Shemar Moore: ‘I am proud to be Black, but I am also proud to be white’

The 'S.W.A.T' star talked about his biracial upbringing and police brutality during a speech.

Jun 8, 2020

Tons of celebrities turned up at protests across the country over the weekend and Shemar Moore is no exception.

The S.W.A.T. star opened up about being bi-racial and how he feels about the ongoing unrest as folks continue to band together to demand justice.

“I am half Black and I am half white. But I am proud to be Black, but I am also proud to be white,” he said during a speech recorded by Love & Hip Hop Hollywood‘s Moneice Slaughter. “I understand what it is to be treated like a n*gga when I don’t have my fame and when I’m in the wrong place at the wrong time, and nobody knows who I am. Then I’m just a n*gga in the street. I’ve been thrown down on the sidewalk in my lifetime. I understand what it is. I haven’t gone through the George Floyd situation. I have not gone through that, but I know what it is. But I’m not gonna denounce the other side of me, because I’m looking at humanity.”

He went on to speak about his mother, who was a white woman dedicated to the cause. She sadly passed away recently, according to Moore.

“My mother, who’s white, who just passed–I lost my best friend. But my momma? If she didn’t look outside the box, I wouldn’t have life. Ok? This is a white woman from Boston in the ’60s. That was a very racist, racially-divided time. She thought outside of the box and she met my daddy, and she made me,” he explained. Now that I have this life, I can’t denounce [it] because there is good and bad on all sides. Black, white, green, or yellow. I understand that I am brown. I understand that I am Black. I understand that I am a n*gga, ok?”

He added, “But I am not gonna denounce my momma. And if my momma was still alive, she’d say, ‘Baby, go out there and make a change. Go out there and spread positivity. Go out there and tell the truth.’”

According to the former soap star, he plans to use his role on S.W.A.T. to send the right message about police.

“With my platform, I do have to go back to work and put on an LAPD uniform, and I am confused about it,” he said. “I am struggling with it because I don’t just wanna go back and just do the dance. I have to go back and tell the real story. Because George Floyd is real, and so many others before that…I’m gonna use my platform on ‘S.W.A.T.’ with my celebrity–all that stuff. I’m going to speak on it. I’m gonna tell Sony and CBS and my bosses that if we don’t speak on it, then they can’t f*ck with me.”

He continued, “These cops need to be corrected. Some of them are f*cked up, but a lot of them are good. Some of us Black people are beautiful, and some are f*cked up…but we all bleed red…I understand how bad sh*t is, but we have to stay optimistic. We have to stay hopeful, because we will fix this…I can’t do it by myself, she can’t do it by herself–but we can do it collectively, together.”

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