Why Obama's Comments About Race in His Farewell Speech Were So Damn Important

President Barack Obama delivered the last official speech of his administration on Tuesday, and it was one only he could have pulled off. As the nation's first black president, Obama spent a considerable amount of time addressing race in America — an unprecedented move coming from a commander in chief.

Few presidents have spoken so honestly about race in America, largely because no president before Obama has understood the struggles of living as a person of color in our country; presidents before Obama also relied on white constituencies for election. By confronting race so frankly, Obama vocalized what marginalized people have longed to hear from a president since the office's inception.

Acknowledging the idea that America entered a "postracial" epoch after his election, Obama conceded that "was never realistic." He continued bluntly and honestly, saying, "Race remains a potent and often divisive force in our society." The fact that discrimination remains rampant in America is undeniable, however much society has progressed: black men are feared by police, immigrants are vilified, and how people choose to look can be criminal.

Discrimination is not only unjust, it also cripples America. "If we're unwilling to invest in the children of immigrants just because they don't look like us," Obama stressed, "we will diminish the prospects of our own children because those brown kids will represent a larger and larger share of America's workforce."

Obama also poignantly described the historic, systematic barriers that prevent the black and brown community from succeeding and the importance of understanding their pain when they protest every time one of their own is killed because of the color of their skin. "For white Americans, it means acknowledging that the effects of slavery and Jim Crow didn't suddenly vanish in the '60s," he said. "When minority groups voice discontent, they're not just engaging in reverse racism or practicing political correctness; that when they wage peaceful protest, they're not demanding special treatment, but the equal treatment our founders promised."

While this is not the first time Obama has spoken candidly about race as president, it will be the last and perhaps most remembered. The time he spent discussing equality is crucial, especially at this historic moment when such a divisive president is about to take office.

"But laws alone won't be enough," Obama said, inflecting the personal rather than political. "Hearts must change. They won't change overnight. Social attitudes oftentimes take generations to change."

Obama was also adamant about how Americans must react to the abject, perpetually widening gap between left and right. "Regardless of the station we occupy, we have to try harder," he added. "We all have to start with the premise that each of our fellow citizens loves this country just as much as we do, that they value hard work and family just like we do."

In a few weeks, Donald Trump will be sworn in as president of the United States, but his inauguration does not signify the end of progress. In spite of his distressing intolerance, transparent self-fulfilling motives, and reluctance to accept fact, progress continues — however incremental, as proved by all the women of color who made history when they were elected in November.

When the ever-emphatic Obama took the stage in 2008 on victory night and presented a vision of a unified America, he did not promise it would be immediate. "The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even in one term," the newly elected Obama said. "I promise you, we as a people will get there." And not without setbacks or roadblocks, he cautioned.

Even as he admitted change would be a process, Obama maintained the hope, the audacity of hope, that progress toward racial equality could not be halted. Eight years later, even while Obama admitted American society's overt prejudices, his vision endured.

"For every two steps forward, it often feels we take one step back," he said on Tuesday night. "But the long sweep of America has been defined by forward motion."