One Hundred Ninety-Nine

I just read a piece from the New York Magazine entitled The Hard Truths of Ta-Nehisi Coates. It is the sort of thing one should not read early in the morning if one expects the rest of the day, and perhaps the rest of one’s life, to be cheery and full of optimism. Coates’ arguments that structural racism is and always has been and probably always will be firmly entrenched in America are like punches to the gut. But they are, I am afraid, legitimate punches. They are punches launched from years of experience and years of analyzing that experience. I wonder whether, collectively, whites and blacks can ever overcome that intractable reality that Coates suggests continues to permeate our social and political structures. After having read just the New York Magazine piece and not having read Coates’ book, Between the World and Me, I reluctantly tend to think he’s right.