Thought Leadership
The BlackOUT Collective is rooted in a simple truth: Black people have always resisted.
Long before policy wins and protest cycles, before hashtags and headlines, our communities practiced collective courage. We cultivated land. We built cooperatives. We organized mutual aid. We created safety for one another when no institution would. We imagined and enacted freedom in the cracks of systems designed to deny it.
We carry that lineage forward.
Our work centers the lived experiences of Black people on the frontlines of change — from organizers and cultural workers to everyday people demanding dignity, safety, and self-determination. By grounding our reporting in community accountability and political education, we help movements sharpen their analysis, deepen solidarity, and move with intention.
This newsletter is a space to stay connected to that work.
Inside, you’ll find opportunities for training and coaching, reflections from the field, strategic insights, and invitations into cross-movement solidarity. We share what we are learning in real time. What works? What evolves? And how we continue building resilient formations capable of sustained action.
We believe Black people must be agents of systemic transformation in this country. Direct action is one critical tactic in making that shift real.
We are building resilient communities rooted in place, in relationship, and in action.
NOTES FROM THE FIELD
We want to take a moment to highlight the incredible things happening in Minneapolis. Without a doubt, the city is experiencing a collective trauma as it combats heightened federal enforcement and oppression.
But the people are coming together in the most beautiful way.
Within minutes of federal enforcement agents arriving in some neighborhoods, residents are tracking them and coordinating a response. People set up hyper-local encrypted chats that cover a block or a few blocks.
What is surfacing is clear: people want to act where they live, and a care ethic is central to their why.
Center for Third World Organizing
1714 Franklin St #100-245
Oakland, CA 94612
United States
