185 Quotes by Assata Shakur

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.

I trust Cuba as a principled country. Cuba’s strength is that it has been steadfast in its commitment to the principles of liberation, freedom, of resistance to the kind of institutionalized terrorism that the United States government does every day.

History has shown me that as long as some white middle-class people can live high on the hog, take vacations to Europe, send their children to private schools, and reap the benefits of their white skin privileges, then they are “liberals.” But when times get hard and money gets tight, they pull off that liberal mask and you think you’re talking to Adolf Hitler. They feel sorry for the so-called underprivileged just as long as they can maintain their own privileges.

Being in Cuba has allowed me to live in a society that is not at war with itself. There is a sense of community. It’s a given in Cuba that, if you fall down, the person next to you is going to help you get up.

I think that one of the great things that the Cuban revolution has done is preserve history.

It is only for the sake of those without hope that hope is given to us.

What made me maddest was the media treatment of the BPP, which gave the impression that the Party was racist and violent. And it worked. The pigs would burst into a Panther office, shoot first, and ask questions later. The press always reported that the police had “uncovered” a large arsenal of weapons. Later, when the “arsenal” turned out to be a few legally registered rifles and shotguns, the press never printed a word. The same thing goes on today.

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.

The death penalty is used in such a blatantly racist way in the United States. There is no way that can be defended under any kind of definition of justice by anybody.