Skip to content
Safety•Exit
  • Who We Are
    • About Us
    • Our Team
      • Board
      • Staff
      • Youth Organizing Fellows
    • Careers
  • What We Do
    • Investing in Young People
    • Advocacy & Organizing
    • Freedom Research Institute
  • Freedom 2030
  • Locations
    • Contra Costa County
    • Los Angeles
    • Oakland
    • Santa Clara County
    • San Francisco
  • Media
    • Young AF
    • Blog
    • YWFC Resources
    • In the News
    • Press Releases
    • Video Gallery
  • Contact
  • Who We Are
    • About Us
    • Our Team
      • Board
      • Staff
      • Youth Organizing Fellows
    • Careers
  • What We Do
    • Investing in Young People
    • Advocacy & Organizing
    • Freedom Research Institute
  • Freedom 2030
  • Locations
    • Contra Costa County
    • Los Angeles
    • Oakland
    • Santa Clara County
    • San Francisco
  • Media
    • Young AF
    • Blog
    • YWFC Resources
    • In the News
    • Press Releases
    • Video Gallery
  • Contact
  • Who We Are
    • About Us
    • Our Team
      • Board
      • Staff
      • Youth Organizing Fellows
    • Careers
  • What We Do
    • Investing in Young People
    • Advocacy & Organizing
    • Freedom Research Institute
  • Freedom 2030
  • Locations
    • Contra Costa County
    • Los Angeles
    • Oakland
    • Santa Clara County
    • San Francisco
  • Media
    • Young AF
    • Blog
    • YWFC Resources
    • In the News
    • Press Releases
    • Video Gallery
  • Contact
Safety•Exit←
Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube
General Blog

Commemorating Juneteenth 2021

Posted by: YWFC
June 11, 2021

Happy Juneteenth YWFC Fam!

Here at YWFC, we celebrate the holidays that have meaning to our people! 

Juneteenth is also known as Freedom Day for African American folks, and it began in Texas. Black Texans were not notified of their freedom until June 19th, 1865, more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed. Juneteenth acknowledges the many generations of ancestors who have paved the way for us in this fight for liberation. 

ABC news video explaining Juneteenth (3:34)

A Brief History of Juneteenth (Houstonia)

A Legacy of Injustice (Equal Justice Initiative)

Juneteenth Spotify Playlist

ACA 3  

Angelique Evans:

We are honoring what our ancestors had to go through. Slavery is not completely over and we’re not completely free, but that’s why we’re doing the work we’re doing right now! Pass ACA 3!

Tumani Drew:

Juneteenth is to celebrate our ancestors’ resistance and use the strength of our history to guide our fight for freedom.

Ifasina Clear:

Growing up in Texas, this holiday was not recognized in schools, libraries, or other public learning spaces. My mother and father never got this day off work, nor did their parents or their parent’s parents. In Dallas, where I’m from, this was a Black holiday celebrated in Black communities, with other Black folks and not even on the “mainstream culture’s” radar. It was not a holiday I saw non-Black people acknowledge until I was in my late 20s. My elders say the exact day is unknown, they just know that approximately 2.5 years after everyone else was freed, Texas got the news. Can you imagine realizing for 2 years you could have been free, and wasn’t?  I also heard stories of Black folks choosing to stay with the slave owner for survival and changing the relationship from enslaved to sharecropping and other forms of domestic/service work. There was no plan for freedom and folks had to figure it out along the way. This is the legacy my elders passed down to me.


This history and story stuck out to me as a queer young person trying to find liberation at the intersection of Blackness and Queerness in Texas, a state that has now voted to take Critical Race Theory from public schools. Dallas, a city with Black leaders that at the time, refused to back Martin Luther King in the bus boycotts, and a state that comes close to meeting California in its number of prisons. At 18 I was harassed and discriminated against at a Salvation Army homeless shelter by the Black women that worked there, for being openly gay with my girlfriend. Freedom in Texas has always felt just out of touch for me. It’s the reason so many queer kids run away from it to the Bay and New York-especially queer Black kids. On this Juneteenth, I honor YWFC for doing something I never saw happen in my youth in Texas; that’s give its employees the day off. I’m 38 and last year was the first time I had a paid day off for this holiday and I’ve been working since I was 14. It matters to have this level of commitment and acknowledgement of this day by the organization. My queer Black liberation is celebrated and that means the world to me. Black folks across the country are asking for more than this holiday from this country, including reparations, equitable transportation, to defund police, Medicare for all,  and a host of other things. On this Juneteenth, I encourage you to look to the voices and insights of Black folks and follow their lead. Institutional acknowledgment does not override the structural change needed in this country. May we all know the difference and honor them both, this year.

Happy Juneteenth y’all!

You can help by Donating today.

Donate ⟶

Read More from General Blog

General Blog

From Foster Care to Prison

By Julia Arroyo, YWFC Managing Director for National Foster Care Month I was three years

Read More ⟶
YWFC May 2, 2022
General Blog

Earth Day 2021: Incarcerated Firefighters on the Front Lines

By Freddie Francis for YWFC The connections between climate crisis and the prison industrial complex

Read More ⟶
YWFC April 22, 2021

My Story

In telling my story, I always start with my grandmother’s migration to the states. She

Read More ⟶
YWFC January 4, 2021
Load More
What do you know about?
#FREEDOM2030
Find Out ⟶

General Info

  • Email Us
  • Call Us

Follow Us

Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube
Locations
Contra Costa County

tumani [at] youngwomenfree.org
(510) 334-2629

Los Angeles

lareferrals [at] youngwomenfree.org
(415) 703-8800 ext 215

Visit Us

Oakland

oakreferrals [at] youngwomenfree.org
(510) 350-7411

Visit Us

San Francisco

Headquarters
832 Folsom Street, Suite 700
San Francisco, CA 94107
sfreferrals [at] youngwomenfree.org
(415) 703-8800

Visit Us

Santa Clara County

sccreferrals [at] youngwomenfree.org
(415) 703-8800 ext 216

Visit Us

YWFC in the News

End Involuntary Servitude in California Act: Press Conference Livestream

YWFC February 15, 2023

How Black History Paves the Way for a Just Black Future

YWFC February 1, 2023

California Looks to Santa Clara County Model to Stop Incarceration of Girls

YWFC January 27, 2023

Get Updates

Subscribe for YWFC Newsletters ⟶

© Young Women's Freedom Center 2023 | Designed + Built by Lu Design Studio

©Young Women's Freedom Center 2023
Designed + Built by LDS

Subscribe for YWFC Newsletters!

* indicates required
Regions
Help us notify you about events in your area!
  • Español