Trevor Noah quotes:

You have two choices, two paths to take as a comedian. You can tackle the difficult subjects and be harsh about it, be brash, be abrasive. But adding hatred to racism is not going to help everybody. So I like to have fun around it.

The older you get, the more you start to realize that you can't win an argument in a relationship. You can't win a fight with your woman. Because if you lose, you lose. And if you win, you lose.

I was born in South Africa during apartheid, a system of laws that made it illegal for people to mix in South Africa. And this was obviously awkward because I grew up in a mixed family. My mother's a black woman, South African Xhosa woman... and my father's Swiss, from Switzerland.

America is the one place in the world where I just innately understood [that] South Africa and the United States of America have a very similar history. It's different timelines, but the directions we've taken and the consequences - dealing with the aftermath of what we consider to be democracy, and realizing that freedom is just the beginning of the conversation, that's something I've learned.

My mom, through my dad, rented the apartment next door to his... he had the lease on both places. But then, she would dress up and act like his maid... a practical maid. No fantasies.

I don't think I have thick skin, but I heal fast. It's easy to break through, but I heal fast.

I lost contact with my father for many years because of apartheid. For, like, six years, I didn't see my dad. And, now, this was the six years of being a teenager.

The first purpose of comedy is to make people laugh. Anything deeper is a bonus. Some comedians want to make people laugh and make them think about socially relevant issues, but comedy, by the very nature of the word, is to make people laugh. If people aren't laughing, it's not comedy. It's as simple as that.

I've never been afraid to fall in love, nor impatient to find it.

We live in the Internet age. Everyone wants clicks. Clicks are what sells.

My mom used to get arrested for being with my dad. She would get fined. She would spend weekends in jail.

I'm not a confrontational person or comedian. I think we can explore more things if one of us is not fighting with the other. I take it easy. But I do like comedians who are very different from myself: I love dry comics with deadpan one-liners. I look on and think, 'That's amazing; why didn't I think of that?'

I'm literally driving in the middle of the night, and my phone rings, and my manager says, 'How would you like to be the host of the 'Daily Show?'' I get out the car, and I didn't have legs. You know in those movies where there's an explosion? But instead of the sound of the explosion, you hear the silence. That's literally what happened.

I live in a country where I'd say nine out of ten people know me when I walk through the streets. There's people taking pictures, there's tabloids trying to make up stories. I'm used to that. The same thing when I'm in Australia or the U.K.: I get stopped.

What I've always said about comedy is if you do it in the right way, you can say anything to anybody because they know where you're coming from. They know it's not malicious.

During my New York run, I injured my voice badly. I was getting increasingly hoarse, and it finally gave up. The doctor said I had two choices. Either cancel things, or try my luck and perhaps never speak again. That's not much of a choice.

I've always been a fan of issues around race and racialism, and I've loved playing with it. People act as though it isn't an issue, but it's a recurring theme in our lives globally.

My ideal setting is I walk from the streets, backstage, and straight onto the stage. Two minutes, and I am on the stage. That way, in my head I have gone from my world and then into a social setting with my friends.

We've got so many different cultural groups in my family that I've had to learn to accommodate them in different ways. My father speaks different to my mum. My mum speaks different to my grandmother. Everybody speaks different, so you find you start tweaking your language to be more accessible to people.

I like the anonymity, the fact that you're a stranger making strangers laugh. You aren't forcing them to laugh - it's involuntary, and that's when they give the most honest response.

There's more outrage on Twitter about a One Direction split or about what one band member said to another than there is about institutionalized racism and something huge.

I was the first in my family to board an airplane. I was the first in my family to get kicked off an airplane.

We get angry about the small things sometimes, I feel, so that we feel like we're doing something, so that we don't have to tackle the big things. And it's fine; let people do that. But I'm not gonna now change because of that. You know? Like, the worst thing that happens to me is you don't like me. And then what?

In America, there is no racial segregation. I'm not sure I'm quite familiar with this phrase.

I'm a quarterback. I don't need to score the touchdown. I just need to spot the pass.

