Baldwin describes his former home in Harlem and the problems facing communities like his within the national context of racism and discrimination. A housing project stands where his old house once stood. This community, filled with people who watched him grow up and hordes of children, faces extreme poverty. Many of the houses are vacant. Gang violence and drugs have infiltrated families and schools. Many people have been affected by the loss of loved ones to World War II, police brutality, overdoses, and other hardships. Baldwin explains that white Northerners are quick to admonish Southern racism while ignoring their own.

The people in communities like Harlem handle their emotions in different ways. Some live in bitterness. Others give up. Some travel each day to white areas of the city to work, only to return at the end of the day to struggle. Baldwin rejects the idea that the success of a few Black men is indicative of the ability to achieve upward mobility: “The determined will is rare—at the moment, in this country, it is unspeakably rare—and the inequalities suffered by the many are in no way justified by the rise of a few” (61).