The symbolism was in – and this sounds really, really small, but it’s actually big for African-Americans – the symbolism was not in being an embarrassment, but to being a figure that folks were actually proud of.
TA-NEHISI COATESThe essence of American racism is disrespect.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
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Any time you have, you know, upwards of 90 percent of a demographic voting against somebody, that’s a statement.
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I would flip this the other way and say over 90 percent of African-Americans voted against Donald Trump.
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And I think, like, there’s a crucial difference between being, you know, Joe Schmo in the neighborhood and being the head, you know, of the government that, you know, in many ways is largely responsible for those conditions in the first place.
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I think there’s a sort of, you know, very thin way of reading this that says, well, Barack Obama is biracial thus that gives him some understanding of both white America and black America, but that’s not really it.
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Talk about class and hope no one notices.
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Just because you came here in 1880, 1950, whenever, you became an American. You get to celebrate July 4th like every other American.
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It was made that way. And what you have is a system in which people are there to be exploited.
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The standard progressive approach of the moment is to mix color-conscious moral invective with color-blind public policy.
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Lot of folks like to mock dumb history, and pretend it’s just a few idiots. Isn’t. It’s the country.
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All you need to understand is that the officer carries with him the power of the American state and the weight of an American legacy.
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Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.
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Often ironic and self-deprecating – are always spoken that take on other meanings when uttered by others.
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I did not know then that this is what life is – just when you master the geometry of one world, it slips away, and suddenly again, you’re swarmed by strange shapes and impossible angles.
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Better you knuckle up and go for yours than have to bow your head and tuck your chain.
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An unsegregated America might see poverty, and all its effects, spread across the country with no particular bias toward skin color. Instead, the concentration of poverty has been paired with a concentration of melanin.
TA-NEHISI COATES