Cornel West: Reason Confederate Flag Still Exists Is ‘Legacy of White Supremacy’

‘the issue of white supremacy is deep into our culture and Republicans and also Democrats run away from taking that legacy’

HARLOW: "There's been a lot of talk about sort of how a lot of these GOP members of the party running for president are responding. What do you want to see from some of these Democrats who are running?"
WEST: "Well, just to tell the truth and say, look, you can't talk about wealth and inequality, you can't talk about the credit education, you can't talk about massive unemployment and under employment and you can't talk about drones being dropped on people in other parts of the world without talking about white supremacy and its ways in which it operates. It doesn't have to be overt. The president is right about that. But too many black people are Nigerized (ph). I would say the first black president has become the first Nigerized black president. Why? --"
HARLOW: "What do you mean by that?"
WEST: "A nigerized black person is a black person who is afraid and scared and intimidated when it comes to putting a spotlight on white supremacy and fighting against white supremacy. So when many of us will say, we have to fight against racism, what were we told? No, he can't deal with racism because he has other issues, he has political calculations, he is the president of all America, not just black America. We know he is president of all America but white supremacy is American as cherry pie. We're talking about moral issues, spiritual issues. White supremacy has nothing to do with just skin pigmentation, it has to be with what kind of person you want to be. What kind of nation we want to be. Democrats and Republicans play on both of those parties in terms of running away from the vicious legacy of white supremacy until it hits us hard. Thank God for Ferguson, thank God for the young folk of all colors, thank God for Staten Island and fighting there, thank God in Baltimore, now the precious folk in Charleston. But keep in mind this and I want to end on this, too that when we talk about forgiveness, you notice how quick the white press wants to accent black people forgiving? Forgiving is not an utterance. It's a process. We are a loving people. We taught the world so much about love because we've been hated so. But to forgive a day or so after, something wrong with that. That's a twist of sympathy and a pathological empathy you forgiven as you have worked it through. You just make sure you don't hate. That's the key. Don't hate. Forgiveness comes later. But the press wants to accent forgiveness. We are fighting people as well as forgiving people."

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