Ta-Nehisi Coates Quotes

He beat me like he beat the children. Cept he don't never hardly beat them. He say, Celie, git the belt. The children be outside the room peeking through the cracks. It all I can do not to cry. I make myself wood. I say to myself, Celie, you a tree. That's how come I know trees fear man.

I loved my parents... but that can never change the fact that my father's violence ruined my childhood.

My mother was the most wicked mother ever seen in life when it came to beating. Oh-la-la! Every time I would say, 'This is the end of me.' Oh, how she would beat me.

It's extraordinary what children put up with. I happened to see two of my uncles put my father up against the wall of my grandmother's house and knock his teeth out, because he'd been unpleasant to my mother. The next day I went upstairs and found my father making a rather half-hearted attempt to gas himself.

Abuse is the means in which violence retards love.

I was physically abused and I retaliated.

The only thing my old man ever gave me was a beating.

Mother beat the hell out of us. She'd have wild outbursts.

I was brought up in a very poor and very violent household. I spent much of my childhood being afraid.

My mother would beat me so bad, I wouldn't be able to sit down. And I would never snitch.

Where does discipline end? Where does cruelty begin? Somewhere between these, thousands of children inhabit a voiceless hell.

Those who are beaten become beaters.

I ran away. I kept running away. Almost once a week, I'd run away from those schools. They'd catch me. They'd bring me back to the school, beat me. And it was - it was terrible.

No matter how much poverty you grow up with, you shouldn't be subjected to violence and abuse.

I was so scared of my father. He'd pull up in his truck and start looking for something I'd done wrong. There was no escape, no excuse, no way out of nothing.

Do you know what happened the last time I loved someone?” Growled against my skin with such tempered violence that my shiver turned into a shudder. I nodded. “No you don’t.” Another lethal growl. “You only know how she died. Let me tell you how she lived— in fear. My actions horrified her, as they horrify you. My enemies exploited her, as they exploit you, so it was more than an advancing army that made her throw herself from our roof. It was me.

Here stands a girl clutching a knife. There is grease on the stove, blood in the air, and angry words piled in the corners. We are trained not to see it, not to see any of it. . . . Someone just ripped off my eyelids.

It's shocking that so many children still live in fear as a result of violence in the home, and don't know who to turn to for help and support. As a child survivor of domestic violence I can remember the fear and isolation. I'm delighted to support the Hideout, the new Women's Aid website for children and young people. I know it could have made a real difference to me and will provide great comfort and support to thousands of children.

I find that truly heartbreaking that, like, it's such a common, constant thing in people's lives - a brutal abuse of people by other people, and it's just accepted.

My childhood ended in this horrible way. I lived in a country where I didn't trust anybody.

Men who have been raised violently have every reason to believe it is appropriate for them to control others through violence; they feel no compunction over being violent to women, children, and one another.

I don't even like to talk about it. I hated being a number and not merely because I was a very small one. I let them bellow at me for just as long as it took me to find enough pluck to bellow back at them.

Rape, mutilation, abuse, and theft are the natural outcome of a world in which force rules, in which human beings are objects.

My parents had this relationship that was really terrifying. I mean, the level of hatred that they had, and the level of physical abuse - my mother would beat up my father, basically - and I think I was drawn to images on television that were bright and reflective.

You know, what we do know is that there is a high frequency of violence in the home of those who bully.