Topic > The vile effects of fear in Between the World and Me, a book by Ta-nehisi Coates

Introduction and abstract In the book Between the World and Me, author Ta-Nehisi Coates works to explore the longstanding violence in the United States United States and progress in providing advice on how victims can respond. In the form of a letter to his teenage son, author Ta-Nehisi Coates works to inform about the risks, dangers, and social distortions that come with being an African American in the United States. His message to his son conceives of a belief supported by first-hand accounts, as well as current events involving police brutality, that being black in the Westernized (or Western-governed) hemispheres of society is a disability, a danger to the well-being of a black individual and a prohibition on the social prosperity of a black individual. This however is due to the root cause of general fear. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay The violence he observes in his memoirs refers to acts of aggression within the black community throughout the history of the United States, but even more violence has followed African Americans throughout the life of the country. From the violence that followed slaves in America's early days, to the police brutality and injustice that persists today, Coates evokes the message to his son, and to the reader, that violence is the root cause of American education, and yet plus its only cause. existence. Violence is America's legs, its back and its support. Coates argues that America, or more precisely, white America, built on the labor of African slaves, is a proven product of human labor and still depends on the mistreatment of man in another form. This current addiction is homeland security violence, brutality, and murders of African Americans. A security that turns out to be false. With this violence against innocent African Americans the supposed security of white America is kept active; his security against the fear that the power resulting from a false hierarchy could be defeated. In turn, these acts, after the presence of the African slaves and their mistreatment, brought out further fear. This other fear weighs on the shoulders of African Americans and, equally, causes violence within the same population. African Americans, for fear of losing themselves, showed violence and aggression, threatening and fighting, across different community and family areas of their population. Coates makes these points to his son throughout his book, providing examples where he was made aware of this fear-induced violence throughout his life. As we explore his message to his son, we will show verbatim the ways in which Coates alludes to this violence and fear, and ultimately the ways in which he advises his son (and presumably related readers) to exist in this world that blindly hates him . In Coates' message to his son, he recalls a statement made by Malcolm X, in which the civil rights leader said, "If you're black, you were born in prison." Coates makes it clear that he shares this view, explaining that being black in the United States means having no protection on your body. Violence and Aggression in America First of all, Coates makes note of this fear and violence, having been triggered by the enslavement of Africans, when he begins his message. He describes to his son a recent interview he was involved in, and in this interview he profoundly states that the answer to why he believes the United States is built on violence, pointing out that the reasoning is simplistic and rather good-naturedsense. For Coates anyone could look back at history and see the way the United States was built entirely on a violent hierarchy that left blacks worse off than whites. This is indicated by Coates when he exaggerates the sadness he felt when asked why he thinks this way. Coates's polite ways show how easy it should be for all Americans, both black and white, to see why. The enslavement of Africans is not uncommon and has not gone unnoticed in academic institutions. Coates explains it by starting: “the host wanted to know why I believed that the progress of white America, or rather the progress of those Americans who believe they are white, was built on plunder and violence. Hearing this, I felt an ancient and indistinct sadness grow within me. The exact reasons for Coates' feelings are not made clear until later in the section. Coates simply states, “The answer is American history,” but later makes aware of his reasons to explain that white Americans have willfully walked blind to the obvious truth that America was built on the backs of African slaves. And while their democracy allows them to walk in the face of the truth, their democracy has also granted them superiority as white people, and thus allowed them to remain blind to this specific truth. Coates proclaims this explanation: “There is nothing extreme in this statement. Americans deify democracy in a way that leaves room for a vague awareness that they have, from time to time, defied their God. But democracy is a forgiving God, and American heresies – torture, theft, slavery – are so common between individuals and nations that no one can declare himself immune. slavery when he says “slavery,” and white Americans when he says “Americans,” further analysis of the cases in his writings will allow us to see this. Next, Coates begins to explain the fear of white Americans; the fear they had of losing power and social pride. This is the cause of the violence attributed to America's education. Coates explains that the hierarchy established by early Europeans was unnatural and stemmed rather from a desire for power and pride. Europeans believed that white skin was superior to black skin, but before that the only rational view/reaction to color difference was indifference to color difference; an oxymoron. Coates recalls this oxymoron when he explains that “the process of naming 'the people' has never been a question of genealogy and physiognomy so much as a question of hierarchy. The difference in shade and hair is old. But the belief in the pre-eminence of hue and hair, the idea that these factors can properly 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 raised without hope , tragically, tricked into believing they were white. . These rational subcategories were recognized as separate entities, without any affiliation with whiteness, before the deceptive hierarchy. Coates states this when he observes: “These new people are, like us, a modern invention. But unlike us, their new name has no real meaning, separate from the machinery of criminal power. The new people were something else before they were white: Catholic, Corsican, Welsh, Mennonite, Jewish…” For the first time in his text, Coates makes it clear that the slavery that built America was specifically that of Africans. It alludes to the imprisonment, mistreatment, rape and murder of African slaves, and the inferior vision thatWhite Americans had it on them when he explains that “the elevation of the belief in whiteness was not achieved through wine tastings and ice cream socials, but rather through the plundering of life, liberty, work, and land; through the flaying of the backs; the linking of the limbs; the strangling of dissidents; the destruction of families; the rape of mothers; the sale of children; and various other acts designed, first and foremost, to deny you and me this right to protect and govern our bodies." (Coates) With the creation of white Americans, came African Americans or black Americans. And with the offensive view towards black Americans, came a fear among white Americans. Before this, of course, Africans were divided into subcategories. This fear is based on the belief that white Americans (from their perspective), without the presence of African slaves to lead the country, and with the potential progress that African Americans could make given freedom from slavery and the unequal rights that end result, white Americans would lose their superior status, their false identity. White Americans' identity is based on their hierarchical status, not their true ethnicity (whether Jewish, Welsh, Catholic, or otherwise). This in turn, as Coates explained, was originally initiated by the devaluation of the social status of the original African slaves. Today, with the social advancement of African Americans having a greater chance of becoming a common phenomenon, white Americans, especially part of national security, have worked to find some reason to kill black Americans. Coates takes note of this when he explains to his son how the American police are heavily adopting this strategy. Coates alludes to several unjustifiable cases involving police brutality and innocent African Americans, including the murder of innocent Eric Garner, John Crawford, Tamir Rice, and Marlene Pinnock. He writes: "I am writing to you because this was the year you saw Eric Garner choked." to death for selling cigarettes; because now you know that Renisha McBride was killed while looking for help, that John Crawford was killed while browsing in a department store. And you saw men in uniform come through and kill Tamir Rice, a twelve-year-old boy they were sworn to protect. And you saw men in the same uniforms punch Marlene Pinnock, someone's grandmother, on the side of a road. And now you know, if you didn't know before, that the police departments of your country have been given the authority to destroy your body." Coates states here that the police have been given the authority to willfully profile black Americans and to kill them based on their own faulty judgment. This long-standing violence against Black Americans has in turn created further fear, particularly within the rational Black American population your essence and citizenship (exhibited as “body” by Coates) are immediately put in jeopardy the moment you are born This concept has been evident within the black community and shown through Coates's experiences he explains to his son that growing up he experienced parental aggression and community tension. Within his community, parents expressed violence by threatening their children. Black children were beaten by their parents simply for making senseless mistakes. The source of this beating, Coates notes, was the fear parents felt about losing their children to police brutality. The beating was done to keep young black men from straying too far from safety and security,.