When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir

by Patrisse Cullors

a dreamer learning to find hope while navigating the shadows of hell even as I know it might have been otherwise.

We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be … black, but by getting the public to associate the … blacks with heroin … and then criminalizing [them] heavily, we could disrupt [their] communities … Did we know we were lying? Of course we did.

For

us, law enforcement had nothing to do with protecting and serving, but controlling and containing the movement of children who had been labeled super-predators simply by virtue of who they were born to and where they were born, not because they were actually doing anything predatory.

Why are only individuals held accountable? Where were the supports these men needed? Men talking about broken dreams and no jobs and feeling hated by the world and being beat up by police.

But now that race isn’t written into the law, she says, look for the codes. Look for the coded language everywhere, she says. They rewrote the laws, but they didn’t rewrite white supremacy. They kept that shit intact, she says.

if my father could not be possible in this America, then how is it that such a thing as America can ever be possible?

Come celebrate with me that every day something has tried to kill me and has failed.

You can have a two-year sentence but it doesn’t mean you’re not doing life.

How does this align with the notion of a democratic or free society—to not take care of the least of these?

Why is America so tethered to punishment and judgment, to one life mattering and another not?

It’s a particular kind of evil, a specific sort of sadism, when someone forces you to be still and silent while a person you love is hurting just beyond your reach and in ways that can never fully be measured.

Love takes off the masks we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.

I feel like I have to be the particular kind of strong Black people are always asked to be. The impossible strong. The strong where there’s no space to think about your own vulnerability. The space to cry.

• Ending all violence against Black bodies • Acknowledging, respecting and celebrating difference(s) • Seeing ourselves as part of the Global Black family and remaining aware that there are different ways we are impacted or privileged as Black folk who exist in different parts of the world • Honoring the leadership and engagement of our Trans and gender non-conforming comrades • Being self-reflective about and dismantling cisgender privilege and uplifting Black Trans folk, especially Black Transwomen, who continue to be disproportionately impacted by Trans-antagonistic violence • Asserting the fact that Black Lives Matter, all Black lives, regardless of actual or perceived sexual identity, gender identity, gender expression, economic status, ability, disability, religious beliefs or disbeliefs, immigration status or location • Ensuring that the Black Lives Matter network is a Black women–affirming space free from sexism, misogyny, and male-centeredness • Practicing empathy and engaging comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts • Fostering a Trans- and Queer-affirming network. And when we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking or, rather, the belief that all in the world are heterosexual unless s/he or they disclose otherwise. • Fostering an intergenerational and communal network free from ageism. We believe that all people, regardless of age, show up with the capacity to lead an...

we are still hard at work trying to get people to see that as much as there is a progressive movement for justice, there are those working just as hard for the opposite outcome, an outcome where only the fewest of lives matter at all.

The most criminalized people on the planet are Black Transwomen who cannot pass.

Living in patriarchy means that the default inclination is to center men and their voices,

not women and their work.

And in the fullness of our humanity, we need this, too, along with protests, and the deep discussions and policy pushes and theory, a place to rest, to renew. A place to restore.

WE HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT OUR CHAINS!

It is hard to be intimate with one person when you’re being intimate with the world.

If you want a taste of freedom, keep going.

I am angry I didn’t realize—or accept at a cellular level—how wedded to racism and misogyny average Americans are.

In 2016, hate crimes in the United States rose 6 percent in 25 of the largest cities. And we, Black people, were the most common target of them, with hate crimes directed at us disproportionately, at nearly 30 percent, according to FBI statistics.

We actually don’t give a fuck about shiny, polished candidates. We care about justice. We care about bold leaders and actions. We care about human rights and common decency.

Three Point Strategies, the Washington, DC–based consulting firm that works at the intersection of electoral politics and social justice.

Punishing someone for not making payments by making them unable to make payments doesn’t work and it doesn’t get us closer to transforming ourselves and the world.

We need policies that allow for transformation.