If I'm doing something on stage, and it evokes an emotion, then I might show that emotion, but I also don't believe in being a preacher. If you have a point, that's a bonus. But the funny has to come first; otherwise, you shouldn't call yourself a comedian.

I don't know how to let loose when I'm dancing to the music and the people that made the music are watching me. I've never felt so much pressure in my life.

When you are honest in your comedy, you have to acknowledge the world that you're in. Through a comedic voice, you're talking about what needs to be talked about, whether it's race relations or politics or anything that's happening on a global or an American scale.

If you look at it, the history of comedy has always been strongest among the nations who have been persecuted the most.

[ My mother] went, OK, I've read the Bible. I've read the Bible again. I'm reading the Bible again. OK, let me - where does this Bible come from? What does this Old Testament speak - who are the Israelites? Who - what is Judaism? And then she went, and I'm going to study that. And, you know, she wanted to almost get to the core.

[Donald] Trump ditched his press pool. That's just stupid and funny. Get over it. You know, [Bill] Clinton ditched his press pool. This is something presidents do sometimes. Don't make everything that Trump does a scandal because what'll happen is you'll diminish the real scandals, you know? You've got to get over the fact that you hate the person and rather focus on what you're trying to do.

[I had Bar mitzvah ]it was just me and my mom. And she's celebrating. And she's reading things to me in Hebrew. I don't know what's going on. And she's telling me that now I'm a man. And I'm like, does that mean I have no chores? And she's like, no, you still have chores, but you're a man. I didn't understand most of it.

[Languages] became a tool that served me my whole life.

[My mother ] will write me an email, and it'll be Shanah Tovah. And the next day it'll be something else, Baruch Hashem Adonai. And I - I'm lost half of the time, but that was the world that I grew up in.

[My mother] wanted to go as deep as possible into the world of religion. And that took her into Judaism.

A lot of black people worked with the police as snitches. We used to call them bimpees where I grew up. And, you know, they were afforded special privileges. They may have been paid by the police. But you never knew who was informing on you. We lived either next door to or - two doors away from us was a known informant in Soweto.

As an outsider myself, I always mixed myself with different groups...I've never been afraid to go into a different space and relate to those people, because I don't have a place where I belong and that means I belong everywhere.

At the same time, you had Barack Obama as a president. You had Hillary Clinton on track, all the Democrats looking good. And, you know, Donald Trump was just an entertaining buffoon to watch. And, over time, you came to realize that Donald Trump was appealing to a lot of people with his populist message. And, slowly, I think, even as a show, we started shifting in tone as the election started shifting.

Comedy is a great tool. We [comics] are trying to find ways to use humor to enlighten people without preaching to them.

Comedy is crowded. There are hundreds of comedians in every place in the world.

Donald Trump does not take criticism well, nor does he appreciate reporting on his life.

Donald Trump was appealing to a lot of people with his populist message.

Donald Trump was just an entertaining buffoon to watch.

Even now in America, you know, when people say they hate immigrants, they're not referring to a Canadian immigrant. You know, they're not referring to somebody who has an accent who's slightly different to theirs.

Families were living separately from the fathers. And so although, according to African culture, men were the head of the household, the truth is women were the ones who were raising everybody, including men. And growing up with my mother, that was something I really learned to appreciate.

I actually think this whole Brexit thing in the U.K. was a welcome example of being straightforward. With the candidates pulling out quickly, there's no stringing the people along.

I always say to people, you know - someone goes, oh, well, what are you going to do about terrorist attacks and Muslims? We got to do something. And I go, don't let those in power trick you out of your freedoms by using your fear.

I became a chameleon. My color didn't change. But I could change your perception of my color.

I came to realize,people who had Chinese accents will continue to have Chinese accents in America are treated as being stupid or not as intelligent as an English speaker who is fluent with an American accent - I came to realize why. But it's always fascinated me how quickly you can change where you stand with another human being just based on how you speak.

I do feel like I have a sense of the times. A lot of the things America is experiencing now, I feel like I have lived through. I think there is a cause for concern.

