Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes

Addressing the moral failings of black people while ignoring the centuries-old failings of their governments amounts to a bait and switch.

You don’t just get the good part. You get the bad part, too. You get all of it.

You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.

Barack Obama is the president of the United States of America.

What it is is that Barack Obama was raised by a white mother and two white grandparents who, A, told him he was black and that there was nothing wrong with being black.

It was a week after Donald Trump had won. And initially he was still optimistic. He felt that things would be OK ultimately. And I have to tell you, this is the area where, you know, I see, you know, some degree of contradiction.

[Donald Trump] went on to, you know, otherize Muslims, otherize Latinos, otherize women, that he built out from that. And it can be true that a unique, you know, individual like Barack Obama can succeed in spite of that and still be the case that that force is quite, quite strong.

Any time you have, you know, upwards of 90 percent of a demographic voting against somebody, that’s a statement.

It was made that way. And what you have is a system in which people are there to be exploited.

[Winning the White House was an achievement], but as an African-American, [Barack Obama], I think the symbolism is in how he conducted himself.