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Ta-Nehisi Coates

Ta-Nehisi Coates - Ta-Nehisi Coates is a senior editor for The Atlantic, where he writes about culture, politics, and social issues for TheAtlantic.com and the magazine. He is the author of the memoir The Beautiful Struggle. More

Born in 1975, the product of two beautiful parents. Raised in West Baltimore—not quite The Wire, but sometimes ill all the same. Studied at the Mecca for some years in the mid-’90s. Emerged with a purpose, if not a degree. Slowly migrated up the East Coast with a baby and my beloved, until I reached the shores of Harlem. Wrote some stuff along the way.

The arrogance of white America

By Ta-Nehisi Coates
Dec 19 2008, 2:20 PM ET Comment

From long-time poster Stacy:

I'm confused. I thought the 'electric slide' was about the whitest thing you could do. It sure seems that way at every family wedding I've ever been to. Black people don't line dance, do they?
Yeah sure, steal from us and then lie about who you stole it from. Fuckers. This reminds of that scene in Back To The Future, where Michael J. Fox "teaches" Chuck Berry how to play the guitar. Or like people coming here to tell me that there was nothing "black" about the fist-bump. Damn right there's nothing black about the "fist-bump"--we don't invent slang that sounds like it looks. It's called dap, motherfuckers. A pound, if you must. Ya'll got me calling that shit a "fist-bump."

Damn you post-racialism. Damn you to hell. And damn you Stacy. You can forget about that ghetto pass--and that Muslim Sleeping Pill.


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