I don't even remember hearing about [Immorality Act of 1927]. I just knew about it. I was born into it, so I don't remember my parents ever saying it to me. I don't remember a conversation ever being had around this. I just knew this to be the law because that's what I was growing up in during that time in South Africa.

I don't think I, myself, am personally afraid. I do worry for the press, though, because Donald Trump has shown himself to be extremely thin-skinned. He does not take criticism well, nor does he appreciate reporting on his life.

I don't think things are getting more insane. I do know that the country is more divided than it's ever been. Tensions in America are at their peak.

I existed in a space where my mother was a black woman and my father was a white man. And that's how I saw the world. I was just like, some dads are whites and some moms are black. And that's how it is.

I go - I trace depression back to things. So I go, ok, I look back and I say my self-esteem was affected because of my skin and because my family had no money and I was ashamed of how poor I was. And I look at all of that and I was trying to hide myself. And so I felt like I was less than I was. And so that then leads to you being depressed. And I work on these things.

I guess that is the strange part of the human brain that people have studied for eons - is hatred and self-hatred. You can convince people that the problem is not coming from the top but is, rather, being created by the people who are being oppressed.

I had some people who disagreed with me here or there - but nothing as strong as I've received, you know, coming to America.That is the irony of life. So I guess - I always tell people - I go, I feel like, in a strange way, I'm home. You know, this doesn't shock me. This is just - I've come a long way to be in a place that is extremely familiar to me.

I hate using this term [miracle]. I'm a man of science. I'm a doctor. I don't use this word. But he said, it's a miracle your mom's alive.

I just had - we had instances - like, for instance, when I turned 13, she threw me a bar mitzvah. But nobody came.But nobody came because nobody knew what the hell that was. I only had black friends. No one knows what the hell you're doing.

I knew of like - I remember, for most of my life, I grew up, and "Knight Rider" was, you know - David Hasselhoff was a Dutch character in my world.

I know that I cannot change the entire world, but I've always believed I can at least affect change in my world.

I know that in South Africa, we were in that space, and we're still suffering from that space. And that was where a government very successfully convinced the majority of a population that every single person there was blocking the other people from achieving greatness in the country, only to realize that we were all being oppressed at the same time. That's one of the biggest things. And I'm proud to say that.

I learned to use language like my mother did. I would simulcast, give you the program in your own tongue.

I lived in a world where I didn't share the love for my stepfather that my mother shared for him. She married him.

I lived my life as a part-white, part-black but then sometimes-Jewish kid.

I love ebola jokes. When done in the right way, maybe it gets people to learn about ebola, to learn about the stigmas behind the identities held by Africans and so on.

I often feel like the woman in your life is your driving force. She's your muse. She plays a big role in determining how confident you feel when you walk out the door. She can add 1,000 kilowatts of energy - or drain that out of you. She said, "No, you're not that funny." I thought, She knows better than anyone.

I speak English, obviously, Afrikaans, which is a derivative of Dutch that we have in South Africa. And then I speak African languages. So I speak Zulu. I speak Xhosa. I speak Tswana. And I speak Tsonga. And like - so those are my languages of the core. And then I don't claim German, but I can have a conversation in it. So I'm trying to make that officially my seventh language. And then, hopefully, I can learn Spanish.

I still live today with my mom sending me, you know, Hebrew Scriptures or phrases or celebrating.

I think all of us should seek help, and not help is in a - you know, help shouldn't be seen as a frightening thing. Help shouldn't be seen as a weak thing.

I think any show has the potential to bring about social change. I do not think any one show in isolation can do it. I think it is a groundswell that needs to continue to be bolstered from all ends.

I think it does because if you think of where "The Daily Show" was when I inherited it from Jon Stewart, I was in a space where, essentially, everything seemed like it was on track, you know, in terms of - from a progressive point of view, you know, you're looking at Republicans who, yes, were in control of many facets of government.

I think it was something I inherited from my mother, who learned to do it. You know, I, like a baby duckling, was merely mimicking the survival traits that my mother possessed. And I came to learn very quickly that language was a powerful, powerful tool.

