From Ta-Nehisi Coates:

We have too much faith in talk,—or rather we have too much faith in big men to control events through talk. The obsession with a “dialouge around race” is nauseating. I can’t tell if it’s real, or just a notion that (much like “postracial”) that cable news hosts put to their guests. But it’s an extension of this notion that Barack Obama created this America we see right now, as opposed to him being a product of it.

I’ve had many “teachable moments” around race in the past fifteen years. Very few of them have been inaugurated from up on high. No president could teach me what I learned walking down Broadway to Canal Street, what I learned out on Flatbush. At least not through words.

We have become obsessed with talking. Everywhere you look someone’s talking. We need more listening, more watching, more reflection, and more time alone. One of the reasons I tossed the TV was because I felt like having it the house, was like having a friend over who wouldn’t shut the f— up. Or rather I was unwilling to make him shut the f— up.

IMAGE: Mrs. Evie Bellamy (Life)