Huey P. Newton and the Black Panther Party - Research Paper Example

of Huey P. Newton and the Black Panther Party The sixties were one of the most turbulent eras is the history of the United States of America. America had been prosperous; however, discontent was growing amongst those sections of the society which felt that they had not been given their share of the pie. Amongst these communities, the most prominent was the African American community. During the sixties, they organized movements under the able leaderships of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. these were launched and implemented for the purpose of gaining a foothold in the cultural mainstream of the United States of America. With the assassination of Malcolm X in 1965, there was a vacuum as far as the leadership of the underprivileged blacks was concerned. This was filled with the arrival of the Black Panther Party on the scene. The establishment of the political party was done by Huey P Newton and Bobby G. Seale, in Oakland (Jeffries x, 2002). While the party may not have lasted too long and may not seem to have done much, the truth is that in certain pockets of the nation, it did improve the living conditions of the African American community. They helped in improving the self-esteem of the members of this community in a place like Oakland. In a place like Oakland, the energies of the African American male youth were dissipated and untapped. One of the most important achievements of the Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newton was to attempt to harness these energies into one single channel- the betterment of the race and to stand up to racist behavior from people in seats of authority. Newton speaks of his own experiences of having been a criminal in his essay “scoring”. The path of crime is not, according to Newton, one that every black man needs to take but the structural forces in American society often did force African American youths to take up this path. He argues that white communities in America committed burglary at a larger level, by taking what was rightfully the property of the African American community. He argues that the proclivity that street youth display for drugs and crime is related primarily to their inability to validate themselves. He cites his reading of existential philosophy as one of the reasons as to why he is able to decode the reasons as to why the black youth behaved the way they did in society (28-32, 2002). Another important contribution of the Black Panther Party to Oakland was the fact that they had organized the youth of this place into a force. Bobby Seale speaks of the poverty alleviation programs that were put in place in Oakland during the heyday of the Black Panthers Party in his book, Seize the Time: The Story of the Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newton. He argues that these programs were beneficial to the community because they created awareness in the community regarding the opportunities that they could seize rather than wait for. The objective of the program would be, according to Seale, the eradication of poverty. One of the main ways in which Seale and Newton sought to do this in the Oakland area was to create awareness about Black history. He says, My objective in the program was to teach Black American History if I could, and teach them also some degree of responsibility; not teach them responsibility in old Establishment terms, but in terms of their own people living in the community (35). The Panthers’ solution to the problem of poverty among the Black community of Oakland was to trace the history of the African American community and enable them to understand the structural reasons for their poverty. They were made to also understand that problems of drinking and cards were eroding the values of their society without leading to prosperity. The main problem that haunted the blacks was, according to the Panthers, American capitalism which led to the upliftment of a few blacks while leaving the rests in doldrums (MIA: History: USA: The Black Panther Party n.d.). This led to a division in the ranks of the blacks which Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale sought to rectify. This rectification was also based on a vision of an organic community that would then fight against the common problems that they had. This was not a program intended at integration but at the assertion of the self on the part of the African American community of Oakland and eventually, the whole of the United States of America. This is important as it runs against the strain of Martin Luther King Jr.’s vision of happiness for the African American middle classes. He argued for the integration of black communities across America with the white mainstream in his autobiography (King Jr. 2001). This is not the stance that the youth of Oakland sought to take and this was largely due to the work of the Panthers Party. Another important achievement of the Panthers was the vision of a black brother/sisterhood that did not keep out sections of it based on extraneous considerations. Amy Abugo Ongiri argues in her essay “Prisoner of Love: Affiliation, Sexuality, and the Black Panther Party” about how Newton envisaged a future where African Americans who were disenfranchised even within the community owing to their gender and/or sexual orientations (2009). This