this week’s reading is The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
We have lived under a class of people who ruled American culture with a flaming cross for so long that we regularly cease to notice the import of being ruled at all. But they do not. And so the Redeemers of this age look out and see their kingdom besieged by trans Barbies, Muslim mutants, daughters dating daughters, sons trick-or-treating as Wakandan kings. The fear instilled by this rising culture is not for what it does today but what it augurs for tomorrow—a different world in which the boundaries of humanity are not so easily drawn and enforced. In this context, the Mom for Liberty shrieking “Think of the children!” must be taken seriously. What she is saying is that her right to the America she knows, her right to the biggest and greenest of lawns, to the most hulking and sturdiest SUVs, to an arsenal of infinite AR-15s, rests on a hierarchy, on an order, helpfully explained and sanctified by her country’s ideas, art, and methods of education.
I’m 1’39" into the audiobook (read by the author), and so far, two things stand out (short of the atrocious audio editing … every seam is very visible on account of leveling): his is the most compelling writing voice I’ve run into in decades …
Because he uses my cadence and idiolect. Slightly more prone to shorter sentences, but as it’s an audiobook; who knows how many semicolons are in there?
I realize this sounds narcissistic as hell, but seriously, for those who’ve gotten to know me over the past couple of years, is this not like, “Yeah, Pete could have totally written this were he Black”? And the parallels. First few were like “OK, we all have shared experiences.” Then it’s like “college journalist seeking to bring new writers into the craft” – exactly the fucking way I’d say it. He throws adverbs as I do and throws throat-clearing clauses in exactly the same places. It’s honestly really fucking weird.