It stands for diversity. It stands for vision and strength. It stands for belief in the right things. That's what I think it stands for.

Peter Norman is a humanitarian, and I say "is" because in my life, Peter Norman is never deceased. He's always going to live with me.

Peter [Norman] never denounced us, he never turned his back on us, he never walked away from us, he never said one thing against what he stood for in Mexico City, and that was freedom, justice and equality for all God's people.

Becoming involved in sports and traveling the world and seeing how people of color were treated around the world, and America being such a great nation, probably the greatest nation in the world, I think that the thing that would destroy this nation more than anything is the inequality that we have amongst people of color.

The black socks [on me at Olympics in 1968] emphasized the fact that we had so many Blacks and people of color here in the United States, the greatest country in the world, that was running around in poverty every day, so we wanted to illustrate the fact that these individuals did not have shoes and they had to walk 20 miles to and from school every day with no shoes in the greatest country in the world.

[Peter Norman] was a man of principle and pride, had a strong moral character.

I think the Olympic Games have been married to political statements. If I go back to Berlin in 1936, it was very politically orientated then, just with the Nazis.