The Struggle for a Better World Prior to reading Between the World and Me , I was under the impression that everyone collectively would be responsible for “the birth of a better world”. But when Coates tells his son that “a better world is not ultimately up to you,'' he is referring to the fact that it is ultimately up to the wealthy Americans in power that refer to themselves at white, and that young black men (like Samori) are not able to make such advances in life. In the beginning of the novel, the Ta-Nehisi Coates describes his recollection of an interview with a popular news show host. Coates says that she asked him about his body, but soon after asks about “hope”, as he discloses that “I knew that I had failed” (10). The news host is almost completely disregarding the words he had supplied for her previous question. His ideas of how America is and always has been white America don’t go through to her. She seems to be convinced that the prejudice towards African-Am