Black Panther

*who shot first *

The Police used to ride through out neighborhood and watch the Black Panther's Drill Team perform. Then the police started cracking down on the drill teams . . . harassing kids . . . claiming that the small white wooden toy rifles that the kids had were real, and if they didn't get out of the street, they'd arrest them. We were dispersed from performing in our neighborhood, and they threatened the Block Club Patrol, and said we out after curfew. We had done what the Detroit Police couldn't . . . we were keeping our neighborhood safe, and a few of the businesses in our community were spending money on our little black asses. And this had been going on for three years.

Doing Block Club Patrol was a sign of maturity . . . and it was pretty easy to do too. All of us had martial arts training. So, at night when you were on patrol in the alley . . . and your dog started to barking at the Police or some other criminal snooping around there in the dark. All you had to do is . . . let go of the dog's leash, and run like hell. I can't say how dumb it felt when you'd get home all tuckered out from getting the piss scared out of you by the boogeyman . . . and you'd see your dog sitting there on the porch steps, looking at you like . . . boy, what the hell took you so long . . . there's a man out there in the alley with a got damned gun.

It was summer and out of boredom, me, Kenneth and Derrick started hanging out at Bi-lows Supermarket. Where it didn't take us long to figure out that all you needed was a grocery sack and a grocery receipt, and all the toys and candy were ours for the taking. And when we had to show our receipt we'd even get change back. A couple undercover Police used to watch us playing king of the mountain, throwing our bounty down to the less fortunate us. Ervin Boozer, the man who raised us was nervous cause he didn't want us telling on him, so her confronted them, and they flashed their shinny gold badges. A few weeks later the riots began . . . Derrick came running to the mountain that was being dugout for a swimming pool. The Grocery Clerk chased him outside the store and was beating him up. The and this guy told the store clerk to leave Derrick alone, a crowd gathered, they guy got arrested . . . somebody and somebody pulled the Cops pistol out of his holster and they took his baton, and the riots and looting had begun.

The Police started arresting the same guys they let out of jail earlier, but those guys weren't going back to jail quietly. For all the knew the Police might get em around a corner, and put a bullet in their head. So, the Police would kick down a door to make an arrest, to find themselves blown back out onto the street by a double barrel shotgun. The Police didn't care about the looters, most of them were white anyway. The Police were just cleaning up the evidence, cause its what they always did.

All you have to do is listen to the music of the 60's riots . . . its telling you how corrupt our government and our police were . . . Three Dog Night & War, people did not give a damn about race.

I feel like I've been knocked senseless by all the lies that they keep telling on me. But what choices do I have but to set the story straight. The only life I have ever known is a life of brutality at the hands of those who call themselves "Just." And they'd rather I die, than to have me tell you the truth. I was a child when the FBI, they call me notorious, and they've been calling me that since I was eleven years old, can you imagine that. Can you imagine what it is like to be the descendant of a King and living in humiliation because, because you had the human decency to try to have your own in the land called freedom, only to have the FBI "sic" the Mafia and criminals on you, cause although you are a child, you refuse to be a weaker man. "Black Panthers," wasn't about race, nor did we discriminate, and although in of itself discrimination is childish, however if you are an adult who has gone through a little bit of something in life, I don't believe that I need to tell you that discrimination often leads to murder and blood shed on the basis of race. But what Black Panthers meant that if you were a criminal snooping around in the dark, in our neighborhood, chances are that somebody from the neighborhood watch would be there in the dark watching you. And in the night, as we'd patrol the alleyways with our German Shepards, it brought a little comfort to our neighborhood. Don't ask what the dogs were for, we'd turn em lose if we saw someone breaking into a neighbor's home.

And here's where it really it gets sad, the Justice Department released bunch of felons from prison, set these criminals up with guns, and then turned them lose in the ghettos. Well when the rioting started, these criminals gave the United States Justice Department quite a spanking, shooting any cop or Federal Agent that was foolish enough to get in their face, cause if the Police caught them with those felons guns they were going back to prison, and they weren't going back to prison, ain't no telling what crime scene those guns came from. And I don't know what the Justice Department was thinking, but they single handedly took a peaceful Civil Rights movement made up of a bunch of law biding Community Leaders who'd hold their gatherings at "Idlewild, Michigan" and turned it into a Civil War.

