Remembering "The Black Panther Party"
"So the concept is this. Basically the whole Black Nation has to be put together into a single black army, and were gonna walk on this nation. Were gonna walk on this racists power structure and were gonna say to the whole damm government stick em up motherfucker! This is a hold up, and we've come for what's ours."
-Bobby Seale
Racial inequality ran rampant in the San Francisco Bay Area as well as in the South during the late 1960's. It was a different kind of racism though out west. The segregation in California differed in the fact that it was not printed on signs saying, "White only", moreover, it was fused into the system of society and became a part of everyday life. The racism out west and in the northern states was different from the legal segregation in the south but not any less repugnant or repressive to the African American communities.
English: 40th Reunion of the Black Panther Party i...
Original six members of the Black Panther Party (N...
Co-founder of the Black Panther Party, Huey P. New...It was so ingrained into the culture and government agencies it became a form of institutionalized racism. It affected where African Americans could live, work, how much political clout they were able to attain within the law, and affected them on a very personal level as they felt the racial discrimination and dealt with the injustice of inner city police tactics. Many movements in the 1960's helped blow the winds of change for African Americans living in America. One of these movements was the "Black Panther Party for Self Defense". The Black Panther Party organized to try to fight against the racial segregation in California and to help achieve the equality that African Americans yearned for. They worked on fixing the problem on two levels. They helped politically by organizing the community through mobilization, education and protest, as...