Nicole (she/her) shares sad news about the death of her close friend Taylor in prison.
Content warning – suicide (graphic), prison, violence, self harm, abuse, homophobia, transphobia.
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Transcript
Welcome to the Frontline Have Liz podcast with your host, Nicole Rose
Speaker:from the Solidarity Apothecary.
Speaker:This is your place for all things plants and liberation.
Speaker:Let's get started.
Speaker:Hello strangers.
Speaker:I'm so sorry that the podcast came to like an abrupt halt.
Speaker:Fortunately I hadn't really done an official launch.
Speaker:My plan was to get six episodes recorded and then do a big launch.
Speaker:And that way people can kind of like work through the back catalog, which
Speaker:is like the advice I'd been given.
Speaker:But as fate would have it, something pretty full on happened in my life,
Speaker:which meant that I had to stop recording.
Speaker:And yeah, my kind of whole world came to a halt, and some of you that follow me on
Speaker:Instagram may have seen the news already.
Speaker:Obviously close friends will know, and I've shared the news on my email list.
Speaker:But for those of you who don't know me at all, I'm gonna be sharing a
Speaker:little bit about, what happened and yeah, I'm probably gonna be recording
Speaker:this, uh, podcast like 10 times.
Speaker:Just so I can get my words out and feel clear and grounded and this kind of horror
Speaker:story, but I just wanted to share that.
Speaker:Yeah, there's like a very strong kind of content warning
Speaker:with this, with this episode.
Speaker:It's very intimate and personal about my friend Taylor who died.
Speaker:I'm gonna be graphically talking about suicide, abuse
Speaker:in prison, transphobia, class.
Speaker:Yeah, just kind of general state violence.
Speaker:So yeah, I just wanna kind of pause things there and give you the opportunity to, to
Speaker:skip, and just download the next episode, which is gonna be about, dandelion and
Speaker:yeah, there's not, there's not kind of much herbal content, if that makes sense.
Speaker:This is just like a personal episode about, a friend that I've lost and
Speaker:I feel like it's relevant to share because I kind of wanna explain where
Speaker:I've been and I also wanna honor him.
Speaker:I want people to know his story and yeah, I feel like part of the Frontline
Speaker:Herbalism podcast is talking about kind of, it's so talking about herbalism,
Speaker:but it's also talking about frontline struggles, including abolitionist
Speaker:movements to free people from prison to build a world without prisons.
Speaker:And so, yeah, this, this kind of feels important and relevant.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I'm gonna, I'm gonna pause it there.
Speaker:And then, after the little, kind of music bit, I'm gonna start reading a
Speaker:statement which I'll explain more about.
Speaker:In a second.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Thanks for listening.
Speaker:Okay, so I already gave a content warning.
Speaker:And yeah, I'm probably gonna be pausing and editing this
Speaker:and trying not to wobble out.
Speaker:I am sharing the details of my close friend who died.
Speaker:He was called Taylor.
Speaker:I met him back in, I don't even know, 2009, 2010 maybe, in prison.
Speaker:And he was the partner of my best friend, Sam, who some of you
Speaker:would've heard me talk about before on Instagram in various places.
Speaker:And yeah, we, we kind of, yeah, just hit it off really because of his partnership
Speaker:with Sam and I was like some sort of weird relationship counselor between them and
Speaker:yeah, then they, I got out and they got separated into different prisons and kind
Speaker:of kept apart intentionally by the prison.
Speaker:And Sam asked if I would visit Taylor cause she was worried about him.
Speaker:And then, yeah, I started visiting Taylor and me and Taylor began to have like
Speaker:more of an autonomous kind of friendship.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Where I would see him like every few weeks and write to him and sent him
Speaker:emails once email a prisoner was launched.
Speaker:And Yeah, it was just a long decade of friendship and love and trying
Speaker:really hard to get him out of prison.
Nicole:I'll explain more about that in a minute.
Nicole:When I read the statement.
Nicole:But yeah, he, he killed himself, inside in July and that's why
Nicole:I haven't been podcasting or really doing anything at all.
Nicole:And yeah, I loved him so much.
Nicole:We had a beautiful funeral.
Nicole:He was cremated.
Nicole:I went with a friend and some of his family members to spread
Nicole:his ashes where he wanted them, including in the beautiful sea.
Nicole:Literally like swam, swam out in the sea to, to, let his ashes go.
