I am apprehensive about responding to a student’s opinion piece published in a student newspaper because of the obvious power dynamics between a professor and an undergrad.
But my voicemail and email were bombarded by demands from IU students, staff, faculty and organizations to offer a corrective piece.
I support the right to free speech.
However, if one’s opinion is to be published for all to see, then his or her comments should at least be informed and reflect the academic integrity expected of IU representatives.
Grammy award-winning rap artist Common stated in one of his songs, “My raps are a smoke signal to let the streets know I’m with ‘em.”
This is the best description of Beyoncé’s artistic expression that paid homage to the Panthers, Malcolm X and the Black Power movement.
Her command to get in “Formation” reflected the imagery and activism of civil rights and black power activists who, for example, lined up in formation to cross the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma to advocate for voting rights, or the Panthers, who marched in formation into the California state legislature to protest the disarming of civilians (Mumford Bill).
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Panthers, which began in 1966 in the Bay area, where the Super Bowl was played.
Two law students, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, created the organization to legally combat police brutality and to create community service programs to address the social inequality of institutional racism that plagued poor and oppressed communities.
Self-defense is not a promotion of violence but rather a human response to abuse.
The student cited Pearson’s book (1995) in his column.
There have been more than 50 books published since 2000 on the Panthers and Black Power, most of which have effectively discredited Pearson’s work for many of the same reasons used by those in the comments section to attack the student’s column.
The Panthers were never a hate group, gang, terrorist unit or a black separatist organization.
They advocated for class struggle that transcended race.
One of Deputy Chairman Fred Hampton’s (who was assassinated at age 21 by the FBI and Chicago police in 1969) most quoted phrases is, “You don’t fight racism with racism, you fight racism with solidarity.”
Panthers worked in coalition with all poor groups, including Confederate flag-wearing southern whites. Many of their philanthropic donors were some of the most famous people of the period such as Marlon Brando, Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland.
The illegal actions of the FBI’s COINTELPRO (counter intelligence program) included a massive misinformation campaign, which created many of the misconceptions that plague the student’s column.
These misconceptions have thus become popular lore.
So popular are they that current groups like the New Black Panther Party, which has no link to the original Panthers, has also embraced many of the same misconceptions and subsequently spews hate speech.
One can teach only so much in a short newspaper article.
I teach a course on the Panthers at IU that is my most popular class. I encourage Brian Anderson to enroll.
One tangible final lesson to consider: a white male student from Conservative/Republican Carmel who took my Panthers course two years ago recently won two awards for the final research paper he wrote.
It will be published in the College of Arts and Sciences Undergraduate Journal, and has also been accepted to the 2016 Ball State University Student History Conference on Feb. 26.
He originally held many of the same misconceptions presented in the student’s article.
After conducting his own research on the Panther’s community service programs, he has become an advocate against such falsehoods.
Jakobi Williams is an associate professor in the Department of African American and African Diaspora Studies and the Department of History.
