Black Panthers as Icons

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Black Panthers as Icons

• Marketable Products, Global Interests, and
  Inspiration to the Downtrodden
  
• (By Sharon Kim, Beth Scholler)

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Insider accounts

• In the late 1960s and beyond, the Black Panther
  Party became a lucrative commodity for the media.
  They began to seek out anyone who could claim to
  have the inside scoop on information.
• Some of these were positively framed, showing
  them as victims of racist government agendas,
  heroes to the Black community, and humanitarians.
  Many others relied on the traditional framing of
  the Panthers as violent threats to white America
  or celebrity terrorists.
• A worst offender in the insider account was I
  Was a Black Panther, which was allegedly written
  by a youth swept into the Party after attending a
  rally and culminating in violent acts by said
  youth.
• Former Panther, Earl Anthony, wrote a scathing
  indictment of the Panthers. He claimed that he
  and his family had been threatened by the
  Panthers when they learned of his book. Also, his
  book talked about incessant pressure from the
  FBI.
• Eldridge Cleaver, though in exile, was hugely
  marketable. His writings and speeches were
  gathered in books and sold. Numerous articles
  about him appeared in newspapers and magazines.
  He was, after all, mass medias favorite black
  nationalist

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Communists Neo-Nazis

• Much of the anti-Black Panther Party literature
  that appeared focused on their framing as violent
  thugs. Some of them took it one step further,
  though.
• By the 1970s, negative articles were doing well
  in the marketplace, so the numbers began to
  swell. One of these articles suggested that the
  Panthers were Communists. Since the Communists
  were considered to be an insidious threat to all
  global freedom, the connection seems clear. The
  popularity of Panthers like Cleaver, Newton, and
  Seale was luring in the young and impressionable
  and brainwashing them into their way of thinking.
  Like the Communist Party, the threat came from a
  vague notion that the Communists were secretly
  building up power all over the U.S. until they
  could essentially take over.
• Two different sources, Look and The New York
  Times, juxtaposed images of Eldridge Cleaver and
  Roy V. Harris (a segregationist). The implication
  was to equate the Black Panthers with racist
  white supremaciststwo sides of the same coin.

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Social Heroes

• The image of the Black Panthers began to change,
  though most media still preferred to focus on the
  old imageclenched fist, berets, leather jackets,
  guns and threatening looks.
• Those few who focused on the positive found
  inspiration from Free Breakfast for School
  Children, free food distribution, transportation
  to local prisons, health care help, legal aid,
  and Liberation Schools
• Some media proposed them to be servants of the
  people, while many others suggested that the
  children were being propagandized into the Black
  Panther agenda.
• Many cultural entrepreneurs found that the
  human interest angle was a lucrative source.
  Thus, they focused on the effects of these
  programs on the children, showing them smiling
  and healthy. The true motivation, of course, had
  little to do with childrens need for
  nourishment, and a lot to do with selling papers
  and magazines.

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Eldridge Cleaver

• The media was obsessed with Eldridge Cleaver,
  more than any other member of the Black Panther
  Party. In part fueled by his intelligence in
  writing, his opposite symbol of scowling rebel,
  and his exile from the United States evasion
  from The Law, they sought out every tidbit of
  information, every angle imaginable.
• His writings were re-packaged and sold.
• When Cleaver was spotted in Havana, The New York
  Times ran an article on his virtual imprisonment
  in Cuba, implying that exile in Communist Cuba
  was far worse than an American prison (shades of
  the Cold War, yet again)
• New York Times Magazine wrote about his 10-point
  plan that he wrote for the Black Panther Party.
  Unfortunately, he didnt write it. Newton and
  Seale, the actual authors, were never mentioned.
• Cleaver had hoped to begin a global Black Panther
  Party from his new home of Algiers, but it didnt
  happen. Eventually, the BPP realized that they
  were being manipulated by socialist governments
  to serve the government agendas, contrary to the
  Panther rules and regulations.

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Black Power Politics in Britain

• The spark that began Black Power in Brittan was
  not the BPP, but visits by Malcolm X in 1964 and
  1965 and a visit by Stokely Carmichael in 1967.
  
