Most white folk fail to get this when they ask, "Why don't you just cooperate?" Besides the fact that most of us do cooperate, as countless videos prove, there's the larger issue of how one must suddenly contort one's bodily expressions and fold one's entire history and being into a made-for-white-comfort presentation: the Black person speaks when spoken to, says things loudly enough to be heard but not too loudly. The margin of error is extremely tight in such high-octane situations. It's just all too much.
-- Michael Eric Dyson, Long Time Coming, p. 183
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