Between The World And Me Analysis

Innocence. Does it really exist in America? The book written by Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me, was not only written for his son, but for innocence itself. The book’s main idea revolves around the innocence of people who are often convicted of crimes and actions based upon their race, belief or ethnicity, someone who could have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, or even a person who could have just been suspected based on racial profiling and prejudice. In this essay, there will be three types of innocence; weakness, naivety, moral purity. So, how do his allusions and belief of innocence connect? Throughout the book, the author uses allusions and examples that are used to reinforce the theme of innocence. First, I would …show more content…
He states to his son that he needs to “resent the people trying to entrap your body” and continues how it can be destroyed and explains the destroyers. He doesn’t directly point fingers to the “destroyers”, however, he does state that the victims are black people, and how common and old this is for them. So we now understand that there are black people who are innocent, and some of the examples that he decides to use are “Trayvon Martin” (a reference made by the author) for example, who was fatally shot in the chest by a man who claims to have been injured in the confrontation. Then there is Coates continuing what you had to do to defend yourself against that vulnerability, “These were the summonses that you answered with your left foot forward, your right foot back, your hands guarding your face, one slightly lower than the other, cocked like a hammer.” (Coates 7). Continuing with the “destroyers” of innocent citizens, Coates himself describes that at one point when he was threatened (p.19) and he feared the destruction of his body. That was just an example of the many times that Coates has felt that way, just as when he was pulled over by an officer in Prince George’s county (p.75-76). Anyway, the quote above describes how Coates said how you had to act, to adapt your fitness, to learn the streets and how to act and behave on them, because if you didn’t, you assured the …show more content…
Coates seems to push aside the pride in the idea that racial progress is necessary for life in America. He writes, “one cannot, at once, claim to be superhuman and the plead mortal error.” (Coates 8) As he puts it, “American exceptionalism” does not accept weak people or their confessions, for their weaknesses. A way to look at it is that those oin the inside of a circle are the strong who don’t admit to their errors while other who find themselves being honest and innocent are caught outside of the circle. Continuing, this serves as a sort of blinding light for those who are caught inside the circle, thus creating the insider’s own delusions for “The Dreams”, based on their greatness, and most of all, their moral purity. Since we can see that moral purity is connected to the “The Dream”, it can be shown that innocence can be found for those outside the circles, that they have moral purity that gives them their innocence, and the ones that could really be blamed are some of those who are found inside the circle. Think about, what would be more popular on the news, someone dead in the city or a traffic incident around the suburban area? As I have found for myself, a way that I can connect to what the author is saying, is that I learn about more tragic and violent news from the city compared to an aunt who lives in the calm suburban area around Minneapolis, who worries about the next traffic incident that delays her 30-minute commute. Finally,