My life wasn't beautiful and creative before I became politically active. My life was totally changed when I began to struggle.

Any Black person in amerika [sic], if they are being honest with themselves, have got to come to the conclusion that they don't know what it feels like to be free. We aren't free politically, economically, or socially. We have very little power over what happens in our lives. In fact, a Black person isn't free to walk down the street. Walk down the wrong street, in the wrong neighborhood at night, and you know what happens.

The US government's most acute fear is that other countries are going to follow the Cuban example. They want everybody to know that if you follow this example we will attack you in every way that we can.

I don't have to live up to that Superwoman myth. I can cry and be human and lean on people who take care of me. That can be very liberating.

People are really beginning to see the mechanisms of imperialism. When colonialism existed people could see colonialism. When racial segregation existed in its apartheid form, people could see the "whites only" signs. But it's much more difficult to see the structures of neo-imperialism, neo-colonialism, neo-slavery.

To have one's race brutally treated for so many years, even after the end of slavery and segregation, people are going to rise up with violence to attain what they believe is rightfully theirs. The most important thing at this time is raising the awareness of everyone; people need to be educated everywhere about all aspects of racism and how it affects people still today.

I hate war, and I hate having to struggle. I honestly do because I wish I had been born into a world where it was unnecessary. This context of struggle and being a warrior and being a struggler has been forced on me by oppression. Otherwise I would be a sculptor, or a gardener, carpenter - You know, I would be free to be so much more… I guess part of me or a part of who I am, a part of what I do is being a warrior - a reluctant warrior, a reluctant struggler. But I do it, because I’m committed to life.