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Readers need to stop assuming characters are white if race isn't explicitly defined.

Roxane Gay

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Roxane Gay
Age: 50
Born: 1974
Born: October 15
Essayist
Journalist
Novelist
Scrabble Player
Writer
Omaha
Nebraska
Character
Readers
Need
Assuming
Needs
Defined
Characters
Reader
Stop
Race
White
Explicitly

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I am interested in intense, unbreakable emotional connections and oftentimes, such connections can be found between siblings.
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I live in the middle of nowhere and I'm an insomniac. I just make the time and I read and write really fast so that makes a lot possible for me. I wish I had an explanation for it. I'm grateful for it.
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I read constantly because there is so much to learn from the writing in the world.
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People do terrible things all the time, but we don’t regularly disown our humanity. We disavow the terrible things.
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My tweeting is cool and calm unless I am riled up about something and then I just surrender to the fury of my fingers.
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I see my tweets as a current joining a bunch of other currents in the world's craziest ocean.
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The other day, I saw a blog post where a woman wrote about why she was unfollowing me and that made me feel incredibly self-conscious and embarrassed about my tweets. I also feel more exposed now that I've become a more visible writer but then I try to get over all that and just use Twitter the way I want.
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So often feminism is built up as this thing where you have to be perfect. You have to be consistent and you can't ever deviate. That's just not realistic.
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There's certainly a portion of my brain that is always tuned to making wry observations about the world, but that portion of my brain was alive and well before Twitter.
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I am fine with my books being categorized as African-American literature but I hope they are also considered Haitian-American literature and American literature. All of these things are part of who I am and what I write.
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Violence is a common part of far too many women's lives.
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What is it like to be connected to someone you can never get away from, for better or worse? I love trying to answer that question.
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People of color are not under any kind of obligation beyond working hard, doing their best, and learning from their mistakes.
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Nemeses aren't born. They are made.
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I'm fat positive, in that I don't see fat as a bad thing. But what I do see as a bad thing is how I'm treated. I can have the most positive outlook in the world, but that is not going to change how hecklers and people walking down the street are yelling at me.
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The actual act of writing brings me such pleasure - to tell stories, to engage in cultural criticism, to reflect, to question, all of it is invigorating.
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I am new to superhero comics, though growing up I read Archie comics, religiously. I've been doing a lot of catching up, reading what's out there and it's been wonderful to see what's going on in contemporary comics.
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When feminism falls short of our expectations, we decide the problem is with feminism rather than with the flawed people who act in the name of the movement.
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When you can’t find someone to follow, you have to find a way to lead by example.
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Most of my favorite tweets go completely ignored but most of my favorite tweets are probably really lame or inside jokes between me and my [redacted]. See what I did there?
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