There’s a story I keep coming back to, one that feels urgent, necessary, and alive. It’s the story of Assata Shakur—a woman who looked at a world that wanted her silent, invisible, and broken, and said, “No.”
Assata wasn’t born a revolutionary. She was born JoAnne Chesimard in 1947, in a country that didn’t value her life, her voice, or her freedom. But somewhere along the way, she decided she wouldn’t accept that. She joined the Black Panther Party, then the Black Liberation Army, not because she wanted to be a symbol, but because she believed in justice. She believed in freedom. And she was willing to fight for it.
“It is our duty to fight for our freedom.
It is our duty to win.
We must love each other and support each other.
We have nothing to lose but our chains.”
― Assata Shakur, Assata: An Autobiography
Then came 1973, the year everything changed. Pulled over by New Jersey state troopers on the Turnpike, Assata found herself in a shootout that left one trooper dead and her own body riddled with bullets. She was arrested, tried, and convicted of murder—a conviction she has always denied. Her trial was less about justice and more about spectacle, a media frenzy that painted her as a dangerous radical. But to those who knew her, she was so much more: a teacher, a poet, a mother, and a woman who refused to be erased.
“Before going back to college, I knew I didn’t want to be an intellectual, spending my life in books and libraries without knowing what the hell is going on in the streets. Theory without practice is just as incomplete as practice without theory. The two have to go together.”
― Assata Shakur, Assata: An Autobiography
In 1979, Assata escaped from prison. She fled to Cuba, where she was granted political asylum, and she’s been there ever since. To some, she’s a hero. To others, she’s a criminal. But to Assata, she’s just a woman who chose freedom—freedom from oppression, freedom from silence, freedom from a system that tried to destroy her.
Here’s what I can’t stop thinking about: Assata’s voice. Not just the words she speaks, but the way she lives. In her autobiography, Assata: An Autobiography, she writes with raw honesty about her life, her struggles, and her unshakable belief in justice. She doesn’t apologize for who she is or what she’s done. She doesn’t soften her message to make it more palatable. She is, unapologetically, herself.
“The rulers of this country have always considered their property more important than our lives.”
― Assata Shakur, Assata: An Autobiography
And then there’s this line, one that stays with me: “Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.” It’s a reminder that freedom isn’t given; it’s taken. It’s fought for. It’s demanded.
Assata’s story isn’t just about her. It’s about all of us. It’s about what it means to resist, to survive, to choose freedom even when the cost is unimaginably high. It’s about looking at a system designed to break you and saying, “Not today.”
“I have declared war on the rich who prosper on our poverty, the politicians who lie to us with smiling faces, and all the mindless, heartless, robots who protect them and their property.”
― Assata Shakur, Assata: An Autobiography
So, as we celebrate Women’s History Month, let’s remember Assata Shakur—not as a symbol or a slogan, but as a woman who dared to fight for a better world. She’s a revolutionary, a writer, and a legend. And honestly, we could all use a little more of her fearless spirit in our lives.
Assata, thank you for showing us how to choose freedom.
