Ben uzun süre James Baldwin'i babam sanarak yaşadım.

”Well I know this, and anyone who’s ever tried to live like this. Now, what you say about somebody else – anybody else – reveals you. What I think of you as being is dictated by my own necessity, my own psychology, my own fears and desires. I’m not describing you when I talk about you, I’m describing me. Now, here in this country, we’ve got something called a ‘nigger’. Who doesn’t in such terms, I beg you to remark, exist in any other country in the world. We have invented the nigger. I didn’t invent it. White people invented it. I’ve always known – I had to know by the time I was seventeen years old – that what you were describing was not me and what you were afraid of was not me. It had to be something else. You had invented it so it had to be something you were afraid of. And you invested me with it. Now if that’s so, no matter what you turn to me, I can say this – and I mean it. I know you can’t do any more and I’ve got nothing to lose. And I know and I have always known – and really always. And that’s part of the agony. I’ve always known that I am not a nigger. But if I am not the nigger, and if it’s true that your invention reveals you, than who is the nigger? I am not the victim here. I know one thing from another. I know that I was born, I’m going to suffer and I’m going to die. And the only way to get through life is to know the worst things about it. I know that a person is more important than anything else. Anthing else. I’ve learned this because I’ve had to learn it. But you still think, I gather, that the nigger is necessary. Well, it’s unnecessary to me so it must be necessary to you. So I’ll give you your problem back. You’re the nigger, baby, it isn’t me.”