Nicole:And, after his death, like was full of rage and pain, I mean, I still am,
Nicole:but, me and a close friend and some other comrades who kind of read it and
Nicole:helped us wrote a statement about what happened, to share a bit more information
Nicole:to kind of talk about the political context and his life, and yeah, to ask for
Nicole:solidarity and support in mourning him.
Nicole:So I'm gonna read that statement now.
Nicole:I'll put the link in the show notes, but if you wanna read it, it's
Nicole:at bristol abc.org/r i p Taylor.
Nicole:I'm gonna pause this now and wipe my eyes and then I'm gonna
Nicole:finally read this statement.
Nicole:Hello.
Nicole:Okay, here we go.
Nicole:And yeah, I also just wanna share that some comrades have translated
Nicole:this statement into Spanish well castellano and Galago, and German,
Nicole:and russian and the links to those translations are also on the webpage.
Nicole:Okay, this statement, Taylor is dead.
Nicole:He was pronounced dead in prison at 10:33 PM on Saturday the ninth of of July.
Nicole:After cutting his neck, he was meant to be on suicide watch,
Nicole:but the prison failed him.
Nicole:We were informed by the prison governor at 3:30 AM on Sunday.
Nicole:His cell has been sealed by police and we await news of the autopsy.
Nicole:We will announce news of his funeral in the coming days and.
Nicole:His story is one of abuse, injustice, transphobia, and tragedy.
Nicole:It didn't have to be this way.
Nicole:He was murdered by the state.
Nicole:His death should trigger resistance and rebellion inside
Nicole:and outside of prisons everywhere.
Nicole:We have no investment in his inquest or that the state can
Nicole:deliver any kind of justice.
Nicole:This is a call to arms, to abolitionists and anarchists all over the world
Nicole:with rage in our veins and love in our hearts until every prison turns to ash.
Nicole:Taylor, you were our best guy.
Nicole:Our queer family will forever miss you.
Nicole:You will never be forgotten and the state will never be forgiven.
Nicole:Oh fuck.
Nicole:Okay, I need to like pause again and then I will rerecord this.
Nicole:Who is Taylor?
Nicole:Taylor was a trans prisoner trapped in the UK prison system for over 14 years.
Nicole:He was an I P P prisoner who had served 10 years longer in prison
Nicole:than his original sentence.
Nicole:He was a beloved friend to anarchist comrades who met him in prison.
Nicole:He had ACAB on his knuckles and an anti authoritarian spirit
Nicole:and a deep love for animals.
Nicole:He was a working class, old school prisoner who knew which side he was on.
Nicole:He hated the system with every ounce of his being.
Nicole:Taylor was one of the first members of the IWW the Industrial Workers of
Nicole:the World Union via the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee, or
Nicole:IWOC that was founded in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland in 2015.
Nicole:He was also active with SMASH IPP contributing to the newsletter
Nicole:and encouraging other IPP prisoners to join the group.
Nicole:I P P Death sentence IPP or Imprisonment for Public protection is a type of
Nicole:sentencing that was introduced in 2005 and meant that people would
Nicole:be sentenced to an initial tariff, that's like time that must be served.
Nicole:And after that, their release would be decided by their parole board.
Nicole:This means that I p p prisoners have no definite release date.
Nicole:It is effectively a life sentence for minor crimes.
Nicole:After huge public pressure, IPP sentences were abolished in 2012, but not
Nicole:retrospectively, which means there are still more than three and a half thousand
Nicole:people in prison with no release date.
Nicole:The uncertainty is a living hell.
Nicole:This sentence led to the UK having one of the highest rates
Nicole:of prisoners suicide in the world.
Nicole:At least 243 of UK's I P P prisoners have died in prison.
Nicole:72 of them took their own lives.
Nicole:For Taylor that I p p was a death sentence.
Nicole:He was given four years for burglary, but served 14 years before he died.
Nicole:The long term imprisonment with no end date totally destroyed
Nicole:Taylor's mental health.
Nicole:He attempted suicide multiple times, including slitting his own
Nicole:throat and taking an overdose.
Nicole:That led to him being in a coma twice.
Nicole:It eventually killed him.
Nicole:No end date.
Nicole:The IPP works by a prisoner, first serving an initial tariff, after which
Nicole:they have a parole board hearing.
Nicole:The parole board decides whether to free that prisoner or to recommend them for
Nicole:open category D conditions, psychiatric imprisonment, or a rehab, for example.
Nicole:They can also decide if a prisoner must stay in prison for longer and recommend
Nicole:certain things like courses for the prisoner to complete, the outside
Nicole:probation service, and offender managers within the prison create reports and
Nicole:make recommendations, and prisoners are also often subject to various risk
Nicole:assessments or psychological reports.
