So what you do [under apartheid system] is you convince black people that the reason they are being oppressed is because there are some within their community who just can't behave. And if only they could behave, then everyone else would have more freedoms and liberties, which, of course, is not true.

Trevor Noah

More Quotes by Trevor Noah
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More Quotes From Trevor Noah

Often, people who can do, don’t because they’re afraid of what people that can’t do will say about them doing.

Trevor Noah
can-do people

I know that I cannot change the entire world, but I've always believed I can at least affect change in my world.

Trevor Noah
always-believe knows world

I've come to learn as an adult that love is a hell of a drug. It's one of the most dangerous things that human beings can have. It's also one of the most beautiful things that human beings can possess because love, on one hand, gives you the ability to care for a human being sometimes more than you would care for yourself. Love, unfortunately, sometimes gives you the ability to forgive somebody and blind yourself to the truth.

Trevor Noah
love-is beautiful hands

In my world, a woman was the most powerful thing that I knew. Still is. A woman made the money in my house; a woman made my food. A woman beat my ass when I wasn't a good kid. Women were behind a lot of what spurred South Africa toward democracy.

Trevor Noah
powerful house kids

As an outsider myself, I always mixed myself with different groups...I've never been afraid to go into a different space and relate to those people, because I don't have a place where I belong and that means I belong everywhere.

Trevor Noah
space mean people

I speak English, obviously, Afrikaans, which is a derivative of Dutch that we have in South Africa. And then I speak African languages. So I speak Zulu. I speak Xhosa. I speak Tswana. And I speak Tsonga. And like - so those are my languages of the core. And then I don't claim German, but I can have a conversation in it. So I'm trying to make that officially my seventh language. And then, hopefully, I can learn Spanish.

Trevor Noah
dutch speak-english trying

Comedy is a great tool. We [comics] are trying to find ways to use humor to enlighten people without preaching to them.

Trevor Noah
tools trying people

Progression, in my opinion, is often identifying shortcomings - whether it's views or the things you're doing in your life, your relationships - and trying to find the places where you improve on those.

Trevor Noah
opinion views trying

If he says that, if he wins, he's going to, you know, dismantle the libel laws and come after the newspapers, I feel like we should take him at his word. This is the same man who has been writing letters to people who he's, you know, bared a grudge against for 20 years. So if Donald Trump says that, I don't know why you wouldn't want to believe him.

Trevor Noah
winning writing believe
I became a chameleon. My color didn't change. But I could change... by Trevor Noah

I became a chameleon. My color didn't change. But I could change your perception of my color.

Trevor Noah
chameleon color perception

When I first came to the U.S. - because I do accents and I've traveled the world. I have friends of almost every single ethnicity, and I would mimic them. And when I came to the U.S., I remember one day we're at "The Daily Show." And I mimicked my Chinese friend. And the guys at the show were like, oh, hey, don't ever do that again. That's really racist.

Trevor Noah
chinese ethnicity guy

I often feel like the woman in your life is your driving force. She's your muse. She plays a big role in determining how confident you feel when you walk out the door. She can add 1,000 kilowatts of energy - or drain that out of you. She said, "No, you're not that funny." I thought, She knows better than anyone.

Trevor Noah
energy play doors

I grew up in a world where authority was female. I never thought to call myself a feminist because of branding. I had this skewed idea of feminist: I thought it meant being a woman who hates men. When I read Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's We Should All Be Feminists, I was like, "Oh, this is what my mom taught me. This is simple. I don't understand why everybody is not this."

Trevor Noah
hate mom simple

Nelson Mandela was in jail when I was really young, and Winnie Mandela was one of the biggest faces of the movement. In South Africa we have a common phrase - it's like a chant in the street and at rallies: "Wathint' abafazi, wathint' imbokodo." Which means, "You strike a woman, you strike a rock."

Trevor Noah
rocks jail mean

If you spoke to me in Zulu, I replied to you in Zulu. If you spoke to me in Tswana, I replied to you in Tswana. Maybe I didn't look like you, but if I spoke like you, I was you.

Trevor Noah
spokes like-you looks

I was like, wow, this guy's [Donald Trump ] going to do well. And I remember people laughed at me. People were like, oh, you silly ignorant person who's just come to this world. You clearly shouldn't be at "The Daily Show" 'cause you don't know what you're talking about. And I was like, but I don't know. He seems like he connects with people. I can relate to him as a performer. I can see what tools he's using. He's good at riffing. He's good at taking the crowd on a journey. I can see what he's doing.

Trevor Noah
journey silly talking

Families were living separately from the fathers. And so although, according to African culture, men were the head of the household, the truth is women were the ones who were raising everybody, including men. And growing up with my mother, that was something I really learned to appreciate.

Trevor Noah
growing-up mother father

I think all of us should seek help, and not help is in a - you know, help shouldn't be seen as a frightening thing. Help shouldn't be seen as a weak thing.

Trevor Noah
weak helping thinking
Language and accents govern so much of how people think about oth... by Trevor Noah

Language and accents govern so much of how people think about other people.

Trevor Noah
language people thinking

I was really lucky in that my mom and dad never got caught in the act, so to speak. So my mom was caught fraternizing with my dad. My mom was caught, you know, in the building that my father lived in. My mom was caught in a white neighborhood past curfew without the right permits. My mother was caught in transition. And that was key because had she been caught in the act, then, as the law says, she could've spent anywhere up to four years in prison.

Trevor Noah
dad mom mother