Angela Davis - Part 1
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What's going on, everybody? I'm Marah. And I'm Tez. And welcome back to Sisters Who Kill. I hope everybody enjoyed their Juneteenth this past weekend. Thank you all for your love and support and well wishes.

through last week and we had a wonderful service to celebrate my granny and her passing and also had a wonderful Juneteenth that I was able to spend with my family. So thank you all so much for that. Here we are with another history lesson, thoughts on prison reform and how justice system yet again comes after black and brown people.

If you're listening to this, you probably already know what I'm about to say. That today is the day for you to start your podcast. You have everything that you need. Your computer, a little microphone, and Spotify for podcasters. It is the all-in-one platform where you can host, edit, and record your podcast and distribute it everywhere. Where you're listening right now, you can have your podcast there. I promise. For real. And it's free. And you can make some money off of your podcast. For free. For free.

Free money. Free money is out there. Just go get it by starting your podcast today. Our players this week are the state of California, specifically Governor Ronald Reagan, the FBI, specifically J. Edgar Hoover, George Jackson and the Soledad brothers, the cause, Jonathan Jackson, George Jackson's brother, Judge Haley, the victim, and Angela Davis, our murderess.

Angela Yvonne Davis was born on January 26, 1944 in Birmingham, Alabama. Initially, they lived in the government housing projects on 8th Street in Birmingham. And in 1948, when Angela was four years old, they moved out of the Birmingham projects and into a house that their family was super excited to purchase. They purchased the house for $6,000. And it was a pretty big house. So like $6,000, of course, we're looking at them like, ooh, if the houses only cost that now. But...

That was still quite a significant amount of money. Angela had two brothers, Ben and Reginald, and her sister, Fania. Her dad, Frank Davis, was a teacher, but he didn't really make much money. He had supplemental income because he actually owned a service station in town. And her mom, Sally Bell Davis, also was a teacher. She was an educator. She was also working to get her second degree at the time that the kids were growing up.

And she was also a civil rights activist. She was a national officer and leading organizer for the Southern Negro Youth Conference. And it was a black organization and it was influenced that organizations was influenced by the Communist Party. And basically it was.

to build alliances amongst Blacks in the South. She also was a member of the NAACP, but in Birmingham, they outlawed the NAACP, but she was paying her dues up until they finally were like, no, there is no NAACP.

And it's completely illegal because we're talking about Alabama, everybody. So at the Southern Negro Youth Conference, at the Southern Negro Youth Congress, Angela met Margaret Burnham, who became one of her greatest friends and also one of her biggest supporters. Now, where they moved, they were on Center Street, and they were one of the first families to ever move to Center Street. But first black family, you know them whites was already there.

Them whites were there. And not only were they the whites there, they were livid. They were pissed that her family moved there. So the whites, of course, were like, oh, my goodness, how could this happen? Black people were starting to get money, starting to buy houses, starting to move out of the projects, trying to pull themselves up, do better for themselves. And the white people were pissed. So they drew an imaginary line down Center Street. And basically they're like, black people, y'all live on this side of Center Street. White people, you live on this side of Center Street. You ever talk?

Like, in the country, we always say, like, it's across the railroad tracks. You know, across the railroad tracks is where the white folks live. But it's whatever side of Center Street you live on. And if a family, if any Black family, like, dared to move onto the white side of Center Street, you know, because they had money and they were gaining money, then...

Bitch-ass Bull Connor would literally just get on the radio and was like, a black family moved onto this side of Center Street. There's going to be bloodshed tonight. Like, lo and behold, that night, dynamite was always put in those

families' houses, and those houses were blown up for being on the wrong side of the street. There were so many bombings. It was known as Dynamite Hill. And I mean, there was a reverend that was starting to rally and get people together to start boycotting buses, start boycotting the unjust systems that are happening in Birmingham, Alabama. And this reverend went to the hospital and then rode back home sitting in the front of

the bus and that a stick of dynamite was found under his bed and it exploded. And it just so happens he wasn't there. Like they were blowing you up for no reason in Birmingham and the police and the commissioner of public safety was doing absolutely nothing about it. So now I kind of want to pull over so that we can talk about Bull Connor, who was the commissioner of public safety. And honestly, like he's a shit show and I don't want to spend much time on him because he's like,

The literal spawn of Satan, but he is unfortunately so influential in the in segregation that has happened in the South and the unjust treatment of black people during the Jim Crow area during the segregated South that it would be an unjust for us to for you to not know the history of this man and how horrid he is.

How horrid he was. He died. He did. Two strokes. He did. So Bill Connors from Mobile, Alabama. He was born on July 11, 1897 with the name Theophilus Eugene Conner. Which I mean, with a name like that, of course, you hate yourself. He entered politics as a House representative for the state of Alabama in 1934 and was running on a Democratic ticket.

While serving, he voted to extend the poll tax, which served as a barrier to voter registration to poor blacks and whites. He wasn't voted for a second time in the House, but...

He comes back as the commissioner of public safety from 1936 to 1954 and then was voted back into office from 1957 to 1963. In the 1948 Democratic Convention, Harry Truman was running for president and Truman started introducing civil rights policy and Bull was not having that shit.

So he grabbed his uncles and cousins from Alabama and they staged a walkout. And in May of 1961, the Freedom Riders made their way to Birmingham, Alabama. This is going to be on your study guide if y'all don't know who the Freedom Riders are. The Freedom Riders were basically protesting against

on buses that were traveling interstate. So they got, there were blacks and whites that were on a bus traveling from D.C. to Louisiana and they were doing stops along the way. Of course, there were a lot of protests. Of course, there were a lot of people that were attacking them. But the biggest attack happened in Birmingham, Alabama. Yeah. So while those Freedom Riders were making their way through, they were attacked by Klansmen. And Bull Connor did not let the police intervene for 15 minutes. Um,

Because he wanted to see them get their ass beat. Because he was so pissed about the fact that blacks and whites were sitting together on a bus. Like, it was the hill he was willing to die on. Right. The elementary school that Angela Davis went to was Carrie A. Tugel School. And it was segregated. She used to speak about how the books that she had in elementary school were missing all the important parts. Like, y'all know how it went. We got the hand-me-downs. We got the torn up shit that they was ready to throw out while they got new books. Yeah.

And the playground was just one big bowl. But the best part of it, you know, the upside of it was learning from black teachers and learning black history from people who didn't want to cover it up and skew the view and make it seem better than what it actually was. That was that was the real golden ticket right there. Like getting a real history from your perspective, from truth. You know what I mean?

