“What side are you on, my people? What side are you on?”

Since last week’s action at Netroots Nation, in which Black Lives Matter activists seized control of the Town Hall at the biggest progressive convention in the country, I’ve had the voices of my Black sisters singing those words during the protest in my head.

Knees buckling, I marched down one of the aisles in the event space at Phoenix Convention Center behind #BlackLivesMatter co-founder Patrisse Cullors; GetEQUAL’s Elle Hearns and Angela Peoples; Ashley Yates; Amber Phillips and Gloria Malone of Echoing Ida; and Monica Simpson of SisterSong; among many other amazing leaders. Not long after the interview with Gov. Martin O’Malley began, roughly 50 of us walked from the back of the space to the front, where we demanded that Netroots and the two presidential candidates attending the conference hear us and questions posed directly by Cullors about their plans to address structural racism and the police state in this country. It was one of the proudest moments of my life, even though I was completely unsure of myself. To get to that moment, I had to set aside my priorities as an editor and a reporter covering the event, and I had to actively reject the impulse bestowed on me to be “respectable,” which many wrongly assume will keep us from being killed by the police. I had to just be who I was: a Black woman who needed to express her frustration and impatience at the “progress” so-called progressives are seeking.

What I realized in that moment, something I’ve felt for years but only then could put into words, is that doing social change work is scary and will make you uncomfortable; it will change you, for better or for worse. But that’s part of what showing up and taking a stand means. And what choice do we have? I have 12 nieces and nephews, and I hope that one day they’ll also take a stand for what they believe in, because if they don’t, who will? I have some faith that other liberals will continue taking steps to fight for racial justice, but given what I saw this past weekend, Black people, Black women in particular, will have no choice but to lead the way.