No One’s Free Until Everyone Is

We like to think we’re fighting for something. That we’re standing on the right side of history, loud and clear. But if I’m being honest, most of what I’ve fought for has been what’s right in front of me—what felt urgent, personal, or impossible to ignore. It’s easy to care about what’s close to home. The real challenge is looking further, seeing beyond what touches your life. That’s where the fight falters.

Here’s the truth I’ve had to wrestle with: we don’t fight systems. We fight symptoms. We talk about racism but not the poverty that props it up. We protest climate change but ignore the people already losing their homes to rising seas. We post about feminism but stay quiet about the women who are never invited into the room, let alone the movement. We don’t mean to overlook these things—but we do. And in that oversight, oppression thrives.

The first time I came across the concept of intersectionality, it wasn’t an “aha” moment. It was more of a slow, disorienting unraveling. It gave me language for something I hadn’t fully understood but had always felt: that the fight for justice isn’t one-dimensional. That systems of power don’t oppress us in neat, separate ways. They overlap, they tangle, they reinforce one another. And worse, the ways we try to fight them often fall into the same trap—splintered, siloed, blind to their own limitations.

Intersectionality isn’t about adding complexity for the sake of it. It’s about clarity. It’s about seeing how systems of oppression—racism, sexism, colonialism, capitalism—aren’t just connected. They’re designed to be connected. They rely on each other, feed off each other. If you don’t see that, you’re not dismantling anything. You’re just rearranging the pieces.

But that clarity isn’t easy. It asks questions that are uncomfortable because they don’t just point outward; they point inward. Whose pain have you ignored because it felt distant? Whose struggles have you dismissed because they weren’t yours? Whose liberation have you postponed because you decided it wasn’t “the time” to address it? These aren’t theoretical questions. They’re personal, and they’re damning.

I’ve been complicit in systems I claim to oppose. I’ve stayed quiet when speaking felt inconvenient. I’ve fought for issues that affected me and skimmed past the ones that didn’t. I’ve mistaken proximity for priority and missed what mattered most. And I’m not alone. The way the world teaches us to see injustice is inherently selfish. Care about what touches you. Let someone else care about the rest. But that’s exactly how oppression survives—fractured, splintered, unchecked in the spaces where we think someone else will handle it.

Look at the climate crisis. We treat it like a distant storm we’re preparing to weather, as though we still have time. But time ran out long ago for entire communities—places already underwater, families already displaced. Yet when we talk about solutions, it’s never about them. It’s about us. It’s about reducing personal carbon footprints or buying ethically sourced products. The problem isn’t just environmental; it’s colonial, economic, systemic. The planet isn’t dying equally.

Or feminism. The version of it that gets celebrated now is sanitized and hollow. Women breaking barriers in politics, in corporations, in Hollywood—it’s progress, sure. But progress for whom? For the women already close enough to power to touch it? What about the women of color, the trans women, the disabled women, the undocumented women, the ones whose struggles aren’t hashtag-friendly or headline-worthy? Feminism that doesn’t make space for them isn’t feminism at all. It’s the patriarchy rebranded, sold back to us as empowerment.

Intersectionality reveals what’s hardest to admit: that no struggle exists in isolation. You can’t fight racism without addressing poverty. You can’t fight for LGBTQ+ rights while ignoring the violence against Black trans women. You can’t claim to care about the planet without acknowledging the exploitation of the Global South. These aren’t “extra” issues—they’re the core. To pretend otherwise is not just naive; it’s dangerous.

Of course, intersectionality doesn’t just expose the world—it exposes you. It forces you to ask: What systems have you benefited from? What injustices have you overlooked because they weren’t yours to bear? And are you willing to give up comfort, power, even identity to truly fight for someone else’s liberation? These are hard questions because they cut through your armor. They strip away the illusion that your fight is enough.

But guilt isn’t the answer. Guilt paralyzes; it centers you in a fight that isn’t about you. What intersectionality demands is responsibility. To show up when it’s hard. To listen when it’s easier to speak. To understand that solidarity isn’t just a gesture—it’s survival.

None of us are free until all of us are free. That isn’t idealism; it’s strategy. The systems that oppress us rely on division. They thrive on the idea that our struggles are separate, that we can afford to fight only for what we know. But that’s the lie that keeps the system intact. The truth is, our liberation is tied together. The web of oppression is also the web of resistance.

This isn’t about being perfect. Intersectionality isn’t a checklist or a purity test. It’s a way of seeing, of refusing to turn away from the uncomfortable connections between struggles. It’s a practice—a discipline, even. It demands humility and courage, and it never stops asking more of you. But that’s what makes it worthwhile.

Because once you see the full picture, you can’t unsee it. And once you see it, you can’t help but act. Not just for what touches you, but for what’s furthest from you. That’s the only fight that matters.