we are still slaves to this day whether
it be mental
financial material spiritual these are
things that we have to attack on every
side because the enemy is attacking on
every side
this is why we have self-defense classes
to make sure we can have
the best response when we are doing
non-armed or armed rescues
we are warriors
in america black women face a unique set
of threats
their concerns involve a deadly
combination of racism and violent
patriarchy
every 19 hours in america a black woman
is killed by a man
and once every 21 hours a black woman is
killed by a black man
the black woman's defense league is
showing these women how to fight back
we will fight just as violently against
the oppressor
for each other formed in dallas in 2015
by ncx
the bwdl has embraced the legacy of
their four mothers in the black panthers
they're out in the community empowering
young blacks to exercise their second
amendment rights
to protect themselves from the violence
of misogyny and systemic racism
in terms of this house do you guys have
guns here yeah
guns were actually involved in the civil
rights movement
because of the fact that there might be
a cross burning in your front yard
it was because of the fact your daughter
might go to church and there's a bomb in
the church it's just that that history
has been hidden
it's you know it's a weapon it's
something to protect you
and we all know the safe way to handle
it i mean yeah i mean it's not really
it's a big deal what is the aesthetic
element of the gun and style and and is
that something that's important to you
you know like when people see women
holding guns it's automatically sexy it
doesn't matter if she's wearing a burqa
it's sexy for some reason and for that
it's not something that i go out of my
way to avoid
but i'm certain on making sure that it's
not
the message that they come away with
like oh there's just some pretty girls
with guns you know
they are for use black women
should be a priority just by the numbers
more black women died
as a result of intimate partner violence
than black men get killed by the police
we have this thing of this
in-house we don't want nobody outside
the house to know what's going on we
don't want you to know that uncle next
door has touched every woman in the
house
and he still gets to come to the family
picnics and why is this not
dealt with that's something that we come
to shed light on
not only do we have to fight the man
we got to fight i mean at the end of the
day
we have a common goal which is
ultimately liberation
but at the very least the well-being and
safety of our sisters
growing up in the city of dallas helped
shape nisi's radical activism
if the life-giver is not safe then the
entire
group of people is not safe it's one of
the most racially segregated major
metropolitan cities in the country
with extreme economic inequality not to
mention
the city's police department has a
woeful record of handling sex crimes for
women
and was until recently one of the
country's most dismal when it came
to police involved shootings it's also
the home base of several other black
activist organizations
like the huey p newton gun club which
nisi joined before starting the bwdl
i had a pretty sheltered life both of my
parents were
catholic had you had any experience back
then with guns or gun violence
oh no actually like i've never been a
big
fan of guns to tell you the truth i
think that
they're probably one of the worst
inventions on
earth what was your evolution to get to
a point where you created an
organization
so many women are excited about my
grandmother had
a deep love for politics i grew up
watching cnn and msnbc and i knew all of
the senators and who the republicans
were
and and really i was drinking the
kool-aid for a while like i really
thought that that's what it was and and
i loved my grandmother i trusted her but
i started going to protests and things
like that
you were in qep new gun club what
happened that you sort of left that
organization
and started your own thing um there were
issues with with
sexism there were issues with an
individual
that i had been dealing with
romantically and
there was some violence that occurred
between him and i i was pregnant at the
time i lost a kid
it was a really really horrible feeling
and it wasn't horrible i think for the
reasons that most people think it was it
wasn't like the immediate pain of
anything that was happening it was just
feeling powerless
and then afterwards it was worse because
the response wasn't one of support
they you know pretty much ignored it and
then at the point when i became more
vocal about it and i started
requiring that there be something done
about these types of things they
literally sent me an email and they were
just like you know we don't deal with
this type of stuff and we're not going
to tolerate it and you need the stock
and it makes me wonder if women and
children are two-thirds of the community
how much of the community are you there
for if you're not there for the
protection of them we reached out to the
huey p newton gun club about their
handling of niecy's allegations
they said that nisi was not part of the
gun club at the time the alleged
incident took place
and say that the black women's defense
league was a male-bashing
feminist movement fueled by a hateful
stance towards men
and i'll be honest there was a lot that
i didn't know about women's issues
before
i started to study it and i became an
unwilling example of why it's necessary
jay agar hoover once said that the most
dangerous thing the black panthers ever
did was not
carry guns for self-defense but actually
administer social programs for the
people
programs like free breakfast and free
lunch the black women's defense league
is following that tradition of providing
support for the people in this community
