“I was a curious boy, but the schools were not concerned with curiosity. They were concerned with compliance. I loved a few of my teachers. But I cannot say that I truly believed any of them.”
― Between the World and Me
― Between the World and Me
“The point of this language of “intention” and “personal responsibility” is broad exoneration. Mistakes were made. Bodies were broken. People were enslaved. We meant well. We tried our best. “Good intention” is a hall pass through history, a sleeping pill that ensures the Dream.”
― Between the World and Me
― Between the World and Me
“I would not have you descend into your own dream. I would have you be a conscious citizen of this terrible and beautiful world.”
― Between the World and Me
― Between the World and Me
“But race is the child of racism, not the father. And the process of naming “the people” has never been a matter of genealogy and physiognomy so much as one of hierarchy. Difference in hue and hair is old. But the belief in the preeminence of hue and hair, the notion that these factors can correctly organize a society and that they signify deeper attributes, which are indelible—this is the new idea at the heart of these new people who have been brought up hopelessly, tragically, deceitfully, to believe that they are white.”
― Between the World and Me
― Between the World and Me
“Black people love their children with a kind of obsession. You are all we have, and you come to us endangered.”
― Between the World and Me
― Between the World and Me
Patrick’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Patrick’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
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