A Taste Of Brown

… Essay, Research Paper

A Taste of Brown: A Black Panther s Movement Critique

And, we sat and we talked

About freedom and things.

And, he told me about what he dreamed.

But I knew of that dream

Long before he had spoke

And a feeling familiarly came around.

I said,

Man, where have you been for all these years

Man, where were you when I sought you

Man, do you know me as I know you

Man, am I coming through

-National Black Panther Anthem

The above lyrics signified a certain type of uniformity and camaraderie, characteristic of the legendary Black Panther movement. However, uniformity and camaraderie were soon threatened when Elaine Brown became head of the party. When the former leader Huey Newton went into exile in the late 1970 s, Elaine rose to the position of leadership, drastically changing the internal party structure. Elaine became a female symbol of power, holding an office traditionally held by men.

The Black Panther party came into existence addressing suffering in America. The 1970s were a time of federal troops in the South being employed to repel racist, police﷓advocated violence against black children attempting to attend school with white children. It was a time of constant police attacks on blacks seeking voting rights, which became both a social and political issue. Brown discusses the major goals of this organization: to insure blacks essential rights denied through the Jim Crow era by institutional racism and lynching. The right to have food, shelter, health care and education was denied to blacks. Brown recounts an instance that shows the unintended effects of the denial of these rights. She begins,

I mean, we ve got a six-year-old girl whose entire right leg is marred by third-degree burns . Three kids from one family came to us with no shoes only thongs and when we went to their own house, we couldn t find a single toothbrush (393).

As illustrated by the quote, the fundamental human rights had been stripped from the black community prior to the rise of the Black Panthers. To ameliorate the past wrong, this party performed major tasks towards the equalizing of the proverbial playing field.

There were hundreds of thousands of people who benefited from our free-food programs, our free medical clinics and legal-aid programs, our prison programs, our schools and education programs, our service programs for seniors and teens and abused children and battered women and homeless people (16).

One must remember that these observations or conclusions are based on one woman s perspective and should be analyzed in correlation to the facts about the time period. Nonetheless, she presents this view in her text that the major goal of the party was enacted.

Now that the goals of and reasons for the Black Panther party were axiomatic, leadership now played a role. This subject is crossed with the misogynistic undertones of the organization. Brown addresses without hesitance the complications dealing with her new position of power. She notes the level of insanity that Huey had in his eyes upon visiting. His eyes were glazed, and they darted back and forth almost uncontrollably. What he said to me had nothing to do with anything. I tried to hide my bewilderment, my fear (9). Indeed she goes into her own catharsis after taking control of this party:

My heart was beating, but I could not seem to draw a breath. My fingers, those fingers, continued to type. They were not my fingers or hands. I tried to shake off the feeling that made me call out for my mother in my childhood nights. It was full-blown [my emphasis] now, though. I could not force myself back. My mother could not hold me until it want away. It would not go away. I leaped from my seat and rushed into the ladies room I dialed the operator for the number of a mental-health clinic (147).

As one could see, the emotional breakdown that Brown had was synonymous to that of Huey had in jail.

Another complication dealing with individual power was the overwhelming majority of males in the movement. Misogyny was prevalent in the organization and was seen at a glance. Brown describes to her readers that upon given her inaugural speech, she had seen several hundred other members of the Black Panther Party, a sea of predominantly male faces (3). Not only was misogyny widespread but also the ideology that goes along with this belief. The premise that andocentric is a culturally accepted belief in the word spread through the party. Brown gives an example of the application of andocentric.

A woman in the Black Panther movement was considered, at best, irrelevant. A woman asserting herself was a pariah. A woman attempting the role of leadership was, to my proud black Brothers, making an alliance with the counter-revolutionary, man-hating, lesbian, feminist white bitches. It was a violation of some Black Power principle that was left undefined. If a black woman assured a role of leadership, she was said to be eroding black manhood, to be hindering the progress of the black race. She was the enemy of black people (357).

Brown words illustrate the idea that in an ironic sort of manner, the Black Panthers, who were fighting against suppression of the race suppressed women in the party from achieving levels o

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