And we were having that conversation the other day with somebody about like having black teachers and how important that is and how it's not seen very often. Everybody that's, that is listening right now, like literally tweet us, when is your first time that you had a black teacher? Tell us, we want to know. And Tazi and I was pretty young, but we realized with talking to people that it's,

A privilege, I guess, you know? Yeah, it really is. And that's why Black teachers are so important, especially Black history teachers are so, so important in the school system. Angela was naturally good at school and she loved to read. And her mom was a teacher as well. And they all would set goals for how many books they would read each year. And she was always ready for like a new book, love to learn. And her parents would have to go to the back of the library where the Black librarian was and request their book. But

The school was headed, the school that she went to was headed by an all-white school board. So although she was having black teachers in the school, it was still white people making up the rules, right? Right. The school was headed by an all-white school board and they really didn't give a fuck. They would come to the schools. Of course, the students are taught that, you know, the white people are coming, be on your P's and Q's because the white people are there. But like the school board members, they were

extremely disrespectful you know we black and we were raised with manners especially in the south is yes ma'am no sir uh please thank you miss mrs you know what i'm saying and there was there was no such thing as a calling a teacher by a first name like that is the the height of disrespect and when the school superintendents and people from the school board would come to

they would be calling the teachers by their first name in front of the students. And of course this shocked the students, but it also shocked the teachers as well. Like this is extremely disrespectful. And so this one teacher, his name was Jesse Champion, and he was really close friends with Angela's parents. And they, the teacher, the super board, whatever the fuck, the education board that was there was like,

Oh, yes, Jesse's teaching y'all really well. And then the teacher was like, if you've forgotten, my name is Mr. Champion. And he was fired right on the spot for demanding respect in front of children. Right. You know what I'm saying? Like, these kids are... And so...

Growing up, the students are watching and learning at a young age that their life doesn't matter, that the respect of their basic respect that they're supposed to give adults, white people cannot give them. And I think it really fueled Angela in her resistance at a young age. She was she saw that, you know, she came from a.

fairly well-to-do family. They were doing pretty well. Of course, they had a mortgage to pay. They were renting out a room at the house to pay their mortgage. But, like, mom would take their hand-me-downs, give it to people. Dad was working as hard as he could. She was telling a story in her book about how she was going to school and she realized that some of these kids are coming to school without no money and without lunches and they're going hungry. And so...

She knew at a very young age that this isn't right. This isn't the way that things are supposed to be. And she tells a story of her stealing money from her dad's like,

I guess like change jar, money jar, spare money and steal the money just so that she could buy lunches for her classmates. So I think it just goes to show that at a very young age, she knew that the systems that were put in place, she knew that the society as it was wasn't right. And she could at least do something to help to make the world, to make somebody's day better, to make the world a little bit of a better place.

While she was growing up, Angela was really heavily involved in church and she was also in the Girl Scouts. Shout out to the Girl Scout cookies. And a part of that, she would march, she would protest racial segregation in Birmingham, all throughout Birmingham, also known as Bombingham, which will soon be known as most of you all know it as First 48. As a teenager, though...

would go back and forth to New York because her mom was actually studying to get her master's degree in New York. So Angela actually got a taste of what life was like in New York versus New

what it's like in the South and the stark differences in living above the Mason-Dixon line. And it also showed her natural instinctual resistance towards white people. She also tells this story that she says that she was like, we found out, she was like, now that I think about it now, like we were showing little acts of resistance every single day. Even as a young kid when playing ding-dong ditch, she said that they would play ding-dong ditch across Center Street at the white folks' house. And it

it would annoy the shit out of them, but it was those small acts of resistance that they were doing as children. And it was just ingrained in her and that manifested into the acts of resistance that we know her to be of today. So she actually wanted to leave school pretty early. She was really smart. And so she actually got accepted into Fisk University. Shout out to the HBCUs. But then she also saw a...

a program and it was a Quaker program. So she applied to that as well. She didn't know what she was going to get into. Turns out she got accepted to both. So she had the option, am I going to go to college early? And Fisk was a great school, especially medical school. And at the time she wanted to be a physician. She wanted to be a doctor. But this Quaker program, like she would be able to live in New York with a white family. It was definitely something that she had to debate with both of her parents and with herself. And she actually decided to...

finish high school in New York through the Quaker program. So by high school, Angela was working with the Quaker program. And not only did the Black students from the South go to Northern integrated schools, but Black students from the South, you know, like she said, they lived with the families. And Angela chose to go to Elizabeth Irwin High School in Greenwich Village in New York.

And while up there, she was recruited by a communist youth group. The political uproar in Birmingham was palpable, and she wanted to come home and help with student resistance. But her mom was like, no, stay in New York, get your lesson, this is what you asked for, like, focus on school. Angela talked about how her education was different in New York, and she was thrusted into a white world with white teachers and whitewashed history. And after graduating, she made her way to Massachusetts, where she would...

Brandeis University. Brandeis has a very, very good theater program. Oh, yeah? Yeah, they do. You would know. Yeah.

Yes, I would. But they do. They actually have a really good theater program. And Angela Davis went there, started attending Brandeis University when she was 17 years old. Now, she was awarded a full scholarship to Brandeis, which is in Massachusetts. And she was one of only three black students in her class. Now, Brandeis is a Jewish school, kind of like HBCUs, but for Jewish people. That's the best way that I know how to describe it. She actually decided to major in French, which...

I was really surprised about when I initially learned this because I was like, she actually decided to major in French, which I thought was really weird at first. Like I, I didn't, she wanted to be a physician. And then I knew that she knew French because there's this funny story in her book.

of when she was really young and her and her sister, they were just like, you know, damn, they hate us. Like we, they hate us because we're black. And Angela was like, no, they hate us because we're black Americans. Like, and she was like, let's go into this store and let's start speaking with our French accent. Cause they both knew French. So let's start speaking in our French accent. Let's start, you know, speaking in French. Like they spoke, they both spoke fluently. Like they were very well educated girls. And so they go into this

racist ass shoe store or whatever. And they just, you know, they'll talk. I have a horrible French accent. So they start talking and Angela Davis has an amazing French accent. It is so sexy. Okay, that's not why we're here. But she, her and her sister, they're talking back and forth and all the white people, the white clerks are like, oh my goodness, you guys must be dignitaries. Where are you from? And they have them up at the front of the store. Oh, now I love Kanye.

Oh, right. Put them all in front of the store. Right. Like, oh, they're an exotic black. They from across the way. They're not just one of these other niggas here in Alabama. And so they're getting all this special treatment. And finally, they just started laughing to each other. And she was just... And they were like, what's going on? What's going on? And she was like, y'all just think that... And of course, they're speaking regular now. She's like, y'all just waited on us because y'all thought that we were special and we're not. That just goes to show how racist you are. Like, how...

now look at your how your opinion has changed me now that you know that I'm a black American now that you know that I'm that I'm not French that I'm not there everything is rooted in this hardcore racism so I knew that she knew French right but I was wondering why she majored in French but doing a little bit more research she actually went because she wanted to do an intense study of the philosopher and writer Jean-Paul Sartre which is like I had

I had to look up who that was. And his whole thing is existentialism. And if you don't know what existentialism is, existentialism is basically a theory and philosophy that emphasizes the existence of individual persons as free and responsible agents, determining their own development and that they have acts of free will. I actually wrote...