I think it's despicable. I also think it's frightening that we seem to live through history over and over again. And I don't know if I'm the only one. I feel like, when you read through history books, you always judge those people in that time.

I think we need to get rid of is improving our minds and our mental health. You know, when when you suffer from depression, you go this is something that I have and I can work on it, you know? I often think of depression, though, as more of a - as more of a symptom than a cause.

I think when you look at religion, you look at where Christianity came from. You know, my mom delved deeper into that. And she felt a deep connection.

I want to be in a position where I get to start off fresh. I don't have any preconceived notion of how I should feel.

I was like, wow, this guy's [Donald Trump ] going to do well. And I remember people laughed at me. People were like, oh, you silly ignorant person who's just come to this world. You clearly shouldn't be at "The Daily Show" 'cause you don't know what you're talking about. And I was like, but I don't know. He seems like he connects with people. I can relate to him as a performer. I can see what tools he's using. He's good at riffing. He's good at taking the crowd on a journey. I can see what he's doing.

I was lucky to come along for the ride. [My mother] really is an amazing woman. And the world we lived in in South Africa at the time was a very matriarchal society because so many black men had been removed from the home.

I was really lucky in that my mom and dad never got caught in the act, so to speak. So my mom was caught fraternizing with my dad. My mom was caught, you know, in the building that my father lived in. My mom was caught in a white neighborhood past curfew without the right permits. My mother was caught in transition. And that was key because had she been caught in the act, then, as the law says, she could've spent anywhere up to four years in prison.

I'd get suspicious looks from people just walking down the streets. Where are you from? They'd ask. I'd reply in whatever language they'd addressed me in using the same accent that they used. There would be a brief moment of confusion, and then the suspicious look would disappear.

If he says that, if he wins, he's going to, you know, dismantle the libel laws and come after the newspapers, I feel like we should take him at his word. This is the same man who has been writing letters to people who he's, you know, bared a grudge against for 20 years. So if Donald Trump says that, I don't know why you wouldn't want to believe him.

If the police believed that they were planning any form of resistance against the state, then you were just gone. Nobody knew where you were, and you just hoped to see that family member again.

If you look at this election, I feel like Donald Trump was speaking a different language to Hillary Clinton.

If you spoke to me in Zulu, I replied to you in Zulu. If you spoke to me in Tswana, I replied to you in Tswana. Maybe I didn't look like you, but if I spoke like you, I was you.

I'm always fascinated when people say, "We found rude conversations people had via e-mail." Why are you e-mailing this stuff? It has your signature on it! It has a time stamp!

I'm coming from a place where I have seen a different way to handle it, or a slightly different way to go through what is happening, that gives me some perspective. So I think it always helps. It always helps to have someone who has traveled the world or seen a different way to do something. That helps give you perspective.

I'm not a political progressive, but I consider myself a progressive person. What makes me a progressive, in my opinion, is the fact that I try to improve myself and by large improve the world that I'm in - in the smallest way possible.

In America, to have news that has explicitly taken a position is a very strange place to be in, and it's a very dangerous place to be in. And that's happening on Facebook, as you saw, and that's happening online. People are just being given their news and not the news, which is really, really scary.

In an American context, let's say gay rights or marriage policy - that's a progressive thing. I understand that in an American context.

In my world, a woman was the most powerful thing that I knew. Still is. A woman made the money in my house; a woman made my food. A woman beat my ass when I wasn't a good kid. Women were behind a lot of what spurred South Africa toward democracy.

It was just how my parents treated me. It was the world they decided to show me. I was really sheltered. My grandmother kept me locked in the house when I was staying, you know, with the family in Soweto. And every household, for instance, had to have a registry of everyone who lived in that house.

It's an interesting place to begin where the country is completely divided into choosing sides, when the only side everyone should be choosing is the side of America, and then politicians essentially should be arguing about the best way to serve America.

It's the reason the United States fell into the Patriot Act - because they were reacting.

It's very rare to find a place where news itself has a political bent. Normally, let's say in the U.K. for instance, newspapers might explicitly support one party or the other, but television is just straight-up facts that are not influenced by any party from either side. In South Africa we try to maintain the same thing. Unfortunately, the government sometimes intervenes, but for the most part, the facts are the facts.

