You have to go through life with more than just passion for change; you need a strategy I will repeat that I want you to have passion, but you HAVE TO HAVE A STRATEGY NOT JUST AWARENESS, BUT ACTION NOT JUST HASHTAGS, BUT VOTES.
At the 1964 democratic convention Fannie Lou five-feet - fiur -inches tall gave a fiery speech on the national stage but then she went back home in Mississippi and organized caution pickers AND SHE DID NOT HAVE THE TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGY WHERE YOU CAN WHIP UP A MOVEMENT IN MINUTES SHE HAD TO GO DOOR TO DOOR BUT TO BRING ABOUT STRUCTURAL CHANGE, LASTING CHANGE.
Awareness is not enough it requires change in law, changes in custom if you care about mass incarceration, let me ask you how are you pressuring members of Congress.
If you care about better policing, do you know your distinct attorney is? Do you know who your state's attorney general is? Do you know the difference?
Passion is vital, but you have got to have a strategy and your plan better include voting not just some of the time, but all of the time it is absolutely true that 50 years after the voting rights act, there are still too many barriers in the country to vote. There too many people trying to erect new barriers to voting. This is the only advanced democracy on earth that goes out of its way to make is difficult for people to vote. And there is a reason for that. There is a legacy to that.
And they were successful because, early on, he engaged law enforcement. He did not say to them, oh, you guys are so radiant, you need to do something, i understood, as many of you do, that the overwhelming majority of police officers are good, and honest and courageous and fair, and love communities they serve.
And we knew there were some bad apples, and that even the good cops with best of intentions including, by the way. So they engaged and they listened, and they kept working untill they built consensus.and because they took the time to listen, they crafted legislation that was good for the
POLICE BECAUSE IT IMPROVED THE TRUST AND COOPERATION OF THE COMMUNITY.
And it was good for communities who were less likely to be treated unfairly.
There will be times when you should not compromise your core values, your integrity, and you will have the responsibility to speak up in the face of injustice. but listen Engage, if the other side has a point, learn from them. If they are wrong, rebut them. Teach them beat them on the batter field of ideas.and you might as well start practicing now because one thing I can guarantee you you have to deal with ignorance, hatred, racism, foolishness, trifling folks.
NOBODY PROMISED YOU A CRYSTAL STAIRS, AND IF YOU WANT TO MAKE LIFE FAIR, WHEN YOU HAVE GOT TO START WITH THE WORLD AS IT IS.
who tell you what you being foolish to keep believing or that you can't do something, or that you should just give u, or that you should just settle,
You might say to yourself a little phrase that I have found handy these last eight years:
YESS, WE CAN.
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