Quote 34
I went to see the white folks then and they gave me help. That's what I don't understand. I done the worse thing a man could ever do in his family and instead of chasin' me out of the county, they gimme more help than they ever give any other colored man, no matter how good a nigguh he was…The nigguhs up at the school don't like me, but the white folks treat me fine. (2.254)
In Trueblood's experience, being "good" doesn't get one rewarded, but being bad does. His behavior is celebrated by the white people as justification of their bad opinion, and resented by the black people for giving their race a bad name.
Quote 35
But seriously, because you fail to understand what is happening to you. You cannot see or hear or smell the truth of what you see – and you, looking for destiny! It's classic! And the boy, this automaton, he was made of the very mud of the region and he sees far less than you. Poor stumblers, neither of you can see the other. To you he is a mark on the score-card of your achievement, a thing and not a man; a child, or even less – a black amorphous thing. And you, for all your power are not a man to him, but a God, a force – (3.314)
In the Golden Day, the vet accuses both Mr. Norton and the narrator for feeding the system of racism without thinking of the other race as real people. For all he is as a patient in an insane asylum, the vet has the most insightful commentary on race relations than anyone else in the novel thus far.
Quote 36
N*****, this isn't the time to lie. I'm no white man. Tell me the truth! (6.34)
Dr. Bledsoe employs a double standard when it comes to lying – lying to white men is fine, but not to him.