I didn't know who this person was. And I actually wrote a paper on existentialism in the grad school with the play waiting for Godot. It's very good. You guys, if you ever feel like checking something out. Um, so, but with his teachings, with his philosophy teachings, he had a couple of points. One of the points is everything is weirder than you think. And that there is absurdity in the world. So I saw a video that was example of you sit there and we think, Oh, um,

Taz and I are sitting at dinner, right? That's the basic thought. But then everything is weirder than that. So at the same time, Tazzy and I sit down and we sit under a slab of wood that was cut off and manufactured to hold up my food. And me and this other mammal sit down and eat meat and grass and plants. And we say, yummy. And when the moon is at quarter high, we decide to

go and dance the night away. It's the breaking down that life really is a little bit absurd. The second thought is that we are free. We as humans are free and we should seek to always be free, which is...

Yeah, that's pretty self-explanatory. That's the easy one. Right? The third one is that we shouldn't live in bad faith. And this was actually a really interesting point for me when I was doing a little bit of a deep dive research into this. Bad faith is basically closing your eyes and saying that, like, I have to go to this job. I have to do this thing. I don't have any other choices in the matter. I have to do X, Y, Z. But...

not giving yourself the, not having the faith in yourself and the faith in your surroundings that you can do whatever you want.

You can quit a job. You don't have to go into the same routine. You don't have to get something because somebody else has it. You are going to have your eyes open to new possibilities, new ways of thinking, new ways of getting to whatever goal you may have, which I thought was very interesting. Number four was that we are free to dismantle capitalism. So the thoughts of, oh, I can't

see the world because I don't have enough money. It's all about financial woes and how those financial woes aren't making us free. And really what it is, is society has told us or given us the idea of what we have to necessarily have to exist when really, you know, food, water, shelter, you know what I'm saying? Those are what we absolutely need. We don't need the, the

We don't need smart water every time somebody's going to be like, hell no, we do need smart water every time. But no, we don't. Like food, water, shelter, we don't. He doesn't say that. So if I'm wrong on the food, water, shelter, he means absolutely nothing. I'm sorry. But in my mind, the only thing that you absolutely need is food, water, shelter. But everything else is just added onto us by this capitalism society. And all of that, Jean-Paul Sartre,

who she was doing this intense study for, was a huge advocate of Marxism.

Marxism, in theory, basically says that people can find freedom if they reduce their roles and reduce their materials. That's where true freedom comes from. Jean-Paul, he was arrested many times for protesting in France, protesting in other countries. He had meetings with Fidel Castro. And, you know, USA was like, hold on. Who the fuck are you? Why are you meeting with somebody we don't motherfucking like?

And the FBI was like, oh, communism. Oh, teaching people that things don't have to be just the way that we say that they are, that people may have freedom and can choose their own destiny. And it's not what we the government have put in place. Oh, no, can't have that. I think it's crazy how indoctrinated we are, like just even to the word communism. Like I think just growing up, it was like.

communism terrorists, communism bad. Like we don't want communists, you know? I remember me and my sisters were going to like a Trayvon Martin rally and it was like headed by the communist party. We was like, oh, we don't want no kind of trouble. Let's get out of here. But it was like not even knowing what it means, just knowing that you hear communists and niggas be like,

These niggas are un-American, you know what I mean? Mm-hmm. Which really means they're uncapitalistic and they're threatening niggas' wealth is what it is. Streaming October 6th on Paramount+. First place I learned about death was the Pet Sematary. Dead things buried in that land would come back. There's something else. Something's wrong with Timmy. He needs time to adjust. That's not Timmy. Something's talking to him. Shh.

Sometimes dead is better. Pet Sematary. Bloodlines. Rated R. Streaming only on Paramount+. Yep. In 1962, during her sophomore year of college, the Cuban Missile Crisis began. While at school, she felt like she had the most in common with the foreign students and became friends with this Indian man and a woman from the Philippines.

and a South Vietnamese woman, and together they would talk about the misery of their people. Around this time, Angela got the urge to leave the country to get a better perspective on things. So after applying, she was accepted to do a study abroad program in France, where she lived with the French family. In France is actually where she first began to hear Malcolm X speak. So a year later, in September of 1963, Angela was walking with her friends in Europe and stopped to get a copy of the Herald Tribune.

There was a tiny little article that detailed the 1963 Birmingham church bombing. 16th Street. Yeah. So Angela Vette, the names of the victims, Carol Robertson, Cynthia Wesley, Addie Mae Collins, and Denise McNair. And she said, quietly, I know them.

Those are my friends. And actually, Carol Robertson's mother, Carol Robertson was her sister Fania's friend. Carol's mother actually called Angela's mother and was like, hey, just heard about this bombing. Can you give me a ride up there? I need to check and see what's going on. And didn't find out until she got there that her daughter had passed and died.

Her daughter got blown up in the explosion. The 16th Street Baptist Church had been a rallying point for civil rights activists throughout the spring and summer leading up to the bombing. So the Klan basically was mad as fuck. I mean, but they always were. Anytime anybody started to get some traction, they were called a threat. Anytime people started to get people's attention...

If you had too many niggas listening to you, telling you that you had rights, you're a threat. You got too many people following this person and saying, hey, you know what? We might actually deserve better. You're a threat. And, you know, she talks about the irony because white people would preach, and she calls this the Booker T. Washington syndrome in her book, which...

we can have a whole different discussion for her and make a whole different podcast about Booker T. Washington. And yeah, basically, she talks about how there's this Booker T. Washington syndrome that we as Black people

and white people tell us like you as black people should pull yourselves up by your bootstraps. You should try to work harder. You should try to be better. The reason that you don't have anything and the reason that you can't get any better is because you're lazy. So if you would stop being lazy and pull yourself up by your bootstrap, then you would be good to go. But the irony is when I pull myself up by my bootstrap, I'm like,

And I'm able to afford a house on the other side of Center Street. I get bombed. If I pull myself up by my bootstrap and I gather all of the people together because I'm a well-educated person, we get attacked. We get bombed. So why are you telling me to pull myself up by my bootstrap? But y'all hurting me. I'm just trying to live. Right. This bombing, of course, her knowing everybody, it was...

