bringing the heat

"I know the myth tells us that heroes came, looking for freedom; just as the myth tells us that America is full of smiling people. . . . It is, of course, in the very nature of a myth that those who are its victims and, at the same time, its perpetrators, should, by virtue of these two facts, be rendered unable to examine the myth, or even to suspect, much less recognize, that it is a myth which controls and blasts their lives."

 James Baldwin, 1964, from "Nothing Personal" - a collaborative book with Richard Avedon.

The book is hard to find, but here's a link to the full essay (from a different source): http://bit.ly/Sh8D5u