"Vanguard of the Revolution": New Film Chronicles Rise of Black Panthers & FBI's War Against Them

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Once the national black community was full of revolutionaries. I've even met a few of the 1960s revolutionaries in the middle or old age: Angela Y. Davis, Huey P. Newton, Stokely Carmichael, Kathleen Cleaver & even CLR James.
These were/are men and women devoted to bring about a fundamental change in the sociel order, and in our order of values.
Freedom, self-determination, the transcendence of racism and economic exploitation. And, in Fanon's words, the settting "afoot of the New Man."
What they seek is as much a moral and spiritual revolution as an economic and political one.
In the 1960s, many gave their lives for the liberation of our people, black people, and indeed oppressed people throughout the land and throughout the world.
Even thier idea of freedom was different, as in no. 1 of the Ten Point Prgoram of the Black Panther Party: "We want FREEDOM. We want the power to determine the destiny of our Black community."
Community was at the heart of the very conception of freedom. And then you had Dr. King with his idea of Beloved Community.
Do we have it in us now to be revolutionaries? Or are we totally immersed and bemused by the toxic culture of consumerism and narcissism?
Have we a vision of a better life transcending the Established order?

-Savant

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Well at least the white racist Ohreally and his black twin freddy have in common their mutual contempt for the liberation struggles of Blacks people (and probably other peoples as well) in America. But I at least have the advantage of working with YOUTH both in the community and on the campus. Our struggle will be a protracted struggle--most likely intergenerational. I'm a long distance runner. I will be educating youth and advancing popular struggles for at least twenty more years before I'm to old to do so. Already I see an awakening among Black youth, and other youth as well. OhFrilly and freddy are just along for the ride, There are others of us who are MAKING history. A Luta Continua!

-Savant

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Savant's words in response to a hater:


Racism is an institutionalized power relations, and intimately interlinked with capitalism. with economic exploitation. It is that SYSTEM which breeds the racist state of mind and the racist culture. You're more like an annoying fly. I can't say you burn me up.
What burns me up are 12 million American children going to bed hungry in the world richest nation. What burns me up is the prison industrial complex which is transforming America into a protofascist carceral society. What burns me up are millions of homeless in the world richest nation, a nation which readily wasted billions in idiotic wars in the Middle East (largely at the behest of Halliburton) but then claims that funds for education, health care and job creation is wreckless spending. What burns me up is a rapacious plutocracy which is pillaging the nation and the world, and which is mainly responsible for the growing and dangerous economic inequality, not only between Blacks and whites, but between haves and have nots the world over. What angers me is the measures taken to disfranchise, or at least limit the franchise of millions of people by new restrictions on voting, just five decades after the heroic fight in Selma. What angers me is widespread and seemingly increasing police misconduct, especially (though not only) in Black communities, and the summary exoneration of killers with badges no matter how blatant their abuses. What burns me us is the increasing militarization of even local police, with fascist pig cops confronting nonviolent demonstrators with tanks and rubber bullet--outrages that didn't even happen in Birmingham and Selma in the What burns me up is the general devaluation of the human world, and virtual deification of things and property. A mindless mediocrity like you don't merit is hardly my main concern.
As for my work in the real world, I am at least ENGAGED in the real struggles of the real world. And I've been "open" enough in mass rallies, in the media and in community forums and organizations where my REAL identity cannot be concealed. You may doubt what you please, but that hardly matters. Some of us are committed to MAKING history. People like you are just along for the ride.

-Savant