is important since one of the most frequent allegations that have been made against the African American movement for equality is that they have left out such members from their own race. These allegations have also been made in conjunction with allegations of hypermasculine behavior on the part of its leaders. Instances such as the one in Oakland reveal that some of the material that these allegations are based is false. Another improvement that was brought about by the Panthers was the improvement of police-community relations in Oakland. This might seem preposterous to begin with. However, the very fact that the Panthers made the African American community capable of standing up for themselves in cases such as the Denzil Dowell case reveals the extent of their help (Wasserman 2013). Rather than remaining meek in the face of police atrocities, the Panthers encouraged the youth to fight back against a racist and unjust system. This fight against an unjust police system can also be seen in the alliance that the Black Panthers Party struck up with the United Farm Workers. This was again a part of the Party to fight against the policies of a capitalist system which refused to give the producers, the farmers, and their due (Araiza 2013). This reveals the urge of the Panthers to stand alongside the people who were being truly oppressed. It also displays their ability to understand and recognize the true losers in a capitalist setup. In later years, one sees the influence of the Black Panthers on other revolutionaries. Tupac Shakur and others of his ilk spoke out against many ills that plagued the African American community. Much of their revolutionary ideology was based on what the Panthers had spoken out against. Kara Keeling in her essay “"A Homegrown Revolutionary"?: Tupac Shakur and the Legacy of the Black Panther Party” speaks of the inputs that the hip-hop generation has received from the teachings of the Black Panthers Party (1999). This is significant since the bulk of the leadership of this party was systematically hunted down. The continuing significance of their work reveals their importance to their community, especially in Oakland and other parts of California. The systematic destruction of the polemical group that was considered to be divisive was brutal. This was also the result of their incisive critique against the capitalist mode of operation of the American nation. Suffice it to say that they ruffled many a feather in their attempt to liberate their community truly and successfully. Many of their efforts have paid off today as one sees a leader of the nation who is black, while many of their works remain unrewarded and unnoticed. Charles Jones in his essay “The Political Repression of the Black Panther Party 1966-1971: The Case of the Oakland Bay Area” speaks of the police brutalities that the Panthers were made to face for their actions (1988). Their leadership was decimated, mainly because what they preached was a dismantling of an entire structure of oppression, unlike the Civil Rights Movement which acted as a safety valve and ensured access to a limited few among the African American community. Even today, the Black Panthers Party remains a remarkable misunderstood party. People associate the party only with violence and misogyny. The remarkable values that they stood for and their contributions to the community that originated in have been forgotten and the debates have shifted to how the middle classes of the United States of America need to progress. The values of discipline that the Panthers articulated too seem to be forgotten as the African American community continues to struggle under the burden of structural barriers to the American dream. Their inability to access this remains a defeat to American democracy. Works Cited Jeffries, Judson L. 2002. Huey P. Newton: The Radical Theorist. Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi. Print. Newton, Huey P. 2002. The Huey P. Newton Reader. Eds. David Hilliard and Donald Weise. New York: Seven Stories Press. Print. Seale, Bobby. 1991. Seize the Time: The Story of the Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newton. Baltimore: Black Classics Press. Print. MIA: History: USA: The Black Panther Party. n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. King Jr., Martin Luther. 2001. The Autobiography of Martin Luther King , Jr. Reprint Edition. New York: Warner Books. Print. Ongiri, Amy Abugo. 2009. “Prisoner of Love: Affiliation, Sexuality, and the Black Panther Party”. The Journal of African American History 94.1: 69-86. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. Wasserman, Steve. 2013. “Rage and Ruin: On the Black Panthers”. The Nation. 24 July 2013. Web. 30 Dec. 2013. Keeling, Kara. 1999. “"A Homegrown Revolutionary"?: Tupac Shakur and the Legacy of the Black Panther Party”. The Black Scholar 29.2/3: 59-63. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. Jones, Charles E. 1988. The Political Repression of the Black Panther Party 1966-1971: The Case of the Oakland Bay Area 18.4: 415-434. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. Araiza, Lauren. 2009. “"In Common Struggle against a Common Oppression": The United Farm Workers and the Black Panther Party, 1968-1973”. The Journal of African American History 94.2: 200-223. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. Read More