now on bbc news, it s hardtalk with stephen sackur. welcome to hardtalk. i m stephen sackur. there are some human experiences which most of us find very hard to get our heads around. my guest today experienced the unimaginable torment of more than four decades in solitary confinement in a tiny cell in one of america s most notorious prisons. albert woodfox was the victim of ingrained racism and brutality inside america s system of criminaljustice. he is now a free man. but what does freedom really mean after everything he has been through? albert woodfox, welcome to hardtalk. thank you. here you are, in london as a free man. but given everything you have been through, is it possible for you to ever feel truly free? well, yeah, i mean, philosophically, mentally and emotionally, i was free long before my actual physical freedom. and so, that was a part of my survival technique. my survival one of my many survival techniques. it allowed me to survive being in solitary confinem
a tiny cell in one of america s most notorious prisons. albert woodfox was the victim of ingrained racism and brutality inside america s system of criminaljustice. he is now a free man. but what does freedom really mean after everything he has been through? albert woodfox, welcome to hardtalk. thank you. here you are, in london as a free man. but given everything you have been through, is it possible for you to ever feel truly free? yeah, i mean philosophically, mentally and emotionally i was free long before my physical freedom. my physicalfreedom. and so my physical freedom. and so that was a part of my survival technique. it allowed me to survive being in solitary confinement for such a long period of time. i wonder in terms of, literally in terms of muscle memory, whether the way your body is, whether the way your body is, whether your muscles remember four decades in shackles, whether you still have that feeling of being in an enclosed space, literally two by three metre
now on bbc news, it s hardtalk with stephen sackur. welcome to hardtalk. i m stephen sackur. there are some human experiences which most of us find very hard to get our heads around. my guest today experienced the unimaginable torment of more than four decades in solitary confinement in a tiny cell in one of america s most notorious prisons. albert woodfox was the victim of ingrained racism and brutality inside america s system of criminaljustice. he is now a free man. but what does freedom really mean after everything he has been through?
but if i may say so, as you has said since, you and herman, your great friend who was locked up in solitary in the same place as you, me and herman, we didn t put up with all the racist comments. if they talked trash to us, we talked trash back to them just as bad. i forced myself to learn how to not give into the fear. i would not let fear rule me. but as a result, you got the pain and the brutality even worse. yeah, we were seeing a lot. they referred to us troublemakers and ringleaders. and um, they had no idea of the political foundation or the philosophy, that we did the things we did motivated us to fight against injustice and inhumanity.