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One of my most salient memories is of scurrying through the streets of DTLA past curfew, evading patrols and blockades of armed soldiers and officers.
I remember dropping into the middle of the city in the dead of night, having to worry about every hint of movement I sensed on the streets, trying to evade confrontation, my path lit only by the harsh white streetlights above, trying to make it to a warm bed waiting for me at my group’s staging area for the next day’s demonstration. I remember the musty, lingering smells of smoke, the streets I traversed having been scenes of intense bloodshed, beatings, arrests, and tears only a few hours prior.
I remember seeing the sirens’ lights as I was dropping into the city. I remember seeing entire lines of people pushed against walls in handcuffs. I remember the armored trucks. I remember the soldiers. I remember how scared I was, trying not to attract attention, trying to avoid detection in the city I considered my backyard. I kept on rehearsing conversations in my head of what to say if I got stopped by a soldier, exploring dialogue options to avoid arrest to make it to my rendezvous safely. I remember the relief when I finally made it indoors, and I could text my friends: “I’m safe.”
I was scared, but I’d do it again, because fear is not a sufficient excuse for lying flat while the authoritarian hand of tyranny orders the oppressive wheels of the military and police to crush we the people.
Stand up for what’s right, even when it’s unpopular, even when it’s difficult, even when it’s hellish. Stand up for what’s right, especially when it’s unpopular, especially when it’s difficult, especially when it’s hellish – because if you won’t, then who will?
Remember: there will come a day when, once it is convenient, everyone will say they were against evil. Yet, evil prevails not because of those who do it, but because of those who look on and do nothing. Will you fight for a better tomorrow? When the call to action comes, will you answer?
Believe. Believe in a better tomorrow. Believe that we the people can fight hate and create a world that serves everyone. Believe in hope, and then let that hope into your heart and let it drive you to act. Have courage: not the absence of fear, but acting in spite of it.
Know what you believe in. Find what you’ll fight for. Find what you’ll die for. Act.
We change the world not through romanticized fantasies of glorious revolutions, but through our individual actions and inactions, every day. We change the world by being agents of the change we wish to see in it. So, I beg you: live this world with love, live this world with courage, and fight – fight for what’s right, even when it’s hard.