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Hyperbole
Explanation and Analysis—Because You're Black:
Ida loses her composure while speaking to Cass about how prejudiced White people are, exposing her frustration with a system she believes has deceived and confined Black people for too long. She uses hyperbole and a metaphor to drive her point home:
They keep you here because you’re black [...] while they go around jerking themselves off with all that jazz about the land of the free and the home of the brave. And they want you to jerk yourself off with that same music, too, only, keep your distance. Some days, honey, I wish I could turn myself into one big fist and grind this miserable country to powder. Some days, I don’t believe it has a right to exist.
Ida metaphorically turns all White people in America into a monolith here, telling Cass that they “keep” her in Black neighborhoods to control and subjugate her. The hyperbole she uses compares White America's self-satisfied, ignorant ideas about “freedom” to masturbation. In Ida’s mind, White people self-congratulate themselves about “freedom” while still subjugating their Black neighbors. What’s worse is that they expect Black people to do the same, but simultaneously want them to stay far away from White spaces. Whiteness, as she perceives it, exploits Black creativity and innovation while refusing any actual inclusion. This makes her so furious that she employs another hyperbolic metaphor, saying she wishes she could “grind this miserable country to powder” by turning into a “big fist.” Of course, this isn’t actually possible, but Ida is so angry that all she wants to do is destroy the systems that limit and hurt her.
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