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.
TA-NEHISI COATESI think President [Barack] Obama deeply underestimated the force of white supremacy in American life.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
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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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To prevent verifying stereotypes, we pledge to never eat a slice a watermelon in front of white people.
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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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Racism is not merely a simplistic hatred. It is, more often, broad sympathy toward some and broader skepticism toward others.
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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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Never forget that we were enslaved in this country longer than we have been free.
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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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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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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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Reparations would mean the end of scarfing hot dogs on the Fourth of July while denying the facts of our heritage.
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[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.
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The essence of American racism is disrespect.
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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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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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Talk about class and hope no one notices.
TA-NEHISI COATES