However the abuse is perpetrated, the result is the same: abuse does not make sense in the context of our humanity, so when we are abused, we must ei… - Aurora Levins Morales

All of us have had failures of integrity. I believe part of what makes it so hard to consider perpetrators as part of our constituency is that we cannot bear to examine the ways we resemble them. Until we confront the moments when we have been co-opted, coerced or seduced into harming others, we will be vulnerable to defensive self-righteousness.

I have learned that suffering does not improve people, that slavery does not ennoble us for freedom, that oppression springs from oppression, echoing the twisted lessons we learn from our pain.

Every vital social movement immediately begins to generate art-songs, poetry, posters, murals, novels-an outpouring of the creativity that people will create from even the smallest crumbs of hope.