VIDEO: Ta-Nehisi Coates on Police Brutality: The Cameras Are New — Not the Violence

On the occasion of the publication of his new book, “Between the World and Me,” written as a letter to his teenage son, Ta-Nehisi Coates, author and intellectual figure of the Black Lives Matter movement, delivered a stirring talk last summer at Baltimore’s historic Union Baptist Church on the unique violence, fear and difficulty in living suffered by black Americans.

“Democracy Now!” focuses on Coates, his speech and his work in the Nov. 27 broadcast, viewable above and below:

Today we spend the hour with Ta-Nehisi Coates, author of the explosive book about white supremacy and being black in America. Titled “Between the World and Me,” it is written as a letter to his teenage son, Samori. In July, Ta-Nehisi Coates launched the book in his hometown of Baltimore. He spoke at the historic Union Baptist Church. “It seems like there’s a kind of national conversation going on right now about those who are paid to protect us, who sometimes end up inflicting lethal harm upon us,” Coates said. “But for me, this conversation is old, and I’m sure for many of you the conversation is quite old. It’s the cameras that are new. It’s not the violence that’s new.”

Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book, “Between the World and Me,” has been called “required reading” by Toni Morrison. “I’ve been wondering who might fill the intellectual void that plagued me after James Baldwin died. Clearly it is Ta-Nehisi Coates,” Morrison said. “Between the World and Me” is written as a letter to Coates’ 15-year-old son, Samori, and has been compared to “the talk” parents have with their children to prepare them for facing police harassment and brutality. The book is a combination of memoir, history and analysis. In July, Coates came to the Democracy Now! studio to talk about the book and his upbringing in Baltimore.

— Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly.