10/06/2025
A Voice for The Voiceless
29 Sep 25
Dear Friends,
Back in the early 90's I started a newsletter called "The Williams Report," which consisted of interviews, essays, and captured conditions on Texas death row. As a young kid faced with the unthinkable, I was inspired by "The Autobiography of Malcolm X", the courage of George Jackson and his book " Soledad Brother", as well as John Henry Abbot whose passages "In The Belly of the Beast" inspired me to write. I needed to fight... I had to fight, but I was unequipped for what was to come. This newsletter spread from country to country as I captured moments that then seemed unreal and even more so now. In fact, being voice for the most ostracized people in America: prisoners, came at a price. I was thrown in blackout cells, management cells, placed in a wheel chair and paper mask for restricted movement, and placed on "food loaf" repeatedly. My mother begged me to stop, but being faced with state sanctioned murder (executions) there was nothing left. If death awaited us all, life had nothing left but courage.
After almost three and a half decades in prison, it is not that some criminal justice reforms have not occurred. Yet, nothing changes if nothing changes. Executions still take place, suicides, and murder within the very walls where I write this is normal.
I would like to create a voice for the voiceless again, but with this new age of technology, I need help. I would like to conduct interviews, journal topics for prisoners to write and post, and eventually conduct live video interviews. This morning we read a newspaper called "San Francisco Bay View" and the discussion about federal law enforcement officers and The National Guard being deployed to predominately Democratic cities sparked many views. I wish I could somehow post these views. When the least of us cannot be heard, the best of us don't realize we even exist.
So, I want to start website where I can take these written views and post them. I need help. Perhaps it is too much work for an individual, but I would like as many ideas as possible to get started. Unlike the early 90's, perhaps these connections will extend to students. Questions can be asked, the cultural expression of various arts can be displayed, but the sole purpose is simply to be heard. Often I teach these men about trauma, how being "safe" is the only way to overcome the triggers that negatively impact their lives and others, but expression plays a key role in healing.
I am asking for help. As we confront an emerging era where freedom of speech comes at a cost, many of us realize the price isn't too high for us. We are dying here, but we're unseen, unheard, and too many like myself spend decades in a cage. Our effort counts too, as well as our collective voices that extend itself to different continents. Just a few days ago I shared a journey of experiences with another prisoner from The Netherlands named Willem. His voice, as well as the other millions of men, women and CHILDREN incarcerated want to be heard.
So yeah, I am not too proud to beg! We need help so that we can be directly heard, unedited, uncut, or as raw as we want to be. Our freedom of speech... Our war of ideas, beliefs, or views on struggle must have hope. That hope comes from various ideas on what freedom is, what it means, and Angela Davis said it best: Freedom is a constant struggle.
Help us to be heard. Please contact me if you have any ideas or really want to help. Collective effort creates collective change.
In struggle,
Nanon
