I consider myself a casualty, one of the many casualties of the war on terror.

I am the man, I suffered, I was there.

I know how to advocate for them because I feel like I basically lived through it

Do you know the Boston Marathon explosion? I did it.

I felt like a social worker a lot of the time.

I was part of this propaganda campaign, absolutely.

I had been there before; I knew all about it.

…I like to think that I'm just part of the struggle because we all sort of exist in this thing, trying to figure out what it means to be human day-to-day and what it means to have, like, suffered and made other people suffer.

Because when you engage in the same things as the masses, you lower yourself to their level.

I'd always identified myself with the people's struggles. I think I began writing more about it and having an audience for writing it. But we wrote as partisans, we call it. You're on the side and like I was marching. I don't say anything about the troubles of the manufacturers association, or any sympathy for them. I just identified with the strikers.

I think my early challenges prepared me for what I do now. I can empathize because I have been there. I can relate because I know that pain.

We're all zoo humans to some extent, even me.

I was only one of hundreds of thousands of Yazidi victims.

I am part of all that I have met.