Short Thoughts on Huey P. Newton’s “Proto-Revolution” and the Momentum of the Riot

Notes on Momentuous Revolution 1 (July 12, 2017)

I really, REALLY dislike how Huey P. Newton talks condescendingly about riots, so I decided to digitize notes I made on his thoughts.

• Calling riots infantile and "proto-" is an ignorant underestimation of opportunity.
• African-American riots have often only appeared to be formless within post-antebellum slavery because the organization of well-directed rage against inaccessibility is often not being measured as a product of unconsensual dependency. As a result, the target is made invisible and thus the punches and kicks (which must be recognized as self-defense) thrown by the masses in such an event are perceived as a tantrum — Black people lashing out at Nothing(ness).
• This Nothing(ness) is in fact only a limb of the terror I will now be referring to as cryptogenocide.
• I would like the audience examining post-antebellum riots of the African American community to consider not only the desperation of our community to fulfill our desires, but also the urgency inherent and necessary in fulfilling our needs: food and diaper for children, entertainment to de-stress from the immense amount of allostatic load our community endures, and shelter.
• Riots are also a natural response to a violent, dehumanizing double bind. As the Black Panthers themselves have put it, we have been backed into a corner and our only choice now is to fight for life or death — self defense and self-preservation.
• Most importantly, riots are not only a logical response to inescapable oppression under the oplegitimacy of the “United States”, but also entirely emotional ordeal. In a world where tens of thousands of African Americans suffer the ill-effects of segregation and police discrimination all culminating in the unfortunate yet timely event of Marquette Frye’s death, a non-riotous response would equate to a proactive African-American social death, or the dehumanization of the Black population of America. A peaceful or civilized response would have legitimized the supremacist idea that Black lives in fact, do not matter, that the suffering and oppression we endure is not worthy of anger or even shame.
• A riot, in essence, is a burning mass of passionate denunciation of the present systems of double and triple oppression we suffer in the African-American community. It is dense as the length of its history, and thus momentous like lead; African-American history also just so happens to be as dark as lead.
• My favorite example of the importance of rioting is what boosted red revolution in Russia, ie the bread riots of the February Revolution. Some lasting effects:

In the cities, food shortages continued to rise and the morale of the people fell. Riots broke out on March 8, 1917 in the city of Petrograd. (The Julian calendar that Russia used at the time was 13 days behind the western, Gregorian, calendar. Therefore, some date the riot on February 24th.) It was started by women demanding more bread, but eventually spread to other industries and throughout the city. Even the soldiers on the front joined in the revolution. The Duma set up a provisional government on March 12, 1917 and a few days later the tsar stepped down.

The provisional government established a liberal program of various rights. These included freedom of speech, religion and assembly; equality before the law; and the right of unions to organize and strike.

• Just because you [Mr. Newton] didn’t know how to harness the power of a riot with TIMING and MOMENTUM doesn’t mean rioting is weak.

• Instead of just trying to build a military in plain sight like Mr. Newton wanted, like Mr. Marcus Garvey did (both brought down by COINTELPR0), maybe we ought to acquire land and goods in the process via a riot.
• EACH ONE TEACH ONE HOW TO RIOT EFFICIENTLY: Acquire necessities. Sieze small shops, land, and infrastructure. Don’t declare shit legally.
• We ought not to beg this settler-colonial, illegitimate “governance”(read Moloch-ite death machine) to legitimize our land. We ought to declare it ourselves and remind this genocidal state that it belongs to no imperialist.
• Even if we could build a military and suddenly call land ours, Mr. Newton, we ought not to expect its legitimacy to mean shit historically if it is given to us by the “United States”; we aren’t uncle toms, asking for bread. We take the fucking bread, Mr. Newton.
• After that shit is seized, preferably in the middle of a city Paris Commune style, you begin to blockade, building what will hopefully be a much improved Fort Negro with much more welcoming fate.
• Perhaps in the process, one may even seek out the support of an ally — recognition from international states, who will legitimize your cassus belli and share similiar if not identical interests. In other words making international friends is preparatory.
• All else must be hidden in plain sight, or developed guerilla-style. Example: the Viet Cong made sure to only expose plans to "subordinates" or ground troops, in this case rioters moments before it was to be implemented.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viet_Cong_and_PAVN_strategy,_organization_and_structure

• However, in the present, we ought to prepare the masses with knowledge of what we need to fight oppression, also showinh them how their needs are available in plain sight.
• Then show the masses that we can have those needs when we work together; rioting is a communal process and activity.
• Once the method of opportunity and rioting is systemized, it will be clear to whom solidarity will be given when solidarity is needed.
• And thus, once a riot occurs and rioters have claimed land AND means of production, solidarity will be given without room for questions.
• If this priming is prepared thoroughly, then by the time a riot occurs the masses will be barricaded and we can fight for them from anywhere, support them from anywhere, and always recognize the riot and barricade as the call for national revolution — a momentuous revolution, the confederational side of the strategy.