To be sure, there are differences between men and groups and there will ever be, but they will be differences of beauty and genius and of interest and not necessarily of ugliness, imbecility, and hatred.
This quote acknowledges the inherent differences among people while promoting a view of diversity as a source of beauty and creativity.
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More from W.E.B. Du Bois
Our song, our toil, our cheer, and warning have been given to this nation in blood-brotherhood.
Around us the history of the land has centred for thrice a hundred years; out of the nation’s heart we have called all that was best to throttle and subdue all that was worst; fire and blood, prayer and sacrifice, have billowed over this…
But whichever it is, the meaning is always clear: that sometime, somewhere, men will judge men by their souls and not by their skins.
The silently growing assumption of this age is that the probation of races is past, and that the backward races of to-day are of proven inefficiency and not worth the saving.