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I am a 20th century escaped slave. Because of government persecution, I was left with no other choice than to flee from the political repression, racism and violence that dominate the U.S. government’s policy towards people of color.

Assata Shakur

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Assata Shakur
Age: 77
Born: 1947
Born: July 14
Activist
Jamaica
Queens
Joanne Deborah Byron
Policy
Dominate
Violence
Repression
Century
Persecution
Choices
Racism
Left
Slave
Political
Towards
Government
Choice
Flee
People
Color
Escaped

More quotes by Assata Shakur

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Black Revolutionaries do not drop from the moon. We are created by our conditions. We are shaped by our oppression. We are being manufactured in droves in the ghetto streets, places like attica, san quetin, bedford hills, leavenworth, and sing sing. They are turning out thousands of us.
Assata Shakur
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I think that spirituality is important for all people to develop. I don't mean there necessarily has to be a religious aspect to spirituality. Some people are spiritual in a religious way, other people are spiritual in their work and in their art and in their treatment of other people.
Assata Shakur
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I worked, studied, mothered and continued to be an activist. I found that Cuba was much different from the US its government was genuinely trying to erase racism.
Assata Shakur
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I'm truly blessed, because many of my friends come to Cuba. They like it here-they can relax and not worry about drive-by shootings or getting raped.
Assata Shakur
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The government recognized immediately that Rap music has enormous revolutionary potential and politicians immediately came together to end it.
Assata Shakur
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When Black people seriously organize and take up arms to fight for our liberation, there will be a lot of white people who will drop dead from no other reason than their own guilt and fear.
Assata Shakur
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Cubans understand that theirs is a country that provides sanctuary for people fleeing oppression. As a nation, they are very proud of this stance. They don't care how much the U.S. government badgers or attacks them.
Assata Shakur
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I can't do nothin except try to find cloud nine.
Assata Shakur
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People get used to anything. The less you think about your oppression, the more your tolerance for it grows.
Assata Shakur
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I believe in living, I believe in birth, I believe in the sweat of love and in the fire of truth and I believe that a lost ship, steered by tired, sea sick sailors, can still be guided home to port
Assata Shakur
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When you go through all your life processing and abusing your hair so it will look like the hair of another race of people then you are making a statement and the statement is clear
Assata Shakur
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A revolutionary woman can't have no reactionary man. If he's not about liberation, if he's not about struggle, if he ain't about building a strong Black family, if he ain't about building a strong Black nation, then he ain't about nothing.
Assata Shakur
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Being a warrior and being a struggler has been forced on me by oppression, otherwise I would have been free to be so much more.
Assata Shakur
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What most impressed me about Cuba was the optimism.
Assata Shakur
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And if I know anything at all, it's that a wall is just a wall and nothing more at all. It can be broken down.
Assata Shakur
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Love is contraband in Hell, cause love is an acid that eats away bars. But you, me, and tomorrow hold hands and make vows that struggle will multiply. The hacksaw has two blades. The shotgun has two barrels. We are pregnant with freedom. We are a conspiracy.
Assata Shakur
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Unless you are addressing the issues people are concerned about and contributing positive direction, they'll never support you. The first thing the enemy tries to do is isolate revolutionaries from the masses of people, making us horrible and hideous monsters so that our people will hate us
Assata Shakur
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Racism had grown out of slavery and exploitation and was very hard to eradicate quickly and completely.
Assata Shakur
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We had to learn that we're beautiful. We had to relearn something forcefully taken from us. We had to learn about Black power. People have power if we unite. We learned the importance of coming together and being active
Assata Shakur
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We usually reach success by putting the simple truths that we know into practice.
Assata Shakur