Top Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes - Quotesmemo.com

Ta-Nehisi Coates Biography

Ta-Nehisi Coates

Ta-Nehisi Paul Coates (/ˌtɑːnəˈhɑːsi ˈkoʊts/ TAH-nə-HAH-see KOHTS; born September 30, 1975) is an American author, journalist, comic book writer, and educator. Coates is a national correspondent for The Atlantic, where he writes about cultural, social and political issues, particularly regarding African Americans.

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Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes

I would flip this the other way and say over 90 percent of African-Americans voted against Donald Trump.

African American, Against, Flip, Trump, Way

When you have a policy of making sure that African Americans cannot build wealth, of plundering African American communities of wealth, giving opportunities to other people, it's only right that you might want to, you know, pay that back.

American, Communities, Giving, Opportunity, People, Wealth

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. 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.

Believe, Felt, Mean, Running, Said

The standard progressive approach of the moment is to mix color-conscious moral invective with color-blind public policy.

Blind, Color, Mix, Moment, Moral, Policy

That's not an accident that Donald Trump didn't begin with, say, trade or jobs or anything, that he actually began by otherizing the first African-American president of the United States.

Accident, African American, Jobs, President, States, Trump

I don't know how you bridge that contradiction, but I felt that Barack Obama was sincere. It didn't feel like a line to me. 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.

Bridges, Know, Optimism, People, Sincere

These were the days when I powerfully believed Breyers and Entenmann's to be pioneers in the field of antidepressants.

Antidepressants, Believed, Field, Fields, Pioneers, Powerfully

[Winning the White House was an achievement], but as an African-American, [Barack Obama], I think the symbolism is in how he conducted himself. 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.

Conducted, Symbolism, Think, Thinking, Winning

Just because you came here in 1880, 1950, whenever, you became an American. You get to celebrate July 4th like every other American. You don't just get the good part. You get the bad part, too. You get all of it.

4Th Of July, Bad, Celebrate, July, Like

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.

Amazed, Curious, Heartbroken, Moment, Moments, Needs

Never forget that we were enslaved in this country longer than we have been free. Never forget that for 250 years black people were born into chains-whole generations followed by more generations who knew nothing but chains.

Country, Enslaved, Forget, People, Years

I think the sad fact is, there's a long history in this country at looking at African-American as subhuman. 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.

Country, Long, Mental, Reflected, Thinking

This feeling African-Americans have, this skepticism towards the police and the skepticism that the police show towards African-Americans is actually quite old. And it may be one of the most durable aspects of the relationship between black people and their country really in our history.

African American, Country, Old, People, Police, Towards

When nonviolence begins halfway through the war with the aggressor calling time out, it exposes itself as a ruse.

Aggressor, Calling, Halfway, War

Humans also tend to find community to be pleasurable, and within the boundaries of community relationships, words - often ironic and self-deprecating - are always spoken that take on other meanings when uttered by others.

Community, Ironic, Meanings, Self, Words

[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.

Ability, Instance, Optimism, People, Way, White

I am not asking you as a white person to see yourself as an enslaver. I'm asking you as an American to see all of the freedoms that you enjoy and see how they are rooted in things that the country you belong to condoned or actively participated in the past.

Country, Freedoms, Past, Things, White

I think President [Barack] Obama deeply underestimated the force of white supremacy in American life.

American, Barack, President, Thinking, White

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.

Boys, Era, Height, Pregnancy, Prison, Teenage

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.

Black, Deficit, Different, History, People, Responsibility

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