‘Every movement I’ve been in has been infected by patriarchy’: an extract from Alicia Garza’s book

I’ve spent much of my life fighting patriarchy, even when I didn’t know it. When I was a kid, my dad used to drink coffee like his life depended on it. He would wake up in the morning and drink a cup – lightened with half-and-half and sweetened with three packets of Equal. I knew how to make it expertly, and so did my mother. “Lynette, make me some coffee!” was a common phrase in my home. Sometimes it would come for me.

“Alicia!” my dad would bellow. “Make me some coffee!” I hated hearing it. Something about the demand to drop everything and run to the kitchen to make an able-bodied man a cup of coffee made me angry, deep in my spirit. I was a child, so it wasn’t like I was doing anything important. But in my eight-year-old mind, that wasn’t the point.

My mother did everything in our home – she made sure the bills were paid, the house was clean, we were fed and taken care of. My dad ran the family business, which was also hard work, but in my mind he spent most of his time telling other people what to do, […]

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