How Society Views Color
Coate’s central message about living in a black body is crucial for him to tell his son because he feels that it is pertinent for his survival in todays day and age in society. He begins by telling his story about the strength and knowledge it took to grow up in the streets of West Baltimore. He emphasizes the importance of learning from an early age the importance of recognizing that the color of your skin will affect how society and this country view and treat you. Coate says “What I told you is what your grandparents tried to tell me: that this is your country, that this is your world, that this is your body, and you must find some way to live within the all of it.” What he is trying to achieve from writing this to his son is that he will understand the importance of recognizing the color of his skin and the risk it imposes while living in America.
He hopes that his son will be able to understand certain aspects of his upbringing such as getting in trouble for minor things or being afraid of being belted by his father. He does this by stating “I know is, the violence rose from the fear like smoke from a fire, and I cannot say whether that violence, even administered in fear and love, sounded the alarm or choked us at the exit. What I know is that fathers who slammed their teenage boys for sass would then release them to streets where their boys employed, and were subject to, the same justice. And I knew mothers who belted their girls, but the belt could not save these girls from drug dealers twice their age.” Being a person of color and living in the United States in todays day and age require you to prepare for certain precautions that a white person would never have to worry about.
All of these precautions and the way that people of color are portrayed in the media cause a person of color to view the color of their skin as a burden instead of appreciating the beauty of their culture. “And so the beauty of the black body was never celebrated in movies, on television shows, or in the textbooks I’d seen as a child. Everyone of any import, from Jesus to George Washington, was white”. When all you see on TV and in the movies is negativity about your race, it is no surprise to me that Coate states that they are never able to truly appreciate the beauty of their own culture. “It is terrible to truly see our particular beauty, Samori, because then you see the scope of the loss. But you must push even further. You must see that this loss is mandated by the history of your country, by the Dream of living white.”
What Coate intends to say by the idea of “the dream of living white” is that it can only be accomplished by white people; its parameters are not made to allow people of color to succeed. He believes that this country, from the beginning of its creation, has created a society where black people are not able to succeed and prosper simply because of the color of their skin. “Here is what I would like for you to know: In America, it is traditional to destroy the black body — it is heritage. Enslavement was not merely the antiseptic borrowing of labor — it is not so easy to get a human being to commit their body against its own elemental interest. And so enslavement must be casual wrath and random manglings, the gashing of heads and brains blown out over the river as the body seeks to escape.”
Coate’s desire to share these truths with his son relate to Rauch’s story because Rauch experienced a traumatic upbringing which emphasized how he acted as an adult. His actions as an adult resulted in his incarceration which is what Coate says is the goal for the American system. It has always been important for him to care for animals because he states that he communicates with them better than he does with people. He says that sometimes he feels like he knows what an animal is feeling and whether it is depressed, happy of scared. He states “I take care of animals because they teach me what I can’t learn from people. Its unconditional affection and appreciation”. What this says about our shared human condition and suffering is that it is sad that some people feel a stronger connection to animals than humans. The fact that humans feel like they cannot make a connection with one another is an example of how normalized oppression is in this country.
These structural issues affect the children that I work with at Canal Alliance because due to the issues that they face, they feel like they cannot relate to anyone else. With what our own President says about their race in the media, it is no wonder some of them even feel ashamed to be who they are. They feel that they are viewed as less than other races in this country just as Coate states. Because of their immigration status, this country views them and their families of not worthy of the “dream of living white”. They have to work two times as hard to try and make a life in this country and move on up. With the current systems in place, it is no wonder so many people of color end up dropping out of school or in jail. The fear of deportation is a though that is very active and constant in their minds. A parent who fears deportation may one day have to write a letter which has instructions on what to do if they are ever deported. No child should ever have to open a letter like that or be put in that situation but, in America it is one of the things that happens everyday. This is a country that has certain structures in place that are meant to stop people of color from succeeding or making a life in this county.