It was personal. Like she obviously had been seeing that things weren't right and balanced in the world and she was making small changes. But now it was like, I really need to do something like enough's enough. You know, this is now becoming something I want to dedicate my life to. I want to be more involved in this. You know what I mean?

So in 1965, she graduated magna cum laude and became a member of Phi Beta Kappa, an academic honor society. And around the same time,

Malcolm X was assassinated February 21st, 1965. On May 2nd, 1967, the Black Panther Party, quote unquote, invades the California Capitol. And this made California be like, oh, now we have to be strict on guns. We have to have gun control here in the state of California, which is crazy, right? Because we can't get gun control when kids are being shot up at their school. But, oh, yeah.

Niggas got guns. Niggas got guns. And see, the thing about the Black Panthers was they wasn't hiding that shit. They was posted out of courthouses with rifles. Like, nigga, try it. They was so fucking badass. They would follow the cops. Like, you chasing down this nigga, we chasing down you. Try it if you want to, okay?

Fuck the pigs, right? But the Black Panther Party also gets a bad rap. And if y'all have not listened to our last year's Black... If you haven't listened to our last year's Juneteenth episode, wait till this episode is done and then go back and listen to that. Don't stop it right now. But, you know, the Black Panther Party was thought to be this super...

violent group, but really they was really trying to help the community. They had like, they had like acupuncture clinics that were put in place to help people not be addicted to drugs anymore because acupuncture is actually a great tool to help you with addiction, but they won't let you use that in medical medical facilities because you know, capitalistic society wants to keep you sick. So these big businesses called the hospitals can keep taking your money. Oh yeah. I'm sorry. That's not even on our script. I just happened to go there. Free Dr. Matula Shakur, who actually started that, uh,

acupuncture clinic who is still a prisoner of war in prison right now even though he has terminal cancer and no one will grant him clemency and everybody else that was accused of the same crime that he was is out.

Okay, that's all I have to say about that. But, you know, there was also the breakfast program, which was a huge thing of the Black Panther Party, where they were feeding the neighborhood kids because kids so they didn't have kids that were going hungry. Now, Angela Davis was not actually a part of the Black Panther Party. People think that she was she was a part of the Communist Party, but she was affiliated with the Black Panther Party. She had a lot of friends, a lot of comrades within the Black Panther Party, and she also was known to help with the breakfast program.

So with the Black Panther Party, you're only allowed to belong to one party. And she had already joined the Communist Party and she wasn't willing to leave them because although she liked some of the things that the Black Panther Party stood for, they were misogynistic as hell. And she was like, she said, I went to something once and I went to go get my food and they said, Sister Angela, the brothers eat first. And she said, okay, I'm out of here.

Oh, bitch, I would have been gone. I would have been gone. Ain't no way. I wish I knew me and food. Please do not make me wait for food. For real, though. So she definitely supported the cause, but she was like, it could be better, you know?

Absolutely. And within the Communist Party, she was actually really vocal against the Vietnam War, which was a huge issue and a huge debate point in the United States, which y'all can add that to y'all. So you guys to look up on your own. Then Ronald Reagan became the governor of Vietnam.

of California during this time. He was elected in 1967, and he reigned as the governor till 1975. And most people know him as the Great Communicator, which that's just the name that they gave him because he was a fucking Hollywood star and likable and therefore got a lot of people to joke and laugh. He was like the spoonful of sugar. He made them laugh so that the shitty...

ways and ideals could go down the throats of Americans. I don't fucking know. I'm just making... So at the end of her senior year at Brandeis, she applied to the University of Frankfurt and she was accepted. And she had plans on studying philosophy and moving to West Germany. So after she was accepted, she was like, okay, I'm going to brush up on my German, brush up on the philosophies that I know. Like Angela really... Just that smart. Yeah. Just pick up languages. I wish. I wish.

Um, she really... Angela went to school to learn about life. She didn't go to school to study for a career. She just truly wanted to learn and gain knowledge. She was able to think critically. She wanted to learn the ability to think critically. And through the ability to critically think about herself, her surroundings, and what life could be, she is the person that we know today. Yeah. So...

One of the reasons that she wanted to go to this school in Frankfurt was because she met this philosopher who taught at the school. His name is Herbert Marcuse. She met him at a rally against Cuban Missile Crisis a year earlier. And that's when she became more engaged in far left politics. She says in her book that Herbert taught her that it was possible to be an academic, an activist, a scholar and a revolutionary. Like she doesn't have to just choose one. Sure.

She went to this school. She lived in a tiny little room near the zoo on the top floor of her post-war apartment, and she had a $100 monthly stipend. One fall, after visiting East Berlin during the annual May Day celebration, Angela felt that East Germany was doing a better job with dealing with the effects of fascism than the West Germans were. She was active with the Socialist German Student Union and was keeping her eye on the Black Panther Party in the U.S., and

And the German socialists, they were very concerned about how blacks were being treated in the U.S. also. She was having a very she was developing a very European style. She changed, smoked cigarettes, dressed very European, but she kept that fro.

Right. I remember in her book, like her parents were like, oh, goodness, you're going out of the country again and you don't know for how long this time, like you're just going for your master's. I bought a one way ticket. You know, luckily she has super supportive parents, but like their initial groan to her leaving the country again. On April 4th, 1968, Martin Luther King was assassinated. Of course, this is putting more pressure

He had fired, assassinated, murdered by the government. I wouldn't say tomato, tomato, potato, potato. This, of course, put more fuel behind the civil rights movement, more fuel behind people trying to get equal rights. Because they like a peaceful ass Dr. King getting shot down in these streets. Like we really it's none of us safe. Y'all don't y'all don't care no matter how we approach it. You don't care.

So during her time at Frankfurt, Angela worked part-time to earn enough money to travel to France and Switzerland and attend the 8th World Festival of Youth and Students in Helsinki. And a few months later, she returned from the conference and Herbert Marcuse was being pushed out of the university because of his political views and decided to move west. He ended up moving to a position at the University of California, San Diego, and

And Angela followed him there after completing two years at Frankfurt. So almost immediately when she stepped her foot back on U.S. soil, the FBI was like, excuse me, ma'am, can you come hang out and talk with us for a second? Why were you at this communist sponsored festival while you were out of the country? They were questioning her almost immediately about her communist affiliation. But nonetheless, Angela was back studying at the University of California, San Diego, and

After finishing, she earned her master's degree in 1968. While she was first in San Diego, Angela tried to join different organizations, and they were like, girl, what are you wearing? Because she had that European style. They're like, what do you have going on? Like, we see the fro, but like, what is it? Everything else is not making sense. It just...

