❝And then, you ask me whether I approve of violence. I mean, that just doesn’t make any sense at all… whether I approve of guns.

I grew up in Birmingham, Alabama!

Some very, very good friends of mine were killed by bombs! Bombs that were planted by racists. I remember from the time - I was very small - I remember the sound of bombs exploding across the street, our house shaking! I remember my father having to have guns at his disposal at all times because of that fact that any moment - someone - we might expect to be attacked.

The man who was in that time, in complete control of the city government, his name was Bill Connor. He would often get on the radio and make statements like - “Niggers have moved into an all white neighborhood, we better expect some bloodshed tonight,” and sure enough there would be blood shed.

After the four girls - one of them lived next door to me - I was very good friends of a sister of another one… My sister was very good friends with all three of them. My mother taught one of them in her class.

In fact, when the bombing occurred, one of the mothers of the young girl called my mother and said - “Can you take me down to the church and pick up Carol? We heard about the bombing and I don’t have my car.”

And they went down and what did they find? They found limbs and heads strewn all over the place.

And then after that, in my neighborhood, all the men organized themselves into an armed patrol. They had to take their guns and patrol our community every night because they did not want that to happen again. ❞ Angela Davis on Violence [x]

(Source: classicalallure, via smeagolden)