Nicole:At each board hearing new hoops can be created that the prisoner
Nicole:will need to jump through.
Nicole:For example, a prisoner might do everything the parole board directs,
Nicole:and then two years later at the next hearing, the parole board might
Nicole:say, "You still need to address X behavior and therefore do X course".
Nicole:This leads to a continual process of imprisonment where
Nicole:goalposts are repeatedly moved.
Nicole:The uncertainty, frustration, and lack of power leads to
Nicole:prisoner behavior deteriorating.
Nicole:Whether that is increased drug use, self-harm, or kicking off in protest.
Nicole:This behavior then becomes a justification for their continuing imprisonment
Nicole:because that person is "not safe", quote unquote, for the community, or has not
Nicole:addressed their offending behavior.
Nicole:The cycle continues.
Nicole:We have 14 years of cataloged evidence of impossible parole
Nicole:hearings and prison failings.
Nicole:Taylor's suicidality was the reason he was kept in prison, yet his
Nicole:suicidality was caused by prison.
Nicole:There is only so much one human can take.
Nicole:Death became the only option for Taylor as all legal doors to
Nicole:freedom closed again and again.
Nicole:Transphobia, pathologized, hospitalized, and imprisoned.
Nicole:Taylor gave his consent in 2018 to share more about his life story, to
Nicole:help raise awareness of trans prisoners and what happens when the medical
Nicole:system pathologizes trans people.
Nicole:Growing up, Taylor was subject to years of physical, sexual, and psychological
Nicole:abuse from his mother and stepfather.
Nicole:He managed to escape and be adopted by his grandparents as an early teenager,
Nicole:however, he would often return to visit his family, desperate for love and
Nicole:validation, but was met with neither.
Nicole:This intense pattern of trauma has followed him forever.
Nicole:Unfortunately during his sentence, both his adopted parents died and as a
Nicole:result, he lost his main support network.
Nicole:The grief was insurmountable and was unable to heal due to being locked
Nicole:in a cell and unable to visit their graves or process his grief fully.
Nicole:We know he is with them now.
Nicole:Taylor always knew he was a man.
Nicole:He went to a local doctor as a young teenager and expressed his feelings
Nicole:and issues with his assigned gender.
Nicole:The doctor Pathologized Taylor as unstable and denied any access
Nicole:to hormones or any surgery.
Nicole:This was over 30 years ago, and access to hormones online or other
Nicole:support groups was nigh on impossible.
Nicole:Before prison, Taylor had never met another trans person.
Nicole:The combination of childhood abuse and gender dysphoria led to drug
Nicole:and alcohol abuse, as well as a long term pattern of self harm.
Nicole:Taylor became an addict, and as a working class person with no
Nicole:financial means, crime was the only option to sustain his habit.
Nicole:This led Taylor to a very self-destructive life, including many abusive relationships
Nicole:and actions that he deeply regretted.
Nicole:Taylor accessed many mental health services, however, none of them affirmed
Nicole:Taylor's gender identity or needs, and he was repeatedly pathologized,
Nicole:hospitalized, and imprisoned.
Nicole:In the judges summing up of his case whereby he was given an I P P sentence,
Nicole:he recognized it was Taylor's gender issues that led to his imprisonment.
Nicole:Taylor experienced transphobic abuse imprison from officers
Nicole:and other prisoners.
Nicole:Once he was attacked by a girl on his wing in a courtyard.
Nicole:Thankfully our Taylor was a fighter and defended himself.
Nicole:He spat back on her and said, "Here's some of my gender fluid".
Nicole:Oh, he was such a fucking legend.
Nicole:Okay.
Nicole:Officers throughout his sentence would target him with insults, dead naming, and
Nicole:repeatedly and repeated misgendering In HMP eastward Park Officer Lorde deadnamed
Nicole:him repeatedly in order to wind him up and try to provoke him into acting out
Nicole:and therefore sabotaging his parole.
Nicole:When admitted to a psychiatric hospital after a spate of suicide attempts,
Nicole:Taylor was assigned a psychiatrist.
Nicole:During sessions, Taylor was repeatedly dehumanized and
Nicole:encouraged to see himself as a woman.
Nicole:They said that relationships were a core part of his offending behavior
Nicole:and discouraged him from being with women or in relationships at all.
Nicole:During this intense time of vulnerability, Taylor believed that only way to
Nicole:ever be released from prison was to pretend to be a woman and to not have
Nicole:romantic relationships with women.
