When I say what I’d like to see happening amongst black young people I’d like to see them stop blaming themselves for the set of circumstances in which they find themselves in. One of the things I really dislike is when black young people will say, “Well if we were more motivated or if we listened better in class”… I’ve just encountered so many privileged young white people who don’t do that to themselves. Who get high and come to class and become supreme court justices. Because they have the sense that they have the right as young people to fail sometimes, to be experimental, to be young, to move through the world. So I mean I think that’s part of it. I hate how much we police black young people and encourage black young people to police themselves.

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Melissa Harris-Perry

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