Ron Daniels
On
April 4, 1968 Martin Luther King was gunned down as he stood on a hotel balcony
in Memphis. He was in Memphis to support a strike by sanitation workers who
carried bold signs proclaiming, I AM A MAN. At the time of his death, King was
actively planning to launch a Poor People’s Campaign to fight for an Economic
Bill of Rights. Faced with a White backlash against the "gains" of the
civil rights movement, King’s goal was to intensify the struggle to translate
the vision of his famous I Have a Dream speech into meaningful changes for the
masses of Black people and the oppressed in this nation. King was also faced
with the growing disaffection of Black youth, particularly from the urban
ghettos who were increasingly inclined to heed Kwame Ture’s (aka Stokely
Carmichael) call to Black Power and Malcolm’s admonition to struggle for freedom
"by any means necessary." This militant mood was fueled by the gap
between the promise of King’s dream and the reality of the nightmare the masses
of Black working people and the poor were forced to endure on a day to day basis
in the ghettos of this nation.
Though
King never disavowed non-violence and his fervent faith in the efficacy of
America’s democratic creed, the Poor People’s Campaign was envisioned as his
most militant assault to date on what he increasingly came to see as an
oppressive, greed driven economic and political system. King was cut down before
he had an opportunity to launch the Campaign. When the life of this apostle of
non-violence, was violently snuffed out, virtually every urban area in America
erupted in rebellion. At the forefront of many of these insurrections were Black
youth who were tired of being told to "turn the other cheek" in the
face of racism and racial violence. The words of Malcolm superceded the dream of
King, as Black youth declared that it would be "freedom for everybody or
freedom for nobody."
As
we enter a new millennium, after a period of relative calm, a new mood of
militancy seems to be moving Black youth to engage the struggle for social
justice and social change. While more Black people enjoy middle and upper class
status than at any other time since our arrival on these hostile shores, racism
or the "colorline" as DuBois termed it remains a barrier to the
forward progress of large numbers of Africans in America, especially those
locked in neglected neighborhoods within the inner-city. It is in these
neglected neighborhoods that untold multitudes of Black youth are being
victimized by out of control cops whose professed mission is to rid high crime
areas of guns and drugs. But as many young people see it, the "War on
Drugs" is a "war on us."
In
the wake of the epidemic of police brutality in New York, where at least four
unarmed Black men have been killed by the NYPD in the last year and widespread
police brutality and misconduct across the country, Black youth are taking to
the streets to engage in massive marches, demonstrations, civil disobedience and
other forms of direct action. Though these actions have basically been
non-violent, in New York more and more organizations like the New Black Panther
Collective and the Justice 2000 coalition are defying the police by marching and
demonstrating without permits and refusing to be confined to the routes outlined
by the police when they have permits. And, during the demonstrations which took
place during the funeral of Patrick Dorismond, an unarmed Haitian immigrant who
was killed by a plain clothes undercover police officer, angry crowds rained
rocks, bottles and bricks down on the police after they used force in an effort
to confine the crowd to designated areas. In the aftermath of the Dorismond
police killing, Black youth in New York initiated a boycott of Easter and there
are growing calls for the creation of armed militias to protect Black people
from the police.
Another
phenomenon which is fueling the anger among Black youth is the proliferation of
hate crimes and racial violence against Black people and people of color and an
overall atmosphere of racial hostility across the country. At a recent National
Youth Summit on Hate Crimes convened by the Atlanta based Center for Democratic
Renewal, youth leaders (primarily African, Latino, Asian, Native American)
discussed the lynching of James Byrd in Texas, the firebombing of buildings on
the campus of Florida A&M University, the rise of racist organizations like
the skinheads and the growing influence of racist/white supremacist
lyrics/music. The Summit participants also discussed racism in public policy
such as attacks on affirmative action, environmental racism and the growth of
the prison-jail industrial complex. Not surprisingly, these young people also
had a spirited debate about the relative merits of nonviolence versus
self-defense and other forms of direct action as means to achieve social justice
and social change.
No
matter what form the struggle may take, there appears to be growing numbers of
Black youth who are "sick and tired of being sick and tired" – Black
youth who are prepared to turn their anger into militant action to promote and
defend the interests and aspirations of young people and the entire Black
community. When young people decide to act it may well be a sign of a militant
mass movement on the horizon.
It’s
about time.
Ron
Daniels can be reached at <[email protected]>.
Editor’s
note: The views expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do
not necessarily represent those of The Black World Today. Copyright (c) 2000
The Black World Today.