Nicole:Fortunately, once he had left the hospital and stopped having sessions,
Nicole:he realized what a horrific transphobic act of institutional violence.
Nicole:This was one that trans people worldwide have experienced pathologized
Nicole:by psychiatric authorities.
Nicole:Taylor was blown away by letters and cards he received from the trans community.
Nicole:Despite the prison's best efforts to stop him obtaining a binder, including
Nicole:claiming they didn't recognize if the binders were sent in for the top or
Nicole:the bottom and refusing to issue them.
Nicole:He eventually experienced the euphoria of making his chest align
Nicole:more closely with his gender.
Nicole:He would speak with excitement about getting top surgery when he
Nicole:was out and running half naked on the beach and swimming in the sea.
Nicole:Now he will never have the chance.
Nicole:Homophobia in prison relationships were constantly considered a risk
Nicole:factor for Taylor, and his attraction to women was ongoingly, pathologized,
Nicole:and criminalized in prison.
Nicole:Over the 14 years he was behind bars, he had separated from many people he
Nicole:had loved, including one long term relationship that lasted over six years
Nicole:whereby he was violently separated from them and the prison service
Nicole:intentionally kept them apart, never allowing them to meet until recent.
Nicole:In prison, physical relationships are met with punishment.
Nicole:You can be given an IEP, enough of which lead you to basic or full segregation.
Nicole:This happened many times throughout Taylor's sentence.
Nicole:The constant policing by officers and the separation between him and people
Nicole:he cared about also contributed to destroying Taylor's will to live.
Nicole:Should Taylor have obtained parole at his next hearing one condition
Nicole:was that he refrained from all romantic and intimate relationships.
Nicole:His own lawyer said he would need to comply.
Nicole:Although we all know, although we all know that closeness to other humans is
Nicole:a deeply necessary part of survival.
Nicole:We often spoke with Taylor about how the state was acting like
Nicole:an abusive controlling partner.
Nicole:He felt powerless to challenge it.
Nicole:In the last week of his life, Taylor was nicked for kissing another prisoner.
Nicole:This was one of the trigger events that led to his death.
Nicole:HMP Eastwood Park, hell hole.
Nicole:HMP Eastwood Park is a quote, "Women's" prison in Gloucestershire
Nicole:not far from Bristol.
Nicole:Horror emerges from its walls regularly.
Nicole:Three prisoners have died there within the last month.
Nicole:One woman, Kayleigh died two days before Taylor on the same wing.
Nicole:People get violently attacked by officers regularly, and sexual abuse is prevalent.
Nicole:On a recent visit with Taylor, he shared how women had been forced to give
Nicole:oral sex to officers in exchange for drugs being brought in from outside.
Nicole:Taylor was so close to freedom and HMP Eastwood Park took it all away.
Nicole:What triggered Taylor's latest spiral of suicide attempts
Nicole:was completely preventable.
Nicole:He had finally been getting his ROTLs released on temporary license whereby
Nicole:he could leave prison for a day with an officer as a way of working
Nicole:towards release and demonstrating to the parole board that he was "safe".
Nicole:On the 20th of May, Taylor was in Cabot Circus in Bristol when the
Nicole:officer responsible for supervising him, abandon him, Taylor tried to
Nicole:find her, but he was unable to.
Nicole:He had no phone or way of finding her.
Nicole:Despite looking continuously around the city, Taylor managed
Nicole:to report it to the prison.
Nicole:Instead of taking responsibility for losing Taylor, the officer
Nicole:who escorted Taylor into Bristol lied and claimed he went missing
Nicole:for a number of hours on purpose.
Nicole:Taylor became angry and pushed over a plant in reception.
Nicole:Prison officers then attacked him.
Nicole:They kicked the shit into him and dragged him into a new cell
Nicole:with none of his belongings.
Nicole:We saw Taylor days after and could see bruises all over him.
Nicole:Taylor was awaiting surgery for a hernia and being bent up by officers
Nicole:was a life threatening act of violence.
Nicole:An action alert was launched that 544 people sent to the prison, warning
Nicole:them that Taylor's loved ones are seriously worried about his wellbeing
Nicole:and that this abusive treatment is only going to exacerbate his serious
Nicole:mental and physical health conditions after years of incarceration.
Nicole:This incident triggered the three suicide attempts and
Nicole:the final one that killed him.
Nicole:What if thousands had taken part in the action alert?
Nicole:How could we have made Eastwood Park take notice?
Nicole:These are the questions that will always haunt us.
