Some consider Rosa Parks to be a radical human rights warrior, despite the fact that history books portray her as a quiet, modest woman who spontaneously ignited a civil rights movement.

Parks worked as the finest investigator and organiser for the NAACP Montgomery branch in 1944. Parks created the group to protect and defend Black women against sexual assault by gathering their testimonials about sexual violence and other adverse situations.

PBS tells us that Parks eventually became involved with the Black Power movement, attending events such as the Black Political Convention in Gary, the Black Power conference in Philadelphia, and a visit to the Black Panther school in Oakland, California. Parks spoke at the Poor People's Campaign and helped organise support for Black political prisoners on topics of reparations, Black history, police brutality, freedom for Black political prisoners, economic justice, and autonomous Black political power.

Her activism did not stop at the United States. She fought apartheid in the 1980s by joining a picket outside the South African embassy, as well as opposing US policy in Central America. When she joined other activists advocating for nonviolence after 9/11 in 2001, she was still protesting.