• In particular, Carmichael turned out to be the
  catalyst for Britains in the Caribbean, Africa,
  Africa, and South Asia.
  
• Obi Egbuna, Nigerian writer and activist, became
  president of the Universal Colored Peoples
  Association (UCPA)
  
• The Institute of Race Relations fought against
  racial discrimination and was modeled on the
  NAACP
  
• Britain in the 1960s was entering a tumultuous
  phase in immigrant relations. In 1962, the
  Commonwealth Immigrants act restricted
  immigration to those with work vouchers. In 1965,
  the number of vouchers given out was drastically
  reduced.
• In response to anti-immigrant remarks made by
  Enoch Powell, Conservative Member of Parliament,
  the Black Peoples Alliance was formed. They
  fought against racism.

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Enter The BPP

• The Daily Mirror, Londons liberal paper covered
  the funeral of Bobby Hutton in April of 1968.
  
• Egbuna formed the Black Panther Movement, which
  had its own monthly magazine Black Power Speaks.
  Egbuna focused more on African descent than
  blackness as a symbol.
• In 1970, Black Peoples News Service, a
  newspaper, began being published. It included the
  snarling panther, the beret, black leather, and
  fists imagery.
• Britain Black Panthers 10-point plan, however,
  did not include guns.
  
• This group was completely ignored by the media
  until there was a suggestion of violence. A
  headline read, Kill Police Order Alleged in
  Black Panther Case. All of a sudden, they were a
  viable commodity and newspapers in Britain
  covered them.
• Still, a British citizen was more likely to learn
  about the American race relations than anything
  happening in their own backyard.

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Icons and Inspiration

• Hybrid Black Panther organizations began to
  appear in Bermuda, Israel, India and Australia.
  These organizations found a commonality in their
  oppressions. Indias BP parties sought civil
  rights for lower-caste Indians.
• Other groups in the United States formed their
  own groups, inspired in part by the BPP The
  Young Lords in 1967 (Puerto Rican youth), the
  Brown Berets in 1968 (Mexican-American
  activists), the American Indian Movement in 1968
  and the Red Guard Party in 1968 (Chinese
  Americans)
• The FBI stepped up their efforts to undermine
  the greatest threat to national security by
  focusing on Bobby Seale (Newton was in prison and
  Cleaver was in exile). He was gagged and chained
  during his trial, which was eventually
  successfully protested by the ACLU as a violation
  of his rights. Police raided Panther chapters in
  overwhelming numbers resulting in the shooting
  deaths of 28 Panthers, according to the BPP. An
  independent researcher concluded that 10 of the
  deaths were definitely caused by unjustified
  police shootings. The others involved shooting on
  both sides.

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The Legacy continues

• There remains a fascination with the Black
  Panthers. The Wall Street Journal coined the term
  radical chic to exemplify a popular culture
  that blindly embraces the Black Panthers image
• Rhodes refers to cultural entrepreneurs who
  made profits by capitalizing on the Panthers
  popularity. No longer being used by the Panthers
  to get their message out, but using the Panthers
  to get their circulations up.
• A Jet article by John H. Britton summed up 1969
  by a show of militants from abolitionist John
  Brown and Marcus Garvey to the Black Panthers. In
  essence, whenever there has been a voice for the
  black protester, there has been an equally strong
  force unleashed in opposition. He completes his
  summary with Malcolm X As for Malcolm X. .
  .well, hes dead.a sobering reflection on what
  happens when hegemony is challenged.

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Connections with our class

• The framing of the Panthers as heroes, villains,
  or somewhere in between.
  
