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.
TA-NEHISI COATESAnd 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.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
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Racism is, among other things.
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Never forget that we were enslaved in this country longer than we have been free.
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You know, the thing I always think about, you get up early in the morning to go to work and there’s some dude outside drinking and you come home and the same dude is outside drinking hanging on the corner. And then this engenders a level of anger I think and a level of shame.
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To prevent verifying stereotypes, we pledge to never eat a slice a watermelon in front of white people.
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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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Racism is not merely a simplistic hatred. It is, more often, broad sympathy toward some and broader skepticism toward others.
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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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Often ironic and self-deprecating – are always spoken that take on other meanings when uttered by others.
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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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Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.
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Segregations, by which I mean people living in a certain area, was a planned system.
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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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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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Reparations would mean the end of yelling “patriotism” while waving a Confederate flag. Reparations would mean a revolution of the American consciousness, a reconciling of our self-image as the great democratizer with the facts of our history.
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An America that looks away is ignoring not just the sins of the past but the sins of the present and the certain sins of the future.
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