With segregation, with the isolation of the injured and the robbed, comes the concentration of disadvantage.
TA-NEHISI COATESWhat 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.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
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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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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.
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When you have a policy of making sure that African Americans cannot build wealth, of plundering African American communities of wealth.
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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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[Winning the White House was an achievement], but as an African-American, [Barack Obama], I think the symbolism is in how he conducted himself.
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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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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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In particular in how [Barack Obama] has directed what you could describe as patronizing remarks to African-American communities.
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[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.
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Addressing the moral failings of black people while ignoring the centuries-old failings of their governments amounts to a bait and switch.
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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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Is the Jewish race thriftier than the Arab race?
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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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Two hundred fifty years of slavery. Ninety years of Jim Crow. Sixty years of separate but equal.
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Often ironic and self-deprecating – are always spoken that take on other meanings when uttered by others.
TA-NEHISI COATES