02-17-2019
In the article, Coates explains how the American Dream was built on the destruction of black bodies. As he speaks throughout the article, he gives many different descriptions of those who were harmed for being black. “And you have seen men in the same uniform pummel Merlene Pinnock, someone’s grandmother on the side of a road, that the police departments of your country have been endowed with the authority to destroy your body.”(P.9) This quote explains how the higher authority is trying to destroy those bodies are black. Another quote that has relevance to the destruction of black bodies is, “… I knew that there was a ritual to a street fight, bylaws, and codes that, in their very need, attended to all the vulnerability of the black teenage bodies.”(P.15) .This shows that teens who are black are more vulnerable to the destruction of their own body. They know that as they step out of their front door they are more vulnerable compared to others around them.
On page 7, Coates uses the quotes “But race is the child of racism, not the father.”. By this quote, he is responding that race is not something that is new. It is something that has been going on throughout America since the beginning. He states “Americans believe in the reality of the ‘race’ as a defined, indubitable feature of the natural world”(P.7). Race is something that is passed on through generations. He believes that judgment against race is “natural” to anyone. As he talks throughout the article to his son, he describes that no matter where you go you will either face racism or see it happening. To go with this Coates adds, “But democracy is a forgiving God and America’s heresies-torture, theft, enslavement-are so common among individuals and nations that none can declare themselves immune”(P.6). This quote explains how people who see or are judged for their race are immune to them. Coates whats his reader to understand the racism is something that is not new and people have been facing with it since they came into this country. He also wants people to understand that racism is something that people are immune to. However, in my opinion, I believe that is something that people should be immune to.
