It’s important to note how the Black Panthers used “violence”. There were very few incidents where they actually fired their guns, and when they did, they were arguably baited into doing it by the FBI and local cops.
Their best tactic was just hanging around with an AK on their back while a cop did their racial profiling thing to somebody else. They’d keep a book of laws handy and give the person advice from the sidelines. If they didn’t have a gun, the cop would likely have found some pretext to arrest them and that’d be it. With a gun, the cop thinks twice and puts up with it. It wasn’t there to actually be fired, but to make sure everyone behaved themselves.
This was so effective they changed California’s open carry law to stop it. It’s estimated that there were only around 100 Black Panthers at the time.
That is why I use the word “defiance”. It is not violence, it is just a refusal to be bullied. We should put forth our own words to describe things, not let the media paint our movements in the light that they prefer.
It’s important to note how the Black Panthers used “violence”. There were very few incidents where they actually fired their guns, and when they did, they were arguably baited into doing it by the FBI and local cops.
Their best tactic was just hanging around with an AK on their back while a cop did their racial profiling thing to somebody else. They’d keep a book of laws handy and give the person advice from the sidelines. If they didn’t have a gun, the cop would likely have found some pretext to arrest them and that’d be it. With a gun, the cop thinks twice and puts up with it. It wasn’t there to actually be fired, but to make sure everyone behaved themselves.
This was so effective they changed California’s open carry law to stop it. It’s estimated that there were only around 100 Black Panthers at the time.
That is why I use the word “defiance”. It is not violence, it is just a refusal to be bullied. We should put forth our own words to describe things, not let the media paint our movements in the light that they prefer.