Assata: An Autobiography

by Assata Shakur

We had been completely brainwashed and we didn’t even know it. We accepted white value systems and white standards of beauty and, at times, we accepted the white man’s view of ourselves. We had never been exposed to

any other point of view or any other standard of beauty. From when i was a tot, i can remember Black people saying, “Niggas ain’t shit.” “You know how lazy niggas are.” “Give a nigga an inch and he’ll take a mile.” Everybody knew what “niggas” like to do after they eat: sleep. Everybody knew that “niggas” couldn’t be on time; that’s why there was c.p.t. (colored people’s time). “Niggas don’t take care of nothin’.” “Niggas don’t stick together.” The list could go on and on. To varying degrees we accepted these statements as true. And, to varying degrees, we each made them true within ourselves because we believed them.

The usual way that people are taught to think in amerika is that each subject is in a little compartment and has no relation to any other subject. For the most part, we receive fragments of unrelated knowledge, and our education follows no logical format or pattern. It is exactly this kind of education that produces people who don’t have the ability to think for themselves and who

are easily manipulated.

Every revolution in history has been accomplished by actions, although words are necessary.

The schools we go to are reflections of the society that created them. Nobody is going to give you the education you need to overthrow them. Nobody is going to teach you your true history, teach you your true heroes, if they know that that knowledge will help set you free. Schools in amerika are interested in brainwashing people with amerikanism, giving them a little bit of education, and training them in skills needed to fill the positions the capitalist system requires. As long as we expect amerika’s schools to educate us, we will remain ignorant.

I am hiding my beautiful, nappy hair under this wig and hating it, hiding my stuff to save my life. I, who have had to give up my headwraps and my big, beaded earrings, my dungaree jackets, my red, black, and green poncho, and my long African dresses in order to struggle on another level, look out from under my wig at my sisters. Maybe we are all running and hiding. Maybe we are all running from something, all living a clandestine existence. Surely we are all being oppressed and persecuted. I imagine the headlines: “Nigger Woman Nabbed for Nappy Hair.” “Afro Gal Has Tangled Hair.” “Militant Mom Bares All.” It is really too much to comprehend. Such horrible things have been done to us. A whole generation of Black women hiding out under dead white people’s hair, I have the urge to cry, but i don’t. It would draw attention. I keep from getting up until my stop comes. I pray and struggle for the day when we can all come out from under these wigs.

I’m not saying that we shouldn’t feel anything, but decisions can’t be based on love or on anger. They have to be based on the objective conditions and on what is the rational, unemotional thing to do.

“You can’t win a race just by running,” my mother told me when i was little. “You have to talk to yourself.” “Huh?” i had asked. “You have to talk to yourself when you are running and tell yourself you can win.” It had become a habit of sorts. Anytime i am faced with something difficult or almost impossible, i chant. Over the years i have developed different kinds of chants, but i always fall back on the old one “i can, i can, yes, i can.”

to become free, you have to be acutely aware of being a

slave.

The victory of oppressed people anywhere in the world is a victory for Black people.

Medical care, dental care, and hospital visits are free. Schools at all educational levels are free. Rent is no more than about ten percent of salaries. There are no taxes—no income, city, federal, or state taxes. It is so strange to pay the price actually listed on products without any tax added. Movies, plays, concerts, and sports events all cost one or two pesos at the most. Museums are free.

He told me a story about a white Cuban who had volunteered twice to fight in Angola. He had received awards for heroism. “His case is not at all common in Cuba, but there are some who have problems adjusting to change.” “What was his problem?” I asked. “When the guy came home he caused a big scandal with his family. His daughter wanted to marry a Black man and he opposed the marriage. He said he wanted his grandchildren to look like him. It was a big argument, and his whole family got into it. This guy was so mixed up he went crazy when his daughter called him a racist. He wanted to fight everybody. He was out in the street, crying and kicking lamp posts. He didn’t know what to do. All the time he was in Angola fighting against racism, he never thought about his own racism.”

Venceremos,