In the 60's everybody in Detroit carried a gun, and you didn't need a permit to get one, you'd just go to the hardware store an buy one, if you had the money and that's what you wanted. The Constitution of the State of Michigan of 1963[1] Article 1, Section 6 reads: Every person has a right to keep and bear arms for the defense of himself and the state. And in 1966 the black man was the minority, we were barely 20% of the population, the odds were four to one, and everybody had guns. Can you imagine what would have happened if the riots were about race. The riots were about a pissed off people who were fed up with a corrupt Police Department. And after the riots it was not the Black man's 20% of vote, but a pissed off 80% of White people that voted a Black Mayor into office.

But here I am, a poor black child trying to stay alive in a world where if given the opportunity or even the slightest hint of an excuse, the white man would murder me for being his equal. But I am the man that my white Mother made me to be. And although the lessons have been harsh what she taught me was the truth about white America, and white people in general. I cannot trust the white man and he has labeled me the racist, but it is not an issue of race, it is an issue of maturity and responsibility, where the white man has acted oppressively childish on the basis of his race. How insane is that, what childish excuse is the white man going to use today to aid him in fighting his imaginary war against me. And looking back in hindsight, I believe that what happened is that the Justice Department didn't know anything about the Black Panther's as a Civil Rights movement cause most of us were kids from the community drill team, so the FBI made up so stuff and tuned a bunch of felons lose in our neighborhoods. The local Police Department knew that the Black Panthers were kids, but the FBI didn't, so during the riots when the Police kept arresting kids, the Justice department was baffled, but that's who the Black Panthers were, we were kids. Be serious grown ups didn't have no time for some Black Panthers, grown ups were busy working, or out getting drunk. And the same year that I was a Black Panther I was also a safety boy at Marquette and got a gold badge too.

With imaginations inflamed by the heroics of a cowardice Justice Department, they pursued running after the shadows that were made by their own doing, rather than to stand and do battle with the discriminations of the criminal mind, although they know without any doubt that the discrimination that they pay homage to always leads to blood shed.

Often overlooked, people are racist simply because they are having childish fun at someone else's expense, and what appears to be hurtful, harmless fun quickly gets out of hand, as the weight of the insults inflame an ideology of a worthless human soul. But it was cowardice behavior that turned its back on human decency and relieved it's own inner anguish in laughter upon the unsuspecting, pulling that soul into harms way where that person now find their existence and their earnest efforts are dehumanized as the bud of someone's hateful joke. And lines are drawn in the sand and flesh becomes the payment for the unwarranted ridicule, as each man must now prove that he is not a boastful coward whose only strength is found in his entourage.

But for the life of me, I cannot comprehend the "Uncle Tom" who arrogantly seeks to take advantage of guilty conscience in the form of an invitation, he is empowered, he has figured it all out and has declared himself the undefeated among his weaker brethren. The unfulfilled childish expectations have made him bitter, and why shouldn't he laugh at the misery of his brethren, if his brother were a smart man, he too could be standing along side him in an assembly of juvenile minds, seeking his approval as qualification for their excuse to turn their backs upon human decency. Anyone can get along with a racist, it's too easy, all you have to do is act as childish as they do, rather than be a victim find a victim, and the invitation will come. And when it comes, it will come groveling from an apologetic soul seeking to purchase a photo op as reassurance that the madness of his loathing is justified by that man's very own brother. But in all this rage and foolishness, who will make the decision to be the adult.

Television Commentary: Tony Brown's Journal, Black Panther Earl Caldwell, speaks about how the Justice Department sent him out to authenticate the Justice Department's story about the Black Panther. The "Brandsberg" case ouch, that hurt.

the three stooges

F.B.I.

JANET JACKSON lyrics - "Black Cat"

All the lonely nights I spend alone
Never around to love me
You're always gone
Cause you're hangin out
Breakin' the rules
Oh the man has come
Looking for you
You're a rebel now
Don't give a damn
Always carrying on
With the gang
I'm trying to tell you boy
It's a mistake
You won't realize
Til it's too late

Don't understand
Why you insist
On ways of living such a dangerous life
Time after time you stay away
And I just know that you're telling me lies

Black cat
Nine lives
Short days
Long nights
Livin on the edge
Not afraid to die
Heart beat
Real strong
But not
For long
Better watch your step
Or you're gonna die

You're so together boy
But just at a glance
You'll do anything
If given a chance
Scheming, plannin lies
To get what you need
So full of promises
That you never keep

Don't you tell yourself
That it's okay
Sick and tired of
All of your games
And you want me to stay
Better change
Makes no sense to me
Your crazy ways

Black cat
Nine lives
Short days
Long nights
Livin on the edge
Not afraid to die
Heart beat
Real strong
But not
For long
Better watch your step
Or you're gonna die

Gill Scott Heron - The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
"but it shall be won within your heart"