Nicole:Class war.
Nicole:Everything about Taylor's life was shaped by class.
Nicole:We do not want this to be erased.
Nicole:It is not rich people who use drugs who end up in prison.
Nicole:It is poor people oppressed by our economic system who end up in prison
Nicole:and they stay there to keep a class stratified society in existence.
Nicole:Lessons for our movements.
Nicole:There's a quote here, The state is permanent violence" - Errico Maletesta.
Nicole:We write our movements, but we don't always know who "our" is.
Nicole:We want to acknowledge there were a small number of amazing close
Nicole:friends and comrades in our networks who supported us over the years.
Nicole:You know who you are with a little heart.
Nicole:Who were on the end of the phone after harrowing visits, or who
Nicole:completed action alerts that we posted online, who sent cards to
Nicole:Taylor and who came to noise demos.
Nicole:But mostly we felt alone.
Nicole:Taylor was alone.
Nicole:Comrades went through years of hell and more often than
Nicole:not, had to beg for support.
Nicole:One person supported Taylor for 13 years, nine of which
Nicole:were almost completely alone.
Nicole:Despite her best efforts to bring up his case in groups and write about him
Nicole:online, some anarchist websites would not share our action alerts or calls
Nicole:for support because Taylor was not a quote unquote political prisoner.
Nicole:Even though an understanding of class and gender oppression is a core of anarchism.
Nicole:Taylor's death could have been prevented if there was more
Nicole:support, more resistance, if our movements were a fucking threat.
Nicole:If prison authorities feared us and our calls to action, we need
Nicole:to fight like hell for the living.
Nicole:We need to fight like hell for those still inside.
Nicole:Abolition means prisoner support.
Nicole:Abolition became flavor of the week for a short time, yet that unsexy
Nicole:and unglamorous work of prisoner phone calls, visits, action alerts,
Nicole:relentless fundraising, et cetera, does not attract many people.
Nicole:We were told we did this work, quote unquote, unsustainably.
Nicole:Yet no practical support to take the load from our shoulders was given.
Nicole:We refused to abandon our friends in prison.
Nicole:Yes, a diversity of tactics is needed, but this can't be used as an excuse
Nicole:not to engage with an unglamorous work where getting a transfer to a prison
Nicole:with marginally less white supremacist screws that reduce your loved one's
Nicole:chances of racist attacks, takes a year and is as good as it gets.
Nicole:What would've helped prevent Taylor's death?
Nicole:People writing to Taylor and building trust with him so that he had a more
Nicole:expanded circle of friends, help traveling for visits, legal advice
Nicole:and support for his parole paperwork.
Nicole:People helping with and sharing our action alerts, people offering
Nicole:counseling or support for the ongoing traumatic stress or even fucking
Nicole:acknowledging how much this was for us.
Nicole:People coming on demos where we called for support, and us not being
Nicole:humiliated, begging people to show up.
Nicole:People with privilege accessing their networks to help get Taylor
Nicole:out, media work, legal work, et cetera, giving money to his top
Nicole:surgery crowd funder, and for visits.
Nicole:Trans prisoner letter writing events, helping host info nights for smash
Nicole:ipp, or IWOC work doing banner drops, reposting our statements and graphics.
Nicole:We needed everyone's rage.
Nicole:We needed to not feel alone.
Nicole:We wanted to feel solidarity in practice.
Nicole:We wanted people to understand that abolition means prisoner
Nicole:support, that this should be a huge part of the movement.
Nicole:That, and that keeping our friends alive in prison is part of resistance.
Nicole:We need people to recognize that prisoners are not projects, they
Nicole:are not quote unquote case work.
Nicole:They are not a fascinating objective study to write your master's dissertation about.
Nicole:They're not the same as organizing a book fair or running a campaign.
Nicole:They are human beings and the stakes are fucking life or death.
Nicole:People need consistency.
Nicole:They need care and friendship.
Nicole:They need to be treated like fucking human beings.
Nicole:Taylor loved us, not because we were anarchists but because
Nicole:we are his fucking friends.
Nicole:We are his family because we love him with passion and kindness for who he
Nicole:is and not because he is a prisoner.
Nicole:Abolition means revolution.
Nicole:No more fucking reading groups, where is your rage, nothing can describe the
Nicole:feeling when you receive another phone call saying your friend has been airlifted
Nicole:out of prison in a helicopter because he has sliced open his own neck because he
Nicole:cannot take the abuse in prison anymore.
Nicole:The rage against the prison system moves through your veins.