I've come to learn as an adult that love is a hell of a drug. It's one of the most dangerous things that human beings can have. It's also one of the most beautiful things that human beings can possess because love, on one hand, gives you the ability to care for a human being sometimes more than you would care for yourself. Love, unfortunately, sometimes gives you the ability to forgive somebody and blind yourself to the truth.

I've just come to realize I'm going to share my point of view. Some people won't like me for it. Some people will. I will work every day to be as honest as I can because I do believe that we're all trying to get to the same place. But various people have tricked us into believing that we are not. And I see America going into that space.

I've lived many places all over the world, so I've always seen myself as a citizen of the world.

Language and accents govern so much of how people think about other people.

Living with my mom, I saw how she used language to cross boundaries, handle situations, navigate the world.

My mom would spend a week in jail. She would spend a day in jail here - a week again, a week and a half, two weeks. My grandmother tells me stories of how because I would be at the house, I wouldn't notice that my mom was gone because she would be at work sometimes. So it was just like time when my mom would be gone and my grandma would tell me she'll be back. And nobody knew where anybody was.

My mother converted, my mom converted to Judaism.

My mother never stagnated in a place where she said, I have it all.

My mother's always looking for answers. She's always searching for new information. I think she has a thirst for hunger that very few possess innately.

Nelson Mandela was in jail when I was really young, and Winnie Mandela was one of the biggest faces of the movement. In South Africa we have a common phrase - it's like a chant in the street and at rallies: "Wathint' abafazi, wathint' imbokodo." Which means, "You strike a woman, you strike a rock."

No one knows what Donald Trump is doing or planning.

Now everyone has eyes, and now everyone has evidence. That's really changed how we tell the news and what we get from it.

Often, people who can do, don't because they're afraid of what people that can't do will say about them doing.

One day as a young man, I was walking down the streets. And a group of Zulu guys was walking behind me closing in on me. And I could hear them talking to one another about how they were going to mug me. (Speaking Zulu). Let's get this white guy. You go to his left, and I'll come up behind him. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't run.So I just spun around real quick and said (speaking Zulu). Yo, guys, why don't we just mug someone together? I'm ready.

One of the people from my online team said he didn't notice - almost immediately after the [Donald] Trump victory within the following days, he noticed that there was a severe spike in hateful messages that were coming towards me.

Our go-to source is no longer dictated by a small group of cable news outlets. We have to expand our view. Sometimes, a story is made and breaks on Twitter. We have to find a way to react to that, to consume and also disseminate the information from Twitter, which is not an easy thing to do.

People should always be wary of that because the precedent is set. And it's so much easier to build on a foundation than it is something that doesn't exist. So you see it as something that's happening to people that are not you. And then it expands, and it expands further. And then, one day, you're on a registry.

People were encouraged to snitch. [South Africa] was a police state, so there were police everywhere. There were undercover police. There were uniformed police. The state was being surveilled the entire time.

Progression, in my opinion, is often identifying shortcomings - whether it's views or the things you're doing in your life, your relationships - and trying to find the places where you improve on those.

Smaller incidents in my life made me realize that language, even more than color, defines who you are to people.

So what you do [under apartheid system] is you convince black people that the reason they are being oppressed is because there are some within their community who just can't behave. And if only they could behave, then everyone else would have more freedoms and liberties, which, of course, is not true.

The police [in South Africa] would check in on you randomly. And they would come into the house, and they would look through that registry and look at all the names of all the people who were registered to be living in the house. And they would, you know, cross-reference that with the actual inhabitants of the dwelling.I was never on that piece of paper. I was always hidden. My grandmother would hide me somewhere if the police did show up. And it was a constant game of hide and seek.

The police didn't afford you a phone call. You just disappeared for a while. And what was scary was we lived in a state where some people disappeared forever.

There are many people out there who don't even think of themselves as being averse to facts, but the truth is, they are not getting it.

There's news that happens in different spheres and can be made just as funny, but it's not necessarily in the normal news medium.