Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X. Huey P. Newton. They all have one thing in common: revolutionary suicide.
According to Newton, revolutionary suicide is an acute awareness of the reality of the world anti-Blackness has built, combined with an intense possibility for hope.
The fight for liberation has never been easy. From medical racism to food inequity to policing, death by state-sanctioned violence has always been a part of our people’s reality.
Some may believe that fighting for liberation is doomed to fail, but Newton thought a revolutionary must always be prepared to face death. The fight itself might be suicidal, knowing how often and brutally our people die, but he believed creating a new world for the next generation is worth the risk.
While incarcerated, Newtown defied authorities by refusing to submit to their exploitation. As a result, they sent him to solitary confinement, and his behavior was considered suicidal.
Newton knew that submitting to them would have killed “his spirit and confined him to a living death.” His resistance to the system contributed to the liberation of his people, both incarcerated and those outside the penal system.
Like Newton, we must know that pursuing liberation could mean a shortened life, whether literally or through reactions to our work. Our lives are worth living and fighting for.