Created in 2014 by five female social activists Anyavette Martinez, Marylinn Hollinquest, Annie Sajid, Diane Martinez and Jessica Benitez, the Radical Monarchs is an Oakland based organization that empowers young girls of colour to step into their collective power, brilliance and leadership to make the world a more radical place.
The Radical Monarchs is a group of young girls, sporting brown berets, in homage to the 1960s activist groups the Brown Berets and the Black Panthers. The girls are from the ages of 8 to 12 and come from different cultural backgrounds in order to create opportunities and a sense of sisterhood among them. Its mission is to not only help these young girls celebrate their identities, but also for them to take part in social activism. The organization gives a feminist and radical twist to the Girls Scouts of USA, to which they are not affiliated with.
The girls earn “radical badges” by participating in various social justice events. For instance, the “Black Lives Matter” badge was earned for attending a civil rights march in Oakland, and they challenged beauty ideals and standards, which earned them the Radical Beauty badge. They also earned the LGBT Ally by practising acceptance of all people. In celebration of Valentine’s Day, they practised “Radical Love” by reading bell hooks and writing kind notes to themselves and their fellow Monarchs. The girls also attended the 30th annual Empowering Women of Color Conference at the University of California, Berkeley, and wrote letters of support to Nicoll Hernandez- Polanco, a Guatemalan transgender woman detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Through all these activities, these young girls develop a social consciousness and become part of the social changes already taking place. Despite harsh criticism from certain media, the movement has gained popularity in the past 2 years and is getting more and more members. With such a success, the founders are realizing their wish, which is “to cultivate awesome, rad women, to give them the tools to not mask their brilliance, their power and their worth”. For the young radicals, being involved in such a cause gives them the oppurtunity “to be aware of each other’s problems and build an intersectional movement” as well as “showing the power of girls of colour”.
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