What started in Ferguson taught me that I belong in this group

I still remember where I was on August 9, 2014. I was at my desk at the bank, taking a break from helping clients who were struggling to pay their mortgages. I was scrolling through my phone, hoping to pass the time on my favorite social media app at the time, Twitter. As I scrolled through my timeline, I came across an image that made me sit up straighter in my seat. This was a time before trigger warnings or sensitive alerts. The image I saw was of someone’s baby lying in the street with a pool of blood running down the cement beneath him. That baby, we all learned within hours, was Michael Brown Jr., and the street he was lying on was called Canfield Drive in Ferguson, Missouri. Brown lost his life that day.

That image that I saw over and over again, forever etched in my memory, was a cultural assault that would spawn a tremendous movement called Black Lives Matter.

No one has shown the world that Black Lives Matter is more than the people of Ferguson, who marched in the streets and took courageous action to ensure the world never forgets what they did to a young black man walking down the street. The courage of a community to share their power has inspired a generation of millions to take action and never look back.

Their protests also inspired my own analysis and what I was willing to do to demand justice. The Ferguson organizers taught us all how to protest. The Women’s March and the racial conversation that took place in the summer of 2020 would not have happened without the Ferguson uprising that resulted from Brown’s death. For that, I believe we owe the Ferguson organizers more than a thank you. The righteous rage that was there was the quintessential action that led America to confront the sins of its past, creating the space for many movements to emerge and centralize the conversations about race, class, and gender that still shape the world today.

My infinite gratitude, admiration, respect and love for Ferguson is eternal. And I pray that none of us ever forget him.

Learn more: How Ferguson Woke Us Up

Ten years is a long time for most people, but it’s even longer for those of us who know what it’s like to lose someone, or even ourselves. Ten years ago, I found myself homeless, without a purpose, and desperate to find a new path. I felt like I had no choice but to suffer and become a shadow of my former self.

I was deeply inspired by the people of Ferguson who looked like me and reminded me of my family, the community that used their voices to proclaim “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” as a rallying cry in response to the actions of a police officer who treated Black lives as disposable. It was the voices of the Ferguson protesters that reminded me that I may be homeless, but I am not voiceless. It was that voice that carried me far and wide, from the White House to communities across this country that lacked resources and support, just as I did a decade ago.

Ferguson encouraged me to never give up and never let anyone stand in my way of creating what I knew was necessary to provide for myself and my community. Many would have me believe that being black, poor, and transgender meant there was no place for me. And if I hadn’t seen women staring at armored trucks and millions of people taking to social media to express their dismay, anger, and sadness, I probably would have thought the same thing. Ferguson taught me that there was no space I didn’t belong in. The only spaces I couldn’t relate to were those that didn’t believe in the humanity of all Black people. For me, there was no compromise to be made on that.

This realization led me to found the nation’s largest Black transgender organization dedicated exclusively to protecting and defending the lives of Black transgender people, the Marsha P. Johnson Institute. We were born out of the rage and sadness of Ferguson. We were born out of the rage and sadness that grows as we learn of the ever-growing list of unarmed Black people who have been unjustly killed.

I remember who I was before I knew so many names and stories of injustice. I remember who I was before the Marsha P. Johnson Institute. And I remember who I was before Ferguson. I was young, free, lost, scared, but optimistic that the world believed in young Black people like me. However, over the past decade, I have learned to question this truth. With the rise of anti-trans laws and the frequency of unjust killings of unarmed Black people, like Sonya Massey most recently, we are constantly reminded that our fight is still ongoing.

Learn more: The Illusion of Police Security

I will never forget that Ferguson saved me and gave me a model for everything I could become as an organizer and, more importantly, as a Black woman. While I have had many sleepless nights filled with anxiety and doubt, coupled with many tragic losses—including several murders and deaths of activists I admired and whose ideas will forever guide me—I have never forgotten that Ferguson’s Black imagination led a resistance movement that changed the way we talk about politics and race in America. So much so that unprecedented firsts are still happening today—like Vice President Kamala Harris announcing her candidacy for president.

Great efforts have been made to end the power of a community like Ferguson and its influence over people like me who need to be reminded that our lives do matter. That we have to fight like hell to preserve them. And that we didn’t have to fight alone.

It was the Black imagination that moved all of us to join Ferguson in the streets and in our own communities, to take action as we learned more and more of the names of Black people murdered by police. It was the Black imagination that led me to believe that despite the continuing horrific consequences of these attacks, we, the witnesses to these atrocities, owe a debt of gratitude to the organizers of Ferguson who showed humanity to all of us by taking courageous steps to hold police accountable for their wrongdoing.

Ferguson lit an unquenchable flame. In it, we saw ourselves more fully. And it sparked a global movement to encourage communities to pursue freedom, safety, and justice for all. I am because we are. I am because of Ferguson, Missouri. Thank you for this tradition that will always be carried on.