It just reminds me of when I went to boarding school and then I came back to public school and I was like, fashion has changed. But she soon met a man. His name was Deacon Alexander, and he was the section leader for the Black Panther Party in San Diego. He asked Angela to participate in the educationals that he was conducting on Marxism. You know, it's

That's what her degree is damn near in, right? And she went to the educationals, but that was kind of the extent of her involvement. Also while in San Diego, Angela Chelu Mamumba Club, which was an all-Black branch of the Communist Party. It was named after the revolutionary Che Guevara and Patrice Lamumba of Cuba and Congo. So these were people that also were met with Jean-Paul, the person that she studied in

undergrad, he worked with these people as well. So of course, right on track. Together, they were advocating for better housing for people. They were advocating for employment. They were advocating to end police brutality. They wanted to prove that the system was rotten at its core. At one time, she got arrested because they were handing out literature, right? You know how you stand around

and hand out literature and they were told that they weren't allowed to do that and so she went up there and was like tell me why I'm not allowed to do this do y'all stop the Jehovah's Witness when they're standing out there at the same you know at the same block giving out their pamphlets and giving out their literature why can't we do the same thing like it's a freedom of the

press, right? It's a freedom of speech. These are our natural rights that we're supposed to be able to have. And at one point, she was arrested. They left her and another girl in the car. They did not have the car on in the hot fucking heat to the point where they were freaking out. Like, are we about to die in this car? Are we about to fucking die in this car? Because they have us locked in here in handcuffs and it's

She also, when she got arrested, they went and, you know, they strip you. And she was just like, I just, my dignity, like they, they just did not care about who I was. And those were just subversive,

some of the early times of her being arrested. So as early as 1969, Angela Davis began public speaking engagements. She expressed her opposition to the Vietnam War, racism, sexism, prison, industrial complex, and her support of gay rights and other social justice movements. Also in 1969, she blamed imperialism for troubles of prostitution

oppressed populations suffer. She also visited Cuba and she was welcomed by Fidel Castro. And once she returned back to America, she was invited to UCLA and Princeton to become a teacher. She like says, I didn't seek out these jobs. They asked me and I was like, sure. Why not? Um,

She went to UCLA because of its urban environment. What did she say? They really wanted her. They wanted her to come and speak about her Western studies. And she's supposed to teach about her Western philosophy, which, you know, who can tell the best from the girl who went out there and lived in it, studied in it, walked in it, marched in it. So after getting the position as an assistant professor in Continental University,

physiology and Marxism. She was getting paid $10,000 and she prepared for her first lecture and continued advocating after school. Like she was teaching in the classrooms and she went out to the streets.

Around this time, like we said, the COINTELPRO and everything was going on and FBI members were infiltrating every single communist group. They were saying like... It's not to be communist group. They were saying, I was watching the documentary and it was like, at this point, it was like, were there even any communists or were the groups all made up of undercover FBI agents? Yeah.

Like, they were everywhere. And so somebody had infiltrated one of these groups that she was a part of. And then they wrote back on it in a newspaper, wrote a report saying Angela Davis is a communist. And when she was asked about it, she was like, yeah, yeah.

I am. So niggas went crazy. They was like, oh shit, we done put a communist up in UCLA. We got to get her out of here. She can't be spreading this shit to the kids. But you hired me to teach Marxism. Yeah.

Which is an ideology. Practice. It's the idea, not the practice. Yeah, but what is it? It's the philosophy. An economic system, right? Like, it's just the idea that we should be equal, but you're putting it a little too... Again, you're challenging... You want to act on these things? You're challenging money. You're challenging capitalism, and capitalism is democracy. So, like, she's basically going against everything the country stands for, right? So they were like, we can't have her at the school spreading this stuff, teaching this stuff to the kids. Yeah.

And the chancellor of the school was like, I mean, I guess I see your concern, but we also can't fire somebody because of their political views like that. That right there is going to get us a lawsuit.

And so they were trying to figure out ways to push her out. And Angela, she started receiving death threats and bomb threats. People writing her racist ass letters. You better die, bitch. All this type of shit, right? You'll see like videos of students talking and the views varied. Like there were some that was like,

She's an amazing speaker. The way she spoke, like, really changed me and opened up my mind to new ideas. And some were like, okay.

OK, I see we got free speech and free speech is good at all. But sometimes speech might need to be a little limited and she don't need to be talking about that. This is America. So, you know, those who were for it loved it and those who didn't, didn't. And it is definitely very spit. But she was definitely getting lots of lots of threats on her life just because she said that she was part of the Communist Party.

It was so bad, she had black cops following her to just make sure nothing happened to her. So then on October 7th, 1969, it's the second day of the fall semester. So on October 7th, 1969, the second day of the fall semester, she had her first lecture. And it brought in 2,000 students and professors to listen to her discuss the philosophy of Frederick Douglass.

And at that time, she was known as a radical black revolutionary and activist, a member of the Communist Party, an affiliate of the L.A. chapter of the Black Panther Party. She had all the tags on her. And the students really they were torn about how they received this information. Like some of them were like.

That was an amazing speech. This was her first lecture in front of 2,000 kids and the way she captivated us, like, it was amazing that she really opened my views. The cadence of her voice, the cadence of her voice, I'm going to listen. I could listen to her talk all day. I could listen to her talk all day. And I would go away to anything you say, baby.

Um, and some, some of the students was like, uh, I'm here for free speech. But when you start speaking that communist shit, then maybe speech needs to be limited. Like maybe free speech ain't always such a good thing. After hiring Angela, UCLA initiated a policy against hiring communists. And they were really trying to force her out, um,

Throughout all of this, she's teaching. She's trying to maintain her position at UCLA is trying to push her out. They're like, we don't want your communists there. The president of the United States is calling her teachings dangerous.

She's a threat to the nation. Now, these are the same people who said that the Black Panther Breakfast Program was a threat to America. That's why they even adopted the program. They was like, because while you were there, they had to learn black history facts while they ate. And they was like, you know what? Come to public school. You'll learn American facts while you eat. You'll come and see them play Diligence.

And put your loyalty. Hand over your heart. Yeah. Tell him that you love the flag. That's what you'll do. Around September of 1969, Angela picked up the LA times and she saw pictures of three black men in chains. They were known as the Soledad brothers. Now the Soledad brothers. How do I start this story? So the Soledad prison is a maximum security prison. And, uh,

One day, the prison was on shutdown for quite a while. On January 13th, 1970, they let these 14 black inmates and two white inmates out onto the recreation yard. They hadn't been out in rec in months, which should be illegal, but we're...

I digress, months since they've seen sunlight. They go out to the yard. There is a guard tower outside. And in that guard tower is Officer OPG Miller. A fist fight breaks out on the yard. A fight breaks out on the yard. Officer Miller does not shoot a warning shot. Straight from the guard's tower starts firing bullets into the yard.

