If you ever think about me, and you ain't gonna do no

Hear, O children of struggle and seekers of justice, the fiery words of Fred Hampton, who declared: “If you ever think about me, and you ain’t gonna do no revolutionary act, forget about me. I don’t want myself on your mind if you’re not going to work for the people.” In this saying, there is both rebuke and command, both love and fury. Hampton, who lived not for himself but for the cause of liberation, reminds us that memory without action is empty, that to honor a martyr without carrying forward their struggle is to dishonor their sacrifice.

The meaning of his words burns like a torch. Hampton declares that remembrance is not enough—one must act. To think fondly of him, to speak his name, yet to remain idle in the face of oppression, is vanity. His demand is clear: if you hold him in your heart, then let that remembrance move your hands, your feet, your voice, your life. To work for the people, to serve the oppressed, to stand against the systems that crush them—that alone is true remembrance. His words tear down passive reverence and replace it with the call to revolutionary duty.

The origin of these words is found in Hampton’s short but blazing life. As chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party, he rose as a beacon of courage, building community programs, free breakfasts, health clinics, and unity across racial lines. He was not content with speeches alone—his leadership embodied the very principle he spoke: memory must be action, love must be service. When the forces of the state cut him down at the age of twenty-one, his legacy became a test: would the people merely mourn him, or would they continue the fight he had begun? His own words answer that question: mourning without action is betrayal.

History itself echoes this truth. Consider the example of Jesus of Nazareth, whose disciples were told not to merely remember his words but to live them—to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to bring justice to the oppressed. Or think of Mahatma Gandhi, whose death could have become mere sorrow, yet whose name endures because his followers pressed onward in nonviolent resistance until freedom was won. In every age, the memory of the just demands not sentiment but continuation of the struggle.

The lesson is luminous: never let the names of the fallen rest only on your lips. To remember without acting is to turn them into statues—silent, lifeless, removed from the living world. True honor lies in movement, in sacrifice, in carrying their banner where they can no longer walk. Hampton’s words cut to the heart of complacency: if you will not act, then forget him, for empty memory is an insult to his life.

Practical wisdom flows from this. If you admire a leader, ask yourself not how often you speak their name, but how you carry their work into the world. Do you serve your community? Do you uplift the poor, the hungry, the silenced? Do you resist injustice wherever it rises? Let your memory of the great become fuel for deeds. And if you are tempted to simply revere, remember Hampton’s rebuke: remembrance without revolutionary act is nothing.

So let Fred Hampton’s words resound across time: do not remember me unless you act for the people. For his life, though brief, is proof that action is greater than admiration, that service is greater than memory. His voice is a summons to rise, not to weep; to fight, not to freeze; to serve, not to sigh.

Thus, O children of tomorrow, take this truth to heart: when you think of the fallen, when you whisper their names, let your hands and your life speak louder than your lips. For only then is memory made holy, and only then do the dead truly live on in the struggle of the living.