Cornel West

So don't confuse prophetic fightback with progressive do-good activity. We need examples of persons willing to speak the truth. The condition of truth is always to allow suffering to speak, and in my tradition—going back to the blues artists of Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith, jazz musicians like Sarah Vaughn, and Mary Lou Williams, and John Coltrane, and Miles Davis, and Duke Ellington, and Count Basie—there is a soulful kenosis that sits at the center of prophetic fightback. Prophetic fightback has to do with the fundamental orientation of your soul, the very core of your being, and the soulful kenosis that you hear in a Sam Cooke or an Aretha Franklin...which is a courageous, creative, unflinching look at catastrophe: “cause the blues are produced by people on intimate terms with catastrophe.” That's what Ralph Ellison said, didn't he?...We look catastrophe in the face, no denial, no evasion, no myths of innocence, no self-righteousness, and say maybe together — and this is where religion plays a fundamental role — let us be honest.

Cornel West