Ta-Nehisi Coates’ collection of thoughts composed as a letter to his son in Between the World and Me, provided myself, the white reader, a visceral experience of what it means to be black in America. His open letter seems to be a brief description of all of the trials he has faced in his life, all leading to the moment where he would impart his invaluable knowledge to his son. Coates’ depiction of what it meant to be a black boy when he was growing up in comparison to what his son is facing in today’s society, differs only in details, but the overwhelming fear of not having control over one’s own body remains as a the connecting factor. However, what I found most surprising from Coates narrative was my ability to understand the feelings that his words evoked even though I am white. The problems that he described as the reality for his people were not situations that I was unfamiliar with. I was expecting to be shocked by the unknown, but I was not. His experiences in the world that he describes in Between the World and Me, are prime examples of the kinds of events that we, as a society pretend to know nothing about.
To think that society sincerely does not know of the atrocities that are occurring all across our country is naïve and intentional. Society is very much aware of what is going on, the truth is that they do not care because they are not directly affected. The amount of effort that goes into silencing those who are able to turn their frustration into expression and speak out against their oppressor is criminal. Silence is a tool of the oppressor, it is the preferred method to perpetuate the acceptance of injustice within our society. This silence just increases the disconnectedness that so many claim as their defense. The “I had no idea” excuse should no longer be an acceptable answer.
Our silence as a culture is what allows the environment that Coates speaks out about Between the World and Me to exist. An example of an environment that perpetuates failure is the comparison between the schools and the streets are both places where injustice occurs. Both places are where blacks lose control of their body by outside forces or “arms of the same beast” that destroy the body, that society is ultimately responsible for creating (Coates, p. 33). If a black child fails in the streets, he is overtaken by those who see him weakening; however if a black child fails at school he is forced back to the streets again. The inevitable misfortune is chalked up by society by blaming it on the individual’s actions to “drop out”, instead of taking responsibility for creating an environment where success is rarely attained.
But what exactly is success? Does the “American Dream” exist? Coates would argue that the success or the “American Dream” was created from the beginning to be unattainable for blacks and maintained to remain as such. America as a country was built upon the backs of oppression, from the physical infrastructure to the ideas that surround our democratic system. Coates argues that blacks were never meant to be fit into the puzzle we call our country. He states that he wants his son to know, “In America, it is traditional to destroy the black body- it is heritage” (Coates, p. 103).
This heritage that Coates speaks of to his son, can be framed in any social construct that one deems unequal, however he explains America’s foundation of inequality in terms of race. He sums up how society views blacks with a quote by the southern senator John Calhoun. Calhoun regards whites as mountains and the others as the below, blacks are “the below” and without the below there would be no mountain. There has to be an oppressed people for there to be an entity to compare one’s own standard of living to (Coates, p. 105). Since the beginning of America, whites have kept the black people at such a standard of well-being to reinforce their superiority by comparison. While there have been events in this country’s history that have changed many blacks’ lives, the reality is that when comparing the average black man to the average white man there is a striking difference between levels of privilege and prosperity.
The levels of privilege and prosperity correlate with the level of fear present within each individual and the likelihood of fear being present within each community. Fear is a constant theme throughout Coates' letter to his son. His memories are full of fear, justifying his actions and rationalizing his future, but he still hopes that his son can be black without fear. For his son to feel the injustice committed against his race, yet to not accept it, provides hope to Coates that his son will continue to dream and live a life apart from fear. As a father, knowing that he is teaching his son the codes of the world, consciously chose to teach his son that injustice is not inherent to humankind (Coates, p. 125).
While this book addresses the scary reality of blacks who are actively fighting injustice, the concept of fear is an overarching concept that plagues the oppressed people as a whole in this country. Coates' letter to his son was depressing, yet held some seed of hope with the identification of a single emotion that allows for injustice to continue to occur: fear. To say that it is human nature to oppress another is disturbing, however the history of past and present civilizations provide evidence to suggest otherwise. But amongst Coates’ thoughts on injustice, he kept referring back to fear, a basic human emotion, a primal feeling. If somehow society could recognize the fear, ultimately the humanity in one another, could compassion exist leading to the demise of injustice of all?
