 The weight of the world and trans-Turman culture should not fall on black women's shoulders. And here in the United States, it's too often the case. We saw it with Roy Moore in Alabama when black women rallied to make sure that he was not elected. And let's not forget that 94% of black women voted against Donald Trump. While these are recent examples of when black women have showed up, the suffragette movement in the 1800s originally started out as a movement led by white women. But people like Sojourner Truth, a former slave, she understood that if white women were getting free, black women needed to be free as well. Another important person to note is Ida B. Wells, a militant journalist. She marched in the 1913 suffrage parade and refused to be in the back, whereas they were told black women should be. This legacy of black women saving the day continued through the civil rights movement and the LGBTQ movements in the 60s. The LGBTQ movement could not exist without Marsha P. Johnson, one of my personal favorite freedom fighters and revolutionaries who fought to ensure that we held the intersections of her womaness, her blackness, and her transness. One of the architects of Stonewall and the reason why we have pride in the first place, she understood that we couldn't leave behind race or gender or sexuality in the conversation when it came to who could be free in this country and who couldn't. The tradition of black women saving this country from itself can even be tracked to right now in this decade. Black Lives Matter, Patrice Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tamedi have taken the reign of formerly single mayoral leadership movements because of movements like Black Lives Matter. We're seeing a new kind of leadership, one that centralizes many voices instead of just one. A popular movement that is happening is threatening to erase black women from its conception. In movements like Me Too, we've seen black women like Tarana Burke own the conversation around sexualized violence, something very real and pervasive in black women's communities but not often talked about. Thanks to social media, we reminded that over a decade ago, Tarana Burke started the conversation and while it was amplified by many people right now, we fought to ensure that black women were not erased from the dialogue. It's time for us to come out of the closet as intersectional feminists, as abolitionists, as freedom fighters, and as revolutionaries. It's time for us all to come out of our fear and come into our power. We need to challenge the stereotypes and stories that aren't authentically representative of black women and girls. Too often, black women and girls are not in the writer's room and stories that are being told about us rely on cinematic servitude or enslavement. We can invest in organizations led by black women. Org's like the Highlander Center, Color of Change, Southerners on New Ground, and BYP100 are great places to start. We need to remember that the revolution starts first at home and in ourselves. It's time for us all to start having conversations that are courageous about race and gender politics in this country with our friends, our family members, and our co-workers.