“The New Black Panther Party, explained”

Jess Brooks
On Race — isms
1 min readAug 21, 2015

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“people familiar with the way groups that advocated for the rights of African-Americans have historically been mischaracterized might be skeptical of that label.

After all, the original Black Panther Party — which did not promote bigotry and in fact formed a cross-racial “Rainbow Coalition” advocating for economic equality for people of all colors — was labeled a “black nationalist hate group” around the time J. Edgar Hoover’s was using the FBI’s COINTELPRO to “expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and otherwise neutralize” it and other civil rights groups. (Black Panthers were in good company: Hoover also targeted the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and, notably, Martin Luther King, Jr.)…

But the characterization of the NBPP is a whole different story. The Anti-Defamation League, the SPLC, and the US Commission on Civil Rights all agree that it’s an actual hate group.

Why? Its leaders espouse really offensive and downright scary views that really couldn’t be categorized as anything but hate…

In 1997, two original Black Panthers won an injunction against Michaels disallowing him from using the name or logo. It was never enforced.”

I didn’t know this was a thing… guess I’m not watching enough Fox News?

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Jess Brooks
On Race — isms

A collection blog of all the things I am reading and thinking about; OR, my attempt to answer my internal FAQs.