Allee

“Into this maelstrom, this present elaboration of the slave quarters, this rehearsal for a concentration camp, we place, armed, not for the protection of the ghetto but for the protection of American investments there, some blank American boy who is responsible only to some equally blank elder patriot… The white cop in the ghetto is as ignorant as he is frightened, and his entire concept of police work is to cow the natives. He is not compelled to answer these natives for anything he does; whatever he does, he knows that he will be protected by his brothers, who will allow nothing to stain the honor of the force. And he is assured of the rightness of his court and the justice of his bigotry every time Nixon, or Agnew, or Mitchell - or the governor of the state of California - open their mouths.”
― James Baldwin, No Name in the Street

“Despite all these boys, I was still alone. We were all within a few hundred feet of each other, in our beds, on our phones, reaching out to strangers, all bound by this same fate, and yet I felt like there wasn’t another soul for years and miles.”
― Santiago Jose Sanchez, Hombrecito

“What would my parents tell me now? Your intentions and your actions must always match, Daiyu. I want to be thick and strong and straight, my lines as black as ink, my corners sharp and neat. I want to be someone I can be proud of. Not someone ruled by fate, but someone who can be certain that her life is a result of the choices she has made. This is the kind of person I want to be: the perfect line.”
― Jenny Tinghui Zhang

“If one really wishes to know how justice is administered in a country, one does not question the policeman, the lawyers, the judges, or the protected members of the middle class. One goes to the unprotected - those, precisely, who need the law’s protection the most! - and listens to their testimony. Ask any Mexican, any Puerto Rican, any black man, any poor person - ask the wretched how they fare in the halls of justice, and then you will know, not whether or not the country is just, but whether or not it has any love for justice, or any concept of it.”
― James Baldwin, No Name in the Street