Patrisse Cullors

“We have to look at queerness as a means towards challenging normativity.”

“Colin Kaepernick is one of the leaders in the movement for black lives. His role as an athlete and activist is not only motivating but inspiring.”

“The story of Black Lives Matter starts before Black Lives Matter. The story of Black Lives Matter, for me, starts with my childhood.”

“I think what's so powerful about Black Lives Matter is we're the first movement able to take on law enforcement and make it a popular discussion.”

“I am scared every day.”

“The black radical agenda, which pushes us closer to freedom and the agenda to which I subscribe, calls for an eradication of white supremacy and an adoption of values and traditions endowed from the black experience.”

“Tamir Rice, Tanisha Anderson, Mya Hall, Walter Scott, Sandra Bland - these names are important. They're inherently important, and the space that #BlackLivesMatter held and continues to hold helped propel the conversation around the state-sanctioned violence they experienced.”

“Black Lives Matter is one iteration of a much larger struggle to fight for black people's freedom.”

“Black Lives Matter was born out of our unwavering love for black people and our undeniable rage over a system that has historically dehumanized black people.”

“The Black Lives Matter National Network and the movement at large are sophisticated. We're not easily won over by talking points and campaign trail pledges. We want to see meaningful collaboration and a genuine transformation of American democracy.”

“Many of us believed that Black Lives Matter would move this country to not only reckon with white racism but to usher in new laws and practices that would curb vigilantism and law enforcement violence. But, instead, white nationalism was nurtured and began to take root among the American people.”

“Since his inauguration, Trump has signed numerous executive orders that negatively impact poor, black and brown, queer, Muslim, and other communities.”

“With abolition, it's necessary to destroy systems of oppression. But it's equally necessary to put at the forefront our conversations about creation. When we fight for justice, what exactly do we want for our communities?”

“I've been an activist since I was a teenager. I was always curious about what we would now call social justice. I remember just trying to navigate growing up poor in an overpoliced environment with a single mother and a father who was in and out of prison.”

“Our decentralized, localized leadership structure has really allowed for Black Lives Matter structures in their own communities to take on the state and take on some of the most egregious acts against black people.”

“In order to reverse the maternal health crisis for black women in the U.S., we need concrete policies from our leaders and better protocols from hospitals.”

“I think part of what we're seeing in the rise of white nationalism is their response to Black Lives Matter, is their response to an ever-increasing fight for equal rights, for civil rights, and for human rights.”

“Under Trump, black lives will become even more vulnerable to state violence.”

“Freedom means the U.S. government not being the main threat to countries around the world.”

“When folks say 'identity politics' don't matter, it simply reinforces the norm of a white, middle-class, cis narrative and further marginalizes the rest of us who don't share that identity.”