To prevent enabling oppression, we demand that black people be twice as good.
TA-NEHISI COATES
TA-NEHISI COATES
Ta-Nehisi Coates on prevent
Ta-Nehisi Coates77 quotes“To prevent enabling oppression, we demand that black people be twice as good.”
More from Ta-Nehisi Coates
Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates 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 CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates Racism is, among other things.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-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 CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates 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 CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates 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.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates Segregations, by which I mean people living in a certain area, was a planned system.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates I am not asking you as a white person to see yourself as an enslaver.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates The unearned skepticism of one group of humans joined to the unearned sympathy for another.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates Often ironic and self-deprecating – are always spoken that take on other meanings when uttered by others.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates I would flip this the other way and say over 90 percent of African-Americans voted against Donald Trump.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates The essence of American racism is disrespect.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates 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 CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates Addressing the moral failings of black people while ignoring the centuries-old failings of their governments amounts to a bait and switch.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates You don’t just get the good part. You get the bad part, too. You get all of it.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates
Original quotes
From our community writers
Someone rejected you does not mean you are not worthy. Maybe they can’t afford to be with you.
Jacklyn TysonJacklyn Tyson I will love you from afar it’s better this way because close up it hurts too much.
Melissa AndersonMelissa Anderson Maybe if you hold me tight, our love won’t be as shallow.
Mira R. AridiMira R. Aridi Sometimes a person is in peace & in the piece at the same time.
Jessica CollinsJessica Collins Between day and night there was a moment of silence.
Frode GaslandFrode Gasland But doesn’t it hurt to feel so much and pretend not to?
Brad NeatonBrad Neaton Admire your sweet way of glowing; your passionate way of flowing.
Ana SoulfulAna Soulful Darling, you are a warrior, for even though each day feels like a battle, you keep fighting and live on.
Sarah ShawkatSarah Shawkat
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More on prevent
You should never let your fears prevent you from doing what you know is right.
Aung San Suu KyiAung San Suu Kyi To prevent verifying stereotypes, we pledge to never eat a slice a watermelon in front of white people.
Ta-Nehisi CoatesTa-Nehisi Coates Buddha means awareness, the awareness of body and mind that prevents evil from arising in either.
BodhidharmaBodhidharma Those magistrates who can prevent crime, and do not, in effect encourage it.
Cato the YoungerCato the Younger An evil intention perverts the best actions, and makes them sins.
Joseph AddisonJoseph Addison All right, your knees may be knocking but that shouldn’t prevent you from going ahead and doing what you need to do.
Aung San Suu KyiAung San Suu Kyi The obstacles preventing the realization of both these extreme states are of the same nature: they derive from our human condition which is opposed to everything infinite.
Primo LeviPrimo Levi The sense of form that both had in such high degree prevented much demonstration; but to be with him, do things for him, to admire, and credit him with perfection; and, since she could not exactly wear the same clothes or speak in the same clipped, quiet, decisive voice.
John GalsworthyJohn Galsworthy