Veeky Forums, tell me about the Black Panthers. I'm having a really hard time finding unbiased sources on them...

Veeky Forums, tell me about the Black Panthers. I'm having a really hard time finding unbiased sources on them. Were they good for communities and unfairly hassled by the government, or were they crazy ideologues? Also, please no /pol/ or /leftypol/ tier answers.

Bit of both desu

armed propaganda group

At least their violence had a purpose.

Some pretty cool cats, desu. I can't think of anything cooler than a black panther.

They also correctly analyzed what was necessary for black liberation. MLK has been watered down to seem like a moderate today, whereas he was a radical, but even still the black panthers occupied a more radical and more correct position that he did without falling into the Nation of Islam "white people are inherently the devil meme.
The revolution will not be televised, brother.

You seem pretty knowledgeable. Did you ever have any firsthand contact with them?

To be fair MLK played the good cop bad cop routine with Malcom X.

fpbp

for the most part, they were the useful idiots of interested professional subversives, like a great many others.


>I can't think of anything cooler than a black panther.

a Japanese black panther

COINTELPRO

Little bit of column A, little bit of column B (back then).

Now they are a joke.

But I wanted to Tevo the revolution when it's televised...

Heaven's a better place.

Now they are old

The "New Black Panthers" are essentially black supremacists led by Khalid Abdul Muhammad who broke off from the NOI
The OG Panthers refuse to acknowledge them as continuity

They organized soup kitchens and other community programs. They intended to help black communities. They also patrolled the streets with firearms, supposedly to protect their people from police harassment. Everyone usually think that sounds crazy but considering the systemic police brutality faced by blacks I can understand why they would want to defend themselves, even if it is questionable. Also right to bear arms is a second amendment right.

What they did at first wasn't outright wrong, though I'm sure some of their members may have taken the rhetoric too far. Indeed after they fell apart some believe the bloods and the crips stepped in to fill the void, which led to unprecedented gang violence.

Members of the party were brutally murdered illegally by police via the COINTELPRO project of the US government. They were definitely the oppressed, not the oppressors.

>MLK has been watered down to seem like a moderate today, whereas he was a radical

In what way has MLK been watered down? What positions did he hold that were radical/don't fit the narrative?

>To be fair MLK played the good cop bad cop routine with Malcom X.

Aye, I think it was more this.

>unbiased source
>no /leftypol/

You will have a hard time finding non left-wingers with an unbiased opinion of the black panthers.

Sounds like a black version of the brown shirt movement, with all the apologitism that would entail

this, only us left wingers can be unbiased

BIG BLACK PENIS KLAN

Fuckin ridiculous man.

Can we please keep leftist and rightist bantz out of this?

I meant posting responses like "KILL WHITEY CRACKA ASS HATAS DESERVE 2 DIE" or something to that extent. I'm assuming /leftypol/ is the antithesis to /pol/ in terms of rhetoric-based political shitposting.

This, too. I didn't want a big ideological debate between liberals and conservatives. I just wanted to learn about the Panthers.

Bump

My dad ate breakfasts they made in schools and according to Stanford because of the black panthers WIC was formed. I also know a man who is taking care of Huey P Newton's last surviving relative, everyone else was murdered by OPD.

Anyways BPP while being really beneficial was also really anti-woman and homophobic, Newton wanted to change that but most brothas weren't down for that.

I think for some of them at least they believed Black rights first and foremost was about black men.

I'm not giving you a direct answer to your question re. MLK, but consider how publicized he is, how every town has a street named after him, and probably a statue too. Now ask people to cite his views, or what he did, or what he stood for, beyond "I have a dream". Chances are most of them have no idea.

"Watered down" in his case, can easily mean "has been co-opted as the marketable black face of feel-good liberal race policy". The man himself is practically irrelevant.