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I want to be really, really clear about this. It doesn’t mean that everyone or even the majority of people who voted for Donald Trump are racist or white supremacists or anything like that. But what it means is that it’s not a mistake that Trump began his campaign with birthersism .

Ta-Nehisi Coates

I want to be really, really clear about this. It doesn’t mean that everyone or even the majority of people who voted for Donald Trump are racist or white supremacists or anything like that. But what it means is that it’s not a mistake that Trump began his campaign with birthersism .
TA-NEHISI COATES

Campaign Country Dumb Few Folk History Idiot Lot Mean Mistake Present White
[Winning the White House was an achievement], but as an African-American, [Barack Obama], I think the symbolism is in how he conducted himself.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Achievement Country House Symbolism Think Thinking White Winning
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

Color Concentrate Country Effect Instead Melanin Paired Poverty Spreadma Cross
[Barack Obama] grew up in Hawaii, far, far removed from the most, you know, sort of violent, you know, tendencies of Jim Crow and segregation. He wasn’t directly exposed to that. He was untraumatized.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Celebrity Country Crow Hawaii Know Man Most Personality President Remove Segregation Tendency Violent
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Feel Heartbroken Know Moment Need Right Tell
Humans also tend to find community to be pleasurable, and within the boundaries of community relationships, words.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Boundary Community Human Ironic Pleasurable Relationship Self Word
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Apart Black Deficit People Personal Responsibility Some
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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Country Dumb Folk History Idiot Lot Mock Pretend
These were the days when I powerfully believed Breyers and Entenmann’s to be pioneers in the field of antidepressants.
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Belive Day Field Pioneer Powerfully
The standard progressive approach of the moment is to mix color-conscious moral invective with color-blind public policy.
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Approach Blind Color Conscious Invective Moment Moral Policy Progressive Public Standard
Any time you have, you know, upwards of 90 percent of a demographic voting against somebody, that’s a statement.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Demographics Percent Somebody Statement Upward Voting
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Always Between Condition Difference First Government Head Many Neighbourhood Place Responsible Schmo Way
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Biracial Country Know People Person Reading Say Some Sort Thinking Under White
You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.
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Live Myth Seriously Taken World
In particular in how [Barack Obama] has directed what you could describe as patronizing remarks to African-American communities.
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Community Country Describe Direct Particular People Person
To prevent verifying stereotypes, we pledge to never eat a slice a watermelon in front of white people.
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Eat never People Pledge Prevent Slice Stereotype Verify Watermelon White
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Geometry Impossible Life Master One Shape Strange Suddenly World
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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Democratizer Fact Great History Image Reconciling Self Yelling
They’re right there waiting for it. A community of people who’ve been denied wealth, denied wealth-building opportunities, are right there. And the banks went right after them.
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After Bank Community Denied Opportunities People Right Wait Wealth
I think President [Barack] Obama deeply underestimated the force of white supremacy in American life.
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Country Force Life People Peron President Supremacy Thinking Underestimate White
The best part of writing is not the communication of knowledge to other people, but the acquisition and synthesizing of knowledge for oneself.
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Acquisition Best Communication Knowledge Other People Writing
Better you knuckle up and go for yours than have to bow your head and tuck your chain.
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Better Bow Chaim Go Head Knuckle Tuck
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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Built Communities Country Giving Make Opportunity People Plunder Policy Sure Wealth
I was a black boy at the height of the crack era, which meant that my instructors pitched education as the border between those who would prosper in America, and those who would be fed to the great hydra of prison, teenage pregnancy and murder.
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Between Black Border Boy Crack Education Era Eye Great Height Hydra Instructor Murder Pitch Pregnancy Prison Teenage
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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Bridge Contradiction Country Felt Optimism People Peron Sincere
The Knowledge Rule 2080: From maggots to men, the world is a corner bully.
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Bully Corner Knowledge Men Rule World
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES

Answer Employment Fact Health Poice Problem Really Reflect

I want to be really, really clear about this. It doesn’t mean that everyone or even the majority of people who voted for Donald Trump are racist or white supremacists or anything like that. But what it means is that it’s not a mistake that Trump began his campaign with birthersism .

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Popular Authors

I want to be really, really clear about this. It doesn’t mean that everyone or even the majority of people who voted for Donald Trump are racist or white supremacists or anything like that. But what it means is that it’s not a mistake that Trump began his campaign with birthersism .

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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