In Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me, the reader walks through the life of Coates in a descriptive recollection of his life as a young black man growing up in an oppressive, unfair world. The book being a letter to his 15 year old son, Coates warns his son of the inequality and prejudicious violence that he can expect to face. Coates focuses heavily on personal experiences that forced him to realize the major flaws in the structure of our society. In reading, I found that I felt almost embarrassingly unaware of the severity of the racial tension that existed and still exists today. While people can be convinced to think that Americas crusade on racism has been largely successful, Coates works to strip away the preconceived notions
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While it seems the judgement system is biased to presuming the innocence of the white male, is it acceptable to believe that black people have pushed racial stereotypes to promote the belief? In thinking over this issue, one passage from Coates kept coming to mind. In discussing police brutality Coates writes “The two great divisions of society are not the rich and the poor, but white and black…”(Coates, 104). Continuing, he says that the breaking of the black body gives both the poor and the rich a feeling of sacred equality because “a mountain is not a mountain if there is nothing below.”(Coates, 105). This was a major point of questioning for myself. Do I subconsciously enjoy the fact that there are people below me in the world, because it makes me feel more secure? While I have always had black friends, and even family members, they are all financially well off, and do not experience the same reality that most lower class black people are forced to live with. Have I presumed that the killings of these black teens has something to do with their actions as opposed to just their skin color? Coates changed my perception of these issues completely. I believe that whether consciously or subconsciously, young black men are characterized as “thugs” sheerly because of how they dress and the economic status they hold. Their opinion of prejudicial bias is justified by the issues that both they and Coates have faced in dealing with everyday situations and police confrontation. The black race did not choose to feel targeted, they were forced
While it seems the judgement system is biased to presuming the innocence of the white male, is it acceptable to believe that black people have pushed racial stereotypes to promote the belief? In thinking over this issue, one passage from Coates kept coming to mind. In discussing police brutality Coates writes “The two great divisions of society are not the rich and the poor, but white and black…”(Coates, 104). Continuing, he says that the breaking of the black body gives both the poor and the rich a feeling of sacred equality because “a mountain is not a mountain if there is nothing below.”(Coates, 105). This was a major point of questioning for myself. Do I subconsciously enjoy the fact that there are people below me in the world, because it makes me feel more secure? While I have always had black friends, and even family members, they are all financially well off, and do not experience the same reality that most lower class black people are forced to live with. Have I presumed that the killings of these black teens has something to do with their actions as opposed to just their skin color? Coates changed my perception of these issues completely. I believe that whether consciously or subconsciously, young black men are characterized as “thugs” sheerly because of how they dress and the economic status they hold. Their opinion of prejudicial bias is justified by the issues that both they and Coates have faced in dealing with everyday situations and police confrontation. The black race did not choose to feel targeted, they were forced