I think, as a writer, I’m in my own head.
TA-NEHISI COATESLot of folks like to mock dumb history, and pretend it’s just a few idiots. Isn’t. It’s the country.
More Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes
-
-
[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 -
I think the sad fact is, there’s a long history in this country at looking at African-American as subhuman.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
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 -
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
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.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
The greatest reward of this constant interrogation, confrontation with the brutality of my country, is that it has freed me from hosts and myths.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
Barack Obama is the president of the United States of America.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
It was made that way. And what you have is a system in which people are there to be exploited.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
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 COATES -
You can live in the world of myth and be taken seriously.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
To prevent enabling oppression, we demand that black people be twice as good.
TA-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 COATES -
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 COATES -
Never forget that for 250 years black people were born into chains-whole generations followed by more generations who knew nothing but chains.
TA-NEHISI COATES -
[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.
TA-NEHISI COATES