Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote ‘The Case for Reparations,’ featured in The Atlantic in 2014. The essay examines housing discrimination and institutional racism from the perspective of those who have faced it and the catastrophic consequences for the African-American generations. Although Coates’s emphatic writing style might repulse some people, the use of evidence and logical construction of his argument in the essay allows him to respond to his opponents with clarity and conciseness.
Coates’ style might be extravagant for people who prefer concise and neutral speech, but it does not make his argument weak. He employs phrases such as “the sway of cotton kings,” which is hyperbolic (Coates, para. 3). This language does not repulse one since it is used for a more significant effect. Moreover, Coates’ reparations argument is based on a causal relationship between slavery and its consequences, which is convincingly supported by quantitative evidence (Coates). Thus, the author’s essay presents a good case for argumentation with evidence and logic employed.
However, one might have opposing arguments, which could be evaluated. For example, Feagin claims that since the socioeconomic status of the Black population has enhanced, there no longer remains a need for such an initiative. To this, Coates would respond that even now, “Chicago, like the country at large, embraced policies that placed black America’s… countrymen beyond the pale of society and marked them as rightful targets for legal theft” (Coates, para. 71). In the article “The Case For—and Against—Reparations,” it is also argued that reparations would rip the black people of their responsibility. However, Coates would counterargue that there are no resources for such a responsibility when blacks still face the consequences of slavery.
To conclude, Coates’s writing is argumentatively strong, employs sufficient evidence, and presents grounds for counterarguments. Slavery harmed the perception of blackness for the rest of the time. Black people have historically been undervalued, treated like objects, and prejudiced against. Slavery is a component of history that all black people must bear. There is no number of dollars or advantages that America can bestow on black people that will compensate for what it has forcibly removed. That, however, does not need to be the narrative’s conclusion.
Works Cited
“The Case For—and Against—Reparations.”WSJ, 2019.
Coates, Ta-Nehisi. “The Case for Reparations by Ta-Nehisi Coates.”The Atlantic, 2022.
Feagin, Joe. “The Case for African American Reparations, Explained.”The Conversation, 2019.