Nicole:You want to destroy the whole world, but you turn to your
Nicole:comrades and where are they?
Nicole:Somehow it feels like even amongst prison abolitionists, the violence taking place
Nicole:within prisons themselves is so often ignored and prisoners are forgotten,
Nicole:erased, patronized, and tokenized.
Nicole:Yes, abolition requires us to burn down the whole state, the
Nicole:borders, the education system, as well as not instead of prison.
Nicole:The state disappears people, so we have to work twice as hard
Nicole:to ensure people are not erased.
Nicole:Our loved ones are tortured, and the response is starting reading groups
Nicole:about abolition writing statements for the transphobic guardian.
Nicole:We would get told time after time that people don't have, quote unquote,
Nicole:the capacity to do a demo right now.
Nicole:We cope with the silence of signal group chats when we ask for support.
Nicole:Where is your fucking rage?
Nicole:Why are we not burning these places to the fucking ground?
Nicole:The abolitionist movement in the UK is passive and docile.
Nicole:It is not angry enough.
Nicole:You cannot learn about abolition just from a book.
Nicole:Learn from prisoners.
Nicole:Learn from loved ones of people in prison.
Nicole:There are fucking thousands of us.
Nicole:Ask anyone their experiences, and you will hear stories of
Nicole:neglect, abuse, and violence.
Nicole:That is enough motivation to fight.
Nicole:Revolutionary abolitionists in the so-called United States would risk death
Nicole:to liberate people from slave plantations.
Nicole:They started the Underground Railroad to free their families and comrades.
Nicole:Where is the direct action to free our friends from cages?
Nicole:Where is the rage when they die inside?
Nicole:How do we push our movements beyond canvasing for fucking Jeremy Corbyn.
Nicole:Abolition means revolution.
Nicole:It means destroying the state.
Nicole:It means direct action.
Nicole:It means putting the war into class war.
Nicole:We know Taylor was one of millions of people around the world kept in a cage.
Nicole:We know thousands of people are murdered by the state in wars,
Nicole:like in the invasion of Ukraine.
Nicole:We know the state kills people on its borders in detention centers, in
Nicole:prisons, in psychiatric hospitals.
Nicole:We know it's those harmed by white supremacy, ableism, poverty,
Nicole:and transphobia who face the sharpest end of this violence.
Nicole:Every single incarcerated person is a political prisoner.
Nicole:The Inquest and the prison and probation ombudsman report will not achieve justice.
Nicole:Prisons are working exactly as they're designed to.
Nicole:The horror is this.
Nicole:Horror is no accident.
Nicole:It is intentional.
Nicole:Pools of Taylor's blood covered his cell where he died alone.
Nicole:His blood covered the hands of HMP and they will face no repercussions.
Nicole:Unless we make them, we call for rage everywhere.
Nicole:Remember Taylor, fight with everything you have for those still in prison.
Nicole:No more empty slogans.
Nicole:This is a life and death struggle we call comrades.
Nicole:To honor Taylor in every way they know how.
Nicole:Against prisons, against the state, for friendship, for freedom, for revolution.
Nicole:Oh, okay.
Nicole:I'm gonna go and have a big cry again now.
Nicole:But yeah, that was written from like a real place of like pain and rage and yeah.
Nicole:I also had covid, like I was really sick after, after Taylor died.
Nicole:And uh, yeah, I thought it was just this kind of like extreme rage response.
Nicole:And then I realized like I also had this viral infection that
Nicole:was giving me a fucking fever and making my heart go crazy and stuff.
Nicole:So anyway, like I said, we had a beautiful funeral for him.
Nicole:The inquest has started, like officially has opened.
Nicole:We were in touch with solicitors about all of that.
Nicole:But ultimately, I just wanna add, like people are still behind bars,
Nicole:like people still need support.
Nicole:I know I regularly put in calls to action on these podcast, like
Nicole:show notes and in the first bit of the kind of intro of the podcast.
Nicole:But yeah, I just want people to learn from his death and to feel like, prisoner
Nicole:support needs to be a priority for anarchists and for other people, and that
Nicole:if we're trying to build a society based on care and mutual aid and solidarity
Nicole:and friendship and freedom, then yeah, we need to look at other people who are in
Nicole:cages and we need to help get them free.
Nicole:Okay.
Nicole:Thanks everyone.
Nicole:I will be back next week.
Nicole:Take care.
Nicole:Thanks so much for listening to the Frontline Herbalism podcast.
Nicole:You can find the transcript, the links, all the resources from the
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