“What white people have to do is try to find out in their own hearts, why it was necessary to have a ‘nigger’ in the first place. Because I’m not a nigger, I’m a man. … The question the white population of this country has got to ask itself … if I’m not the nigger here, and you (the white people) invented him, then you’ve got to find out why. And the future of the country depends on that, whether or not it’s able to ask that question.” – James Baldwin
My birth name is Mahershalalhashbaz Gilmore. In the Bible, that’s the name of the prophet Isaiah’s second son. He was instructed to write the name in capital letters on a rock, and it means “divine restoration” or “speedy to the spoils.” (x)