He shoots and kills W.L. Nolan, a black man.

Cleveland Edwards, a black man, Alvin Miller, a black man, and one white inmate, Billy D. Harris, did not die but was wounded in the groin. This was outrageous and people were hearing all about it. Miller went to court and was tried and you already know what the fuck happened. It was

Ruled to be a justifiable homicide. During that trial, no Black inmates were allowed to testify. Real evidence was not coming forward because, like, the treatment of people, of men in the prison system at the time, especially in that maximum security prison, was horrible. It was bad.

They were treated like shit. And these white officers were taking advantage of that and taking advantage of that power. Oh, after the ruling comes in, everybody in the prison, all of the inmates, they are outraged. Like they were having hunger strikes. They were protesting the

treatment that they were having within the prison system. And literally 30 minutes after the announcement came over the prison radio, another officer, John V. Mills, was found in another wing of the maximum security prison. He had been beaten. He had been thrown from the third floor tier of Y wing. He was dying and he ended up dying. And so there was an investigation. They'd

had determined out of nowhere that three men, George Jackson, Fleeta Drumgoe, and John Clutchett were indicted for the first degree murder of Officer Mills. So I have to tell you, just pull over to tell you why these three men were in prison in the first place. So now John Clutchett, he was in prison for second degree burglary.

And he had already been in prison for three years and he was due for parole pretty soon in 1970. Felita, he also was in prison for second degree burglary and he had been in there for five years at that point.

he was due to come up in front of the parole board and things were kind of looking up for him. At one point he had, he got in trouble. He got written up because he had a Malcolm X poster in his cell. And, you know, getting those write-ups will affect your parole. And,

and affect how the parole board hears you. And it's not like he was, you know, fighting or doing anything crazy or, you know, being a menace. He had a poster up and got written up. And George, George Jackson had been in prison at that time since he was 18 years old. He was with a friend that

stole something from the store, didn't rob the store, that stole something from the store. And because he was there, he was arrested as well. His lawyer was like, oh, you should just, you know, plead guilty. You'll get a lighter sentence. You'll be totally fine. And they gave him the sentence of one year to life. Now, the average time that a white man was serving in prison for these same crimes, they were all second degree burglary. The average

time that a white man was serving for this time was about two years. And all of them had met and surpassed that two-year mark. Also, they really didn't give George Jackson, like, a time he was getting out. Like, he was, you know, they basically wanted him to be like, is it this year? Is it next year? They just...

It's fucking torture for no absolute reason, except for the fact that he was starting to be very influential around the prison. He already was a revolutionary. He wanted to integrate the TV room. He was spreading literature about the political and civil movement that was happening and why it should be happening in the prison. He was talking about, hey, the things that are going on in here is not right. We need to work together and we need to come together to fight this.

these powers. So they really did not like him. So Angela Davis was one of the first people to start really advocating for the Soledad brothers. And she first saw George Jackson at a hearing and they mouthed some words at each other. And she said that she was drawn to him by his tenderness and his beautiful writing. And she was kind of seduced by his writing. He was a good writer.

writer and they begin writing each other letters back and forth you know she's a good writer he's a good writer and um george jackson he had a brother named jonathan p jackson he was his younger brother he was actually seven years old when george his older brother went to prison and at the time that he met angela to advocate for the solid ad incident for the solid ad riot

He was 16 at the time, so there's some math for you. He also was an incredible writer. He wrote articles in his school newspaper talking about the Soledad brothers, talking about his brother in general, and talking about the prison system and wanting freedom for his brother. He also would be the one that sent back and forth the letters that George wrote to Angela and vice versa.

So when John's mom came to visit the prison, she was slipped a note from her son and the note said help. It just goes to show just how horrible they were being treated. Like you're being accused of killing one of our fellow guards. Yeah.

you know that they was getting their ass beat like every fucking day or being denied food. The protests that they were trying to have that started this whole thing, like in the things that they were asking for and advocating for was just fair treatment. They were asking if they could have showers every day. They were asking if they could have toothbrushes. They were asking like the majority of the shit that they wanted was just like,

Can we have stuff so that we can just like be healthy and clean and not be treated like animals? Like most of their demands weren't, they wanted humane conditions. That's what they were asking for. Which I should not have to be begging for a shower.

A shower. I shouldn't. Still while in the Soledad prison, the Soledad brothers, they're really just trying to organize the prisoners. They formed what was called a prison game. They called themselves the Brett Gorilla Family. Because of acts like this, George Jackson was in solitary for seven of the 11 years he spent in prison. He stole a total of $70 or was with somebody who stole a total of $70.

And he's in prison for 11 years. And so meanwhile, at this time, for Angela, the Board of Regents, they're having their meeting to get her out of the school. And she's across town protesting for the Soledad brothers and all political prisoners.

She was fired from her $10,000 a year position because of her membership to the Communist Party and was urged, which was, you know, strongly advised by the governor of California, Ronald Reagan. They voted 15 to 6 that her position be revoked. And Reagan said it's not because she's communist. It's because she's unprofessional, which we all know it's because she's communist.

Judge Jerry Patch ruled that the regents could not fire Angela solely because of her affiliation with the Communist Party. And she got her job back. But they didn't fire her again on June 20th of 1970 for the inflammatory language she had used in four different speeches.

It's just, ugh. How dare you? Yeah.

You know how like now if a white professor were to say like, nigga, we would be like, fire that motherfucker now. She said pig. So, oh my goodness. Inflammatory language. Like y'all is not that hurt by being called pig. The American Association of the University Professors censored

the board for this action. Ronald Reagan was like, you know, she's dangerous. She's going to indoctrinate the children with this. Like, we just can't let her. We can't let her take these young, impersonable minds. Their goal was to repress the radical political movement. And throughout all of this, you know, she's still receiving threats. The threats are getting worse. They want her to go back to Africa.

as if she was born in Africa, go anywhere from here. They just didn't want her around. They didn't want her spreading her knowledge and lifting up the people. That's the biggest threat is an educated Negro. Is an educated Negro, that's the biggest threat you can have. So with all these threats coming her way, of course, Angela was beginning to feel unsafe and she purchased her first gun.

So it's August 7th, 1970. We're in Marion County. We're at the Civic Center in the Justice Hall. And Jonathan and another young Black Panther—Jonathan, remember, Jonathan is George Jackson's brother. At this point, he's 17 years old. They come to the courthouse in a yellow van. He enters the courthouse with three guns in his, like, huge trench raincoat, and he has a bag. He's—

been really down and really in his feelings and really worked up about the treatment of his brother and everything that has been happening circling around his brother and the Soledad brothers in general. Um,

He says that it clouded his judgment, but he sat among the spectators for a while and then he opened the bag, pulled out the guns and threw it to one of his comrades. And one of his comrades was James McClain. James McClain was on trial because he was on trial for murder because they said that he stabbed a guard.

