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 COATESI think the sad fact is, there’s a long history in this country at looking at African-American as subhuman.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
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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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[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 -
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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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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Racism is, among other things.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
Never forget that we were enslaved in this country longer than we have been free.
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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.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
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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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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When nonviolence begins halfway through the war with the aggressor calling time out, it exposes itself as a ruse.
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Talk about class and hope no one notices.
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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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What I’m talking about is more than recompense for past injustices-more than a handout, a payoff, hush money, or a reluctant bribe.
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Barack Obama is the president of the United States of America.
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You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.
TA-NEHISI COATES