The standard progressive approach of the moment is to mix color-conscious moral invective with color-blind public policy.
TA-NEHISI COATESThe best part of writing is not the communication of knowledge to other people, but the acquisition and synthesizing of knowledge for oneself.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
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And I think that’s reflected in the fact that, when we have problems that really are problems of employment, that are really problems of mental health, that are really problems of drugs, our answer is the police.
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I don’t know how you bridge that contradiction, but I felt that Barack Obama was sincere. It didn’t feel like a line to me.
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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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What I am telling you is that you do not need to know to love, and it is right that you feel it all in any moment. And it is right that you see it through–that you are amazed, then curious, then belligerent, then heartbroken, then numb. You have the right to all of it.
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If George Washington crossing the Delaware matters, so must his ruthless pursuit of the runagate Oney Judge.
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More specifically, Barack Obama is the president of a congenitally racist country, erected upon the plunder of life, liberty, labor, and land. This plunder has not been exclusive to black people.
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This feeling African-Americans have, this skepticism towards the police and the skepticism that the police show towards African-Americans is actually quite old. And it may be one of the most durable aspects of the relationship between black people and their country really in our history.
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And they necessitate that of the bodies destroyed every year, some wild and disproportionate number of them will be black.
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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.
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Segregations, by which I mean people living in a certain area, was a planned system.
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Two hundred fifty years of slavery. Ninety years of Jim Crow. Sixty years of separate but equal.
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Giving opportunities to other people, it’s only right that you might want to, you know, pay that back.
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Part of that is ordinary African-Americans, you come out of your house and you see the conditions in your neighborhood and you see, folks in your neighborhood doing certain things that, are irresponsible.
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With segregation, with the isolation of the injured and the robbed, comes the concentration of disadvantage.
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You know, it felt like him reverting back to what was in his bones and that’s, you know, optimism and a deep belief in, you know, American institutions and the American people.
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I’m asking you as an American to see all of the freedoms that you enjoy and see how they are rooted in things that the country you belong to condoned or actively participated in the past.
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I think the sad fact is, there’s a long history in this country at looking at African-American as subhuman.
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I mean, the president, you know, at one point when he was campaigning said I believe that Donald Trump was not qualified to run a 7-Eleven.
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What sets black people apart is not some deficit in personal responsibility. It’s the weight on our shoulders. That is what’s actually different. We have the weight and burden of history.
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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.
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Racism is, among other things.
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Reparations would mean the end of scarfing hot dogs on the Fourth of July while denying the facts of our heritage.
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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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You don’t just get the good part. You get the bad part, too. You get all of it.
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The essence of American racism is disrespect.
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You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.
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