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.
TA-NEHISI COATESMy mom used to tell me, I can’t use this phrase on the radio – but basically don’t be one of those dudes hanging on the corner.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
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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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The progressive approach to policy which directly addresses the effects of white supremacy is simple.
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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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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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In particular in how [Barack Obama] has directed what you could describe as patronizing remarks to African-American communities.
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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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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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I would flip this the other way and say over 90 percent of African-Americans voted against Donald Trump.
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My mom used to tell me, I can’t use this phrase on the radio – but basically don’t be one of those dudes hanging on the corner.
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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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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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The essence of American racism is disrespect.
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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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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.
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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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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.
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With segregation, with the isolation of the injured and the robbed, comes the concentration of disadvantage.
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The unearned skepticism of one group of humans joined to the unearned sympathy for another.
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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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To prevent enabling oppression, we demand that black people be twice as good.
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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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Never forget that for 250 years black people were born into chains-whole generations followed by more generations who knew nothing but chains.
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You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.
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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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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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[Grew up in Hawaii] that gave [Barack Obama] a kind of optimism, an ability to see things, you know, and frankly, an ability to trust, you know, in his fellow, you know, white countrymen in a way that I, for instance, you know, and the vast majority of black people I know never really could.
TA-NEHISI COATES