by giving young kids food and support
and love
what's she supposed to say thank you
you're welcome you know i feel like this
is a good positive thing that y'all
doing
you know letting these children know
that they are somebody and somebody care
about you and somebody care about you
and it's somebody with the same face
that you yeah
you know what do you know about africa
they got cheetahs
people that's real black like you black
like me black
the goal isn't just to give them a full
stomach but to give them something to
think about and some knowledge of self
how do the social outreach programs that
you're working on also connect with some
of the self-defense stuff that you're
doing
the gun in and of itself is a tool right
it's a tool and that's
it if i had it my way guns wouldn't
exist
however if you're providing education
and knowledge of self and it becomes
useful for what it is which is
self-defense
because in the event that you or a
family member needs to use it
it's really important that it's not
something that's scary to you
[Music]
this is private property i don't know
how this works but right
if you're going to be somewhere you need
permission from the owner of that
property what's happening right now is
the black women's defense league has
been coming here to this low-income area
to give food to the children
but because it's private property the
direct manager has been saying yo you
can't do it
they call the police we've been coming
here weeks and weeks and been doing
these different things and giving people
clothes and shoes and hygiene products
and everybody is enjoying it and they
know they're in need of it but the
problem is they wanna
they have a racist maybe five or less
than that racist people
who have a problem with black people
doing positive
and that's really what the issue is so
go ahead and call the pigs
do you think it's right to shut a
program like this down for your kids
it's
up to the owners i know but like do you
think it's right though honestly yeah
please don't touch my flag
thank you
although giving back to the community is
a big part of the black women's defense
league
it's self-defense training with firearms
that sets them apart from other
organizations
in texas black women have been
identified as the fastest growing
demographic of gun owners
of course being a black gun owner is a
dangerous proposition in a country
that has historically criminalized black
gun ownership
from the birth of this nation through
jim crow it was illegal in some states
for blacks to even possess
guns and modern gun control as we know
it
began as a conservative cause pushed
forth by politicians like ronald reagan
in the 60s
to keep firearms out of the hands of
groups like the black panthers
many argue that this legacy continues
today
they cite cases like marissa alexander a
woman who served three years in prison
for firing a warning shot
at her abusive husband in florida the
same state
where george zimmerman got off scot-free
after killing trayvon martin
i was thinking a lot about this history
as i rolled with the black women's
defense league
to a white owned gun rage in texas
we're here with the black women's
defense league kind of been talking
about
how this is still in the early
beginnings of the group
and so as individuals are still getting
acclimated to the idea of using
guns as self-defense this is a process
where they're learning and feeling
comfortable about it
and then they're gonna evangelize it and
you know take this information that
they're gathering
to the people who are interested in the
group so this is sort of the inception
of a new movement so when it comes down
to the necessities which i do consider
the
ability to protect oneself a necessity
it's
it's kind of a necessary evil at this
point you know
actually it's more black women in here
than anybody's usually
really you're a target whether you carry
a gun a knife or
walk in the streets in protest but when
you're an armed
group and have a gun involved and you
start talking about privileges
white privilege say for example john
crawford
was shot in an open carry state if it's
an open carry state and i'm in a walmart
right carrying a gun why would you shoot
me on site even if the gun is
is real and see that's the thing is like
say when nisi is
holding a gun people see a different
thing than just oh she must be a second
amendment
advocate they're not going to initially
associate it
with some sort of constitutional right
they're going to want to know what is
she up to
right
do you see the gun sort of uh phallic or
masculine i think some of them are kind
of sexy
i think it's best to be consistently
training on firearms
hand-to-hand combat you're never good
enough
[Music]
okay okay three bullets in the same hole
nice this is incredible you guys killed
it
you act like you know how to shoot and
she
six months after i met with the black
women's defense league
a violent tragedy erupted in dallas that
put nesi in danger
on july 7th nisi attended a peaceful
demonstration against police brutality
the demonstration was in response to the
police shooting of philando castile
a legal gun owner who was killed by a
cop after announcing that he was in
possession of a firearm
veteran micah johnson who had a history
of mental health issues
ambushed the police at the protest he
killed five officers
nisi was unarmed at the demonstration
peacefully protesting
but she was wrongfully detained by the
dallas police department
for more than six hours she was never
charged
today despite the threat of increased
surveillance
she continues to advocate for black
women and black liberation
with the hope of expanding the bwdl to
more cities across the nation
the world that our daughters have to
grow up in
is going to be a direct correlation to
what we did or what we failed to do
you