• The media representations and the complicated
  effects of these representations must they be
  either heroes or villains? No one is really so
  one-sided.
• Commodification of the Black Panthers
• Effects on Black Culture, here and in other parts
  of the world

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Methodology

• Jane Rhodes uses textual analysis of many
  different types of print media to gather the bulk
  of her information. She compares book reviews by
  different newspapers to get different sides of
  the story. Also, comparing mainstream newspaper
  headlines and content with locally produced
  newspapers, Rhodes shows the difference in
  framing of the BPP

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Anti-BPP sources

• The Black Panthers in Action (Church League of
  America)
  
• The Black Panthers Are These Cats Red?
  (Conservative Society of America)
  
• The Black Panthers Are Not Black. . . They Are
  Red (Christian Crusade Publication)
  
• The Black Panther Menace Americas Neo-Nazis
  (anthology by The Popular Library)
  

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On the BPP Gravy Train

• Selections from the Biography of Huey P. Newton
  (Bobby Seale, through efforts of the editors of
  Ramparts)
  
• Seize the Time The Story of the Black Panther
  Party and Huey Newton
  
• The Genius of Huey P. Newton (Eldridge Cleaver)
• To Die for the People (Huey Newton compilation)
• I Was a Black Panther
• Picking Up the Gun (Earl Anthony)
• Spitting in the Wind The True Story Behind the
  Violent Legacy of the Black Panther Party (Earl
  Anthony)
  
• Eldridge Cleaver Post-Prison Writings and
  Speeches (compiled by Robert Scheer)
  
• The Black Panthers (Gene Marine)
• The Trial of Huey Newton (Mona Bazaar)
• Free Huey (Edward M. Keating)
• The Vanguard A Photographic Essay on the Black
  Panthers (Ruth Marion-Baruch and Pirkle Jones)
  
• The Panther Paradox A Liberals Dilemma (Don
  Schanche)

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Others

• Serious autobiographies in the 1990s by Assata
  Shakur, Elaine Brown, David Hilliard, Geronimo
  Pratt, William Lee Brent
  
• Book reviewers Christopher Lehmann-Haupt,
• Op-Eds Booker Griffith
• Newspapers and Magazines The New York Times, The
  Wall St. Journal, black-owned Los Angeles
  Sentinal, San Fransisco Examiner, Black Panther
  Newspaper, New York Times Magazine, Londons
  Daily Mirror, Look, Black Power Speaks, Black
  Peoples News Service, The New Yorker, The
  Nation, The Oakland Tribune, Newsweek
• Historian Peter Frye
• Kathleen Cleaver
• The BBC
• Political scientist Edward Jay Epstien
• ABCs coverage of the deaths of Huggins and
  Carter during the meeting between the BPP and US
  

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Strengths and Weaknesses

• Strengths gives a good historical context,
  providiing a great framework for textual
  analysisthere are many different accounts, each
  of whichnaturallyhave their own perspectives.
  Using the mainstream sources and smaller, local
  resources in juxtaposition shows the reader the
  dangers of accepting at face value everything
  reported. This is as true today as it was then.
• Weaknesses lack of television news coverage
  (though it is understood that she tried) and lack
  of in-person quotes from anyone involved in the
  media framing of the Panthers. (We counter with
  personal accounts given today could, potentially,
  be colored by time and distance and everything
  that they have taken in from the media since and
  would be less reliable than the resources from
  the time)

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Contributions to the Field

• Jane Rhodes puts the Black Panthers into a new
  light, one that is neither demonizes them nor
  places them on pedestals.
  
• Rhodes establishes the pervasive influence of the
  media on us by
  
• --pulling from many different sources to
  show how different agendas produced very
  
• different interpretations of the Black
  Panther Party
  
• --showing the many ways that the Black
  Panther Party, once strategic users of the
  
• media to get their message out to
  millions, were being turned into products to
  make
  
• millions for publishers
• This is applicable today, because it shows
  strongly how the notions of the once-unbiased
  press is an idealized fantasy that only exists in
  our perceptions. The fairness of the media, even
  when trying to be unbiased, must always be
  questioned. Our own views, too, must be
  questioned, since our willingness to believe or
  not believe is based in our perceptions as well.

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Questions

• The alternative framingthe Black Panthers as
  servants of the people began to emerge (252).
  What do you think about the term servants? Does
  this exemplify a positive image of the Black
  Panthers or not?
• How do you see cultural entrepreneurship
  playing out in Black culture today?
  
• What have you not learned about the Black
  Panthers so far that you would like to know?