.
He's one of my favorite actors. He's making a lot of sense here but he's going to upset his rice bowl if he's not careful.
Je$$e is a consumate scammer ........I'm sure he would get by ........ Calypso Louie could sell bow ties
Well, this just proves Morgan Freeman is really not black. /sarc>
Common sense emanating from Hollywood ~ how can that be??
He usually does. In a period when middle class blacks affect ghetto speak, he took diction lessons and came up with a voice one which, like Richard Burton's is melodious and useful for a range of parts while remaining uniquely his.
You tell 'em, Mr. Freeman!
(He's a great actor - loved him in Shawshank Redemption and others - but of all his work, "E-Z Reader" on the Electric Company will forever be a favorite role for those of us old enough to remember... "Out-a-sighteous!")
"Shawshank Redemption" is one of my all time favorite movies, my only wish is that that a$$hole Tim Robbins wasn't in it.
Yes it is very interesting to me and I agree with Freeman 100% , I am thinking about changing my Freeper Handle to something else but most of you know me as TBM, so I plan to leave it that way. I remember when I use to own my business in Maryland and would receive calls from possible clients, most where shocked when I came around the corner or stepped off the L, I guess to be Black and well spoken is something rare in America to some and usually it was some liberal a**hole, who has a f*cked up idea of what a Blackman is suppose to think, dress and speak like, Freemen will be condemn by the so-called civil rights crowd for speaking on this.
I can't stand Robbins either, but I always thought he was a good actor before he started talking about politics. :-)
Shawshank was taken from a Stephen King story in his book "Different Seasons", and that one story was a great read, too.
I fear you're right, but the tide seems to be turning. Hey! Congrats on a great year and Merry Christmas to you and the new bride!
All of the stories in "Different Seasons" are excellent, it's the only book by Stephen King that I've ever read.
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