Roger Ross Williams Quotes

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Roger Ross Williams

Profession : Producer

Birth : September 16, 1970

Imagine that you're a gay man, and you're spending all your time with people who believe you are possessed by the devil. Or, in the case of a lot of Ugandans, with people who believe you should be killed. Someone told me once that I'm worse than a dog, I'm the scum of the earth, so for me, it was draining.

Roger Ross Williams

What is so attractive about Uganda for missionaries is that they have free rein. They can go anywhere they please - schools, hospitals, the parliament.

Roger Ross Williams

Gay Africans must speak up and let everyone know they are there, they have always been there, and that they are not going away.

Roger Ross Williams

I went to church every Sunday and sang in the choir. But for all that the church gave me - for all that it represented belonging, love and community - it also shut its doors to me as a gay person. That experience left me with the lifelong desire to explore the power of religion to transform lives or destroy them.

Roger Ross Williams

The American evangelical movement in Africa does valuable work in helping the poor.

Roger Ross Williams

It is important for American congregations to hold their churches accountable for what their money does in Africa.

Roger Ross Williams

I'm a recovering journalist, I should say.

Roger Ross Williams

I love 'Jungle Book' and all the classics growing up, but what I learned about this is that these Disney films are basically classic fables that have been told for thousands of years.

Roger Ross Williams

All the politicians in Uganda play to their fundamentalist benefactors in America because of the flow of money.

Roger Ross Williams

Expectations that black directors have to make black films about black subject matter are, to me, kind of absurd.

Roger Ross Williams

As a film-maker, I certainly don't want to be put into some box.

Roger Ross Williams

Even after I won the Oscar, my phone did not ring. No one called me to fund films or offer projects.

Roger Ross Williams

I felt like I was an outsider growing up in the black church, as a gay man, in a poor community.

Roger Ross Williams

I began filming 'God Loves Uganda' by first meeting some of the Ugandan and American missionaries who have helped create Uganda's evangelical movement. They were often large-hearted. They were passionate and committed.

Roger Ross Williams

The war against homosexuality in Uganda is fueled by the funds of American Christian missionary churches.

Roger Ross Williams

I grew up in the church, and I went into the production of 'God Loves Uganda' intending to raise awareness of the abuse of religious power in Uganda, and after 30 public appearances, I have learned a lot about how people receive this sort of message.

Roger Ross Williams

I have learned that the hardest part of campaigning for tolerance and justice is encouraging people to look at their own selves, to examine their own identity and shortcomings.

Roger Ross Williams

I made a film about a person living with a disability. Those kinds of films are often about the disability, not who a person is.

Roger Ross Williams