Literary Analysis Essay
“And you have seen men in uniform drive-by and murder Tamir Rice, a twelve-year-old whom they were oath-bound to protect.”(Coates 9). This sentence puts the meaning of innocence into the eye of many people. A majority of the people are afraid to face the reality of what was occurring those times. Innocent people gunned down every day by their supposed protectors. Talk about a double edged sword. Through the eyes of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s younger self, he describes the tragic murders of innocent people at the hands of people who don't even consider them equal. He depicts how people just glaze over them as if they had done something to deserve it.
As Ta-Nehisi Coates recounts his childhood, He entails how there would be no question about the murders of young black people. He tells the tale of how officers of the law destroyed your body and were faced with no consequences when he
…show more content…
“A white woman pushed you and said said, “Come on!”...”(Coates 94) This is the thing that sent Ta-Nehisi over his limit. He recalls exploding on the woman, but then he is the one that is threatened. He did what any normal parent would do and protected his child, yet he was put in the blast of accusation. He recalls people saying “I could have you arrested!”(Coates 95) He compares this threat as them saying that they could “take your body”(Coates 95) He illustrates this when he says:
But you are human and you will make mistakes. You will misjudge. You will yell. You will drink too much. You will hang out with people you shouldn't. Not all of us can always be Jackie Robinson - not even Jackie Robinson was always Jackie Robinson. But the price of error is higher for you than it is for your countrymen, and so that America might justify itself, the story of a black body’s destruction must always begin with his or her error, real or imagined - with Eric Garner’s anger, with