And the guard died, and he also was initially in prison for, you guessed it, burglary. Jonathan pulls out an Ivor Johnson paratrooper-style vertical front-gripped M1 carbine. That whole name is just one gun, everybody. And it had a 20-round banana clip and...

His comrade had a gun and it was held against Judge Haley's head. Judge Haley was the judge that was proceeding at the time. Jonathan is reported that he yelled out, freeze, freeze. And he told the court officials, the attorneys, the juries, he told everybody to lie on the floor. And he told one of his other comrades, he told one of his comrades to run in there and to free everybody that was in the holding cell because there were some members of the Panther Party in the holding cell that were testifying for murder.

the trial that was going on at the time. It's always so interesting for me to hear how lax security used to be back in the day. Like, from the airport to the courtrooms to all these places. Yeah, we can't get through nowhere now. Mm-mm.

So after being free, the Black Panther members, some of them, they joined the kidnappers. And Judge Haley, he was forced to call the sheriff. And he had to tell the sheriff, like, oh, no, don't come out here. Don't send the pigs to the courthouse. And they made him say, like, don't send the pigs to the courthouse. Road flares were used, and they were held against Judge Haley's necks before being replaced with a shotgun. You know those road flares that, like—

So they were kind of like, I will burn this on you. And then they had they were switching back between that and the gun. The four men secured four hostages, the deputy district attorney, Gary Thompson, the judge and three female jurors. The men had the five hostages and they entered an elevator and they told the police that they demanded that they wanted the Soledad brothers freed by 1230 p.m. today.

day. They forced the five hostages into the yellow rented van and began driving towards the exit. Like they were getting the fuck out of there. Little did they know that the police already was there. They were setting up a roadblock right outside of the civic center. Jonathan Jackson, he was 17. Remember he was driving. Well, I don't know if you remember. I don't know if I said it. Jonathan Jackson, George's little brother was 17 and he was driving the nine passengers out of the parking lot and his

his comrade that was in the passenger seat shot outside of the van and

And once he shot at the police, the police shot back. Judge Haley was shot from the gunshot tied to his neck. Judge Haley ended up dying in the shootout because he had a gun like tied to his neck. And not only was he shot in the neck, but he was also shot in the chest. Now they're not sure if it was the police that shot him in the chest, if it was the captors that shot him in the chest. I'm going to say that it was the police because y'all were just shooting willy nilly because that's what y'all like to do.

And then because of the shootout, three of the Black Panther members that were in the van, including Jonathan P. Jackson, was killed. Only one Black Panther survived the shootout. That was Rachel McGee. The district attorney left the shootout paralyzed because a bullet hit his spine. But the three female jurors were fine. At the funeral for Jonathan Jackson, there were a lot of people. There were

of so many people. It was a huge turnout. And while at the... And while at the funeral, one of her friends was like, hey...

You know that they found out that those guns were registered to you and they're trying to find you and put you in prison for murder and charge you for the crime that just happened that you weren't at. Yeah, because in the state of California, if you are an accomplice to the crime, you can be charged with the crime. But how am I an accomplice? I don't know if that was in her book, but nothing ever said...

They were stolen or I provided them. I know the lawyers are like, why would she give them the gun to go do this? She's a smart lady. But like, right. Why did she give them the guns?

Did she give them the guns? So when Angela found out that she was about to be indicted for a crime that she did not do and was not there for just because her guns were at the scene, she knew that it was clear. She said she made it pretty clear to herself that she was not going to make herself available for the police to arrest.

And she went underground. So now Angela's on the run, right? She's on FBI's most wanted fugitives. She's wanted for murder and kidnapping. And she was at the top of the list along with nine other communists for FBI's most wanted. Like...

Very, very targeted time. And they really started a manhunt for Angela. They had her picture everywhere and they had her fingerprints and they were like, we have to find her. They were on the lookout for a black woman with an afro. And black women all over the country was being stopped. Are you Angela Davis? Are you Angela Davis? Because you know they can't tell us apart. You got a fro. Are you Angela Davis? Yeah.

They also put part of her description. Not only did she have Afro, but she had a gap in her teeth. So they were definitely, after they checked off she was black and checked off that she had Afro, they was looking to see what that mouth was looking like. Her sister said that there were unmarked cars parked out in front of the house waiting to see if she comes home.

And Angela was faced with some decisions, like, what are you going to do? One, it's not like she planned to run. She was at a funeral, got a heads up and was like, I got to go underground immediately. She was like, could go to Cuba, but if I go to Cuba, I'm not coming. I can't come back, you know? Right. So she was like, that's not what I want. I don't want to be in hiding for the rest of my life. And she also said, I can't turn myself in right now because...

You know, look what they did for the Soledad brothers for so little. You know what I mean? So she was like, I'm not at all prepared to defend myself. I can't turn myself in. She went to Las Vegas. And from Las Vegas, she went to Chicago.

and she met her friend David Poindexter. They had to leave Chicago because David got in a fight with his neighbor, and they didn't want the neighbor to tell the police that Angela was there. So they traveled to Miami. They kind of got held up there for a little bit. Angela was very nervous, upset.

All the time. They went to Miami because that's where David's mom lived. And they were just really just trying to keep moving and keep the FBI off their trail. Right. Right. And she was starting to hear like false things like they would be like, Angela Davis was spotted in Birmingham leaving her parents house and she's driving a blue car. And she's like, I'm in Chicago. Right. The fuck are y'all talking about?

But listen, that's what I want to hear. I want to be in Chicago and y'all see me in Alabama. That's all right, man. Go ahead. Check it out. The police are talking to everybody. So they go to David's wife. I guess they got tipped off that she might be working with David. So they go to David's wife, Kendra Poindexter, and she tells the cops that she thinks they're in Florida and tells them what car they were driving. Now, the reason that she snitched is apparently she felt uncomfortable with the closeness of Angela and David.

And now here he is driving to Florida with her. She just got a little jealous and was like, this girl gots to go. So, yeah, they go to Florida. They talk to David's mom. They're hiding out there for a while. They're in a little hotel or whatever. And Angela knows that the agents are hot on her trail and they've got to move before she gets caught. So the agents, they figure out what hotel she's at in Miami and they go to the room.

But Angela and David had already left. So the police are searching the room and they don't find much. But underneath the couch cushions, they find some undeveloped film. So they go and develop this film and they find pictures of Angela Davis dead.

The thing is, Angela ain't got no fro. Her hair is pulled back into a ponytail. It's flat. She has pictures of her in a pixie wig. And I'm like, okay, so this picture that we put out is not how she's looking. We're looking for a lady in a fro and this girl ain't got no fro no more.

