Angelina Jolie Opens Up About Racism In America: 'A System That Protects Me Not Might Protect My Daughter'

Angelina Jolie gave a rare interview with Harper’s Bazaar, opening up about quarantining with her children during a pandemic and opening her eyes to the racial injustice that is being brought to light in America.

“I was fortunate years ago to travel with the UN to frontlines around the world and put into perspective what really matters,” the 45-year-old Oscar winner recalls, when asked about how she’s been reconsidering what is truly important.

Angelina continued, “Having six children, I am reminded daily of what is most important. But after almost two decades of international work, this pandemic and this moment in America has made me rethink the needs and suffering within my own country.”

“I am focusing both globally and domestically; they are of course linked. There are more than 70 million people who have had to flee their homes worldwide because of war and persecution – and there is racism and discrimination in America,” she shared. “A system that protects me but might not protect my daughter – or any other man, woman or child in our country based on skin color – is intolerable.”

“We need to progress beyond sympathy and good intentions to laws and policies that actually address structural racism and impunity,” Angelina adds. “Ending abuses in policing is just the start. It goes far beyond that, to all aspects of society, from our education system to our politics.”

As for what she’s been teaching her children – Pax, Maddox, Zahara, Shiloh, Vivienne and Knox – Angelina says she’s encouraging them “to listen to those who are being oppressed and never assume to know.”

Just recently, Angelina made a big donation to the NAACP for the Black Lives Matter movement.