Wow, did you know we could change our hair? Crazy. Crazy. And it can happen easily, too. They get tipped off again, and they feel that Angela Davis is in New York. So they go to New York, and they're searching, they're searching, they're searching. They're getting tips. Some of the tips are, you know how it is when these tips come. Everybody got a story to tell. Everybody got some information, and they got to filter through what's true and what's not. And...

They get a tip saying that Angela's at the Howard Johnson Hotel. Angela is here. They're running out of money. They've gone state to state. It's not like they're working while they're out here. The cash is drying up. So they're staying at whatever they can afford. So she's at the Howard Johnson Hotel and Angela.

The FBI, they're looking for the car that she was and they see it in the hotel parking garage. So they go to the front desk and they show her. They show the person at the desk the film. And they were like, have you seen this woman? And they shown Angela in a picture cut. And I'm like, yeah, she just checked in, actually. At that very moment, the elevator door dings and out steps Angela Davis.

Uh, the moment they said when she was there, she was like, I could feel like the walls closing in on me. I knew they were close. Yes, but she didn't really react. She kind of just stood there and said nothing. She didn't resist the rest. She didn't try and run. They were like, are you Angela Davis? Are you Angela Davis? She said, I did not confirm or deny. I stayed silent.

And they put her in handcuffs. And after putting her in handcuffs, the officer says, I'm going to have to lift up your upper lip now so that they can check her mouth and see if she checks out to be the person who they think she is. Mm-hmm.

That is like the most disgusting thing. I know. Ew, your nasty hands in my mouth. Move. Nasty ass, white fucking dirty ass hands in my mouth. Disgusting. So on October 13th, 1970, Angela Davis was arrested and on the 14th, she was arraigned in a New York courtroom without bail for murder and kidnapping. The next day, which was October 15th, Richard Nixon was like, oh,

Oh, yes. They found Angela Davis. Congratulations. And he signed an organized crime bill that gave J. Edgar Hoover a standing ovation for, quote, apprehending the dangerous terrorist. Before a trial, before a conviction. Thank you for apprehending this terrorist. Well, we're supposed to be innocent until being guilty.

That part. So Angela was in jail for 18 months while she was awaiting her trial. And the conditions of the jail were just like deplorable. First of all, she couldn't, she had to like resist and fight so much just to get her phone call because, you know, she was in the state of New York, but it was a federal crime. So they were trying to fight over who was supposed to be able to give her her phone call. And when she finally was able to call somebody, the line was fucked up.

And she couldn't even have her real phone call. While she was at the prison, they were subjecting her to vaginal and rectal exams each time that she would leave in and out of the prison. So anytime that you had to go to court or anything, you had to be subjected to that because they were...

looking at you for contraband faintly she could hear chants outside of the walls because people were constantly protesting they were protesting you know free Angela free Angela now free Angela free the Soledad brothers feed them now you know and she also started hearing like there were present prisoners in the prison walls that were chanting that too like who she was and what she stood for had really already gotten around it preceded her there were black guards that worked at the prison

And she said that some of them would be like, oh, you know, we're on your side. But you really couldn't trust them. And she one time a black guard, a black female guard gave her a piece of candy. And she was like, I ain't eating that shit. Why? So y'all can kill me. And it looked like a jailhouse suicide. No, thank you. At one point, they sent her to the psych ward and they said it was for her safety.

And while she was there, she realized, she was like, these women are not crazy. You know, some are. She's like, some of these women are not crazy. Like, what's happening is that they're so out of it because here they're forcing these women to take these drugs that make them out of it all day, every day. Because, oh, now they have you in the psych ward. And she was realizing this for herself, but also like some of the women would not

would spit out their drug and be like, I don't want to take that. They make everybody take it every morning. And she, her and her team uproared about that. And so then she was put back into the general population. When she was put back into the general population, she was obviously known by the prisoners and her political views were well known at the time. And so when they asked her about her political views and they asked her to, you know, talk about what she thought and what she felt and her, you know,

her theories, her philosophies, of course, you know, she's going to do that. Don't ask me about something I'm interested in. Like, don't tempt me with a good time. And so that's exactly what she did. And because of that, they decided to throw her in solitary confinement. And when that happened, oh, she wasn't having that. So she started a hunger strike while she was in solitary confinement. And word got around that some of the other ladies were also doing a hunger strike and

in solidarity for Angela Davis. And she was soon let out of solitary confinement. Another thing that she really noticed, and it pissed me off, Tazzy, and so I know it pissed you off too, or if you don't know, I'm going to tell you now. She talked about how women that came into the jail

Say they were arrested because they were addicted and they were on drugs or they were in something happened. They would just basically throw them into a cell by themselves with nothing and make them detox that way, which is...

If you're hardcore on drugs, you need like medical assistance to detox. It is not easy to do so. Your body is addicted to that. And in the prison system, they don't care. It was to the point where some women were like dying while in these cells because your body needs that drug. If you're hardcore addicted to some drugs, your body needs that drug to survive. And you have to, you need the medical assistance to relieve yourself and detoxify yourself immediately.

of that drug. And then of course there are a whole bunch of women that were sitting in there for months and months and months, just because their bail was, was nothing but $50, you know, like my bail ain't nothing but $50, but I can't afford it. So now because I can't pay my $50 bail, I'm stuck in, I'm stuck in jail until I am able to see a judge and who knows when that will be. And I hate that. Like, so yeah, at this point you're being punished for being poor, right?

Like, I'm not being punished for my crime. I'm being punished because I ain't got no money. And that's a problem within itself. Like, the prison system is based off of capitalism. And we know that prison works for you if you have money to work it. Because of all these experiences, Angela began to understand the criminal justice system in a deeper level. She advocated for prison reform. She advocated for the Soledad brothers and all political prisoners.

It was something that she was extremely passionate about, and now it was even enhanced even more now that she was in it. To stay healthy while she was in prison, she would write letters to family and friends as well as to George. She did karate. She did yoga and yoga.

She was starting to get really emotionally attached to George Jackson. Their relationship between the two, it really began to blossom. And you can hear all about their relationship as well as what happens when Angela goes to trial on part two of this episode, which will come out next. So we're not going to get into OJ and parole or no parole yet because we're not finished with the story yet.

So, friend, just let them know where they can talk to us in the meantime. Yes, if you can talk to us, you can tweet us at Sisters Who Kill. You can email us at sisterswhokillpodcast at gmail.com. You can follow us on Instagram at sisterswhokillpod. You can follow us on TikTok at sisterswhokillpodcast. And you can join the discussion group. And we will see you next week. You got anything else, friend? Talk to us. We talk back.