And good evening and welcome. Thank you so much for coming. It is an amazing house we have here this evening. I have to say, im thrilled and honored to take part in this Amazing Group of people we have here. I am a media studies and film professor here at the new school and i do teach about things like this black power mix tape thing. Alley. Ight up my so of course, i would love to moderate this. But we are really thrilled to have such an amazing set of powerhouse folks here this evening. Dont you think . [applause] so, in addition to thinking our panelists, i would also like to thank you as our audience, because what it means is that you recognize and support this ongoing work and commitment of these cultural warriors that we have here in our midst. And that we are continuing in the struggle for human rights, economic and educational equality and freedom of speech. The struggle continues. Tonight, i would like to frame the conversation that we have around this sort of issue of education. We have a lot of young people here in audience. How do we relate these issues that are represented in the in the filmmix tape and in the book . If you have not seen the film, it is available on the netflix. In mind, to emphasize the impact of the book and the companion book, and their ability to influence our younger generation. ,ere we are at the new school an institute of higher education, and we are all educators in one way or another. There are maybe three or four generations since this film was documented, so there is a lot of people do not know about. So, i really excited and overwhelmed that this is available and possible to have here today. We are going to watch some scenes from the film too that you will see some parts of the film. My first question to all of our panelists is what pushed you to put yourself on the frontlines of the struggle . Brian, i know that you are younger, so you can tell us last. But kathleen and danny, i would like to hear what was your initial impetus . Kathleen in reality, the i have beeny case, wanting to join the organization in for a while. It was two weeks after stokely had made the call for black power. I met people involved with the black Panther Party commandos involved in the black Power Movement. I ended up moving to california in november of 1967, which is approximately four weeks or five weeks after he would noon was in an altercation and ended up wounded in prison charged with murder, and a policeman dead. And he was facing the gas chamber. The leader of the black Panther Party said it is more important to save hueys life. Then to keep myself on parole. So, he was risking his parole, which meant going back to prison. Healy had already risked his life, bobby field and others were already in jail, so there were about five of us. And we said, we have to get get huey out. It. E said, ok, let us do lets free huey. Glover welcome i did not have to go anywhere. [laughter] and raised in San Francisco, and i remember specifically, the summer of panther was the black party of america, a group that county,ed out of this where i had been attending meetings that summer. It was at a storefront right in the black community in the fillmore area of San Francisco. At the same time, i was about to go back to school and come to San Francisco state, so i was attending San Francisco state as well. There was this large influx of men and women involved in other groups who matriculated out to San Francisco. People like sonia sanchez. Those in the summer of 1966, and those were the kind of things that happened. Fortunately, there was a connection there because they members of the organization. The black Student Union had gained control of the associated to it in budget by spring of 1967, so we started a communications project. Panthertime, the black party took this action in sacramento, and when he was did arrested, everything was drawn to us. So, as a member of the black Student Union, we decided to develop and we began to develop relationship with the black Panther Party. If it was not for that, we would not have gone on strike in a 1968. Theet and decided to form Ethnic Studies Program and the black study . Program. It brought in other people like sissel williams into the party. The two of us did not have classes together, so the party was going through an intense. Cointel and other people getting attacked. We decided to do a mass strike . Also had atually, we few students who were panthers in the black Student Union . Glover thats right come up quite a few students were panthers in the bse of. The blacks that in the black Student Union some of us were pretty committed. Jones as a toddler, i was pretty committed to black power. It was inborn. [laughter] talk,istening to you all im am struck by the enthusiasm have fornergy that you these moments now, still. And i think that theres something about this film and this book that raises for a new generation that has not yet tasted what it feels like to feel like you have collective power. There are five of us, that is just get them out of jail. We do not walk around thinking like that. [applause] we are clapping because should walk around like that, but we dont. But come miami etc. To do anything that i can for myself and for others, to teach about. His movement these questions that were raised about power, can we do things and change things . I watched this film with my father, who was not involved in the movement, but he had no personal connection to any of the people that you are describing. But, the way in which from his experience, he came from the north and went to school in the , brian cometold me at these people kicked in the doors that i walked through. The film humanized people and he was over and over again struck by their intelligence, charisma, the fact that they were saying things that just made so much sense. That is part of why they want to bury the black power tradition and are still after the black power militants and why the question of ringing this history back to life is important, still matters, and is dangerous. So made things happened in oakland and San Francisco at the glover so many things happen in oakland and San Francisco at the time. Met hank johnson in a 1966 when we were going to meetings in the fillmore and they were trying to put some sort of stopgap on redevelopment,orcible removal of their homes and i met hank there. Other people who are part of the black Panther Party were there as well, and of the way in which this was so amazing, and this comes from all the other groups, their organizing capacity. I think what happened to the bsu was that one of the things that we learned and began to cultivate there, it was our organizing ability. Came to thets that black Panther Party, they were part of what was happening at an to state, moment, and was a teacher college. It had ten Tutorial Centers around the city. We would begin to infiltrate those centers. We would always talk about, how do we use that as a platform for mobilizing the Community Around education . So now, we were working with them around the issue of housing, removal, etc. Michelle well, you all already answered my next question. But i have more. I wanted to touch on something that brian said, which is how we on it got to see one side of the movement, in terms of what the media allowed us to see, right . Does a totally different thing, it takes us inside to humanize the people who were part of it. That was something we were talking about behind, in the green room. That is something that we dont get to see too often, and i think that the film does that extremely well. With that in mind, i would like to show clip number one, if we could roll clip one, please . [video clip] and so he is singing about this for the fbi, but it is just song and words. A few years ago i was listening to Stokley Carmichaels speeches while i was prepared for a new record that i was working on. It was shortly after 9 11 in america, and i was making a reservation with Jetblue Airlines to fly to california. When i got to the airport, the fbi, cia, and tsa intercepted me , all of these guys in black suits, and they took me in the back room and started questioning me about this Stokely Carmichael speech that i was listening to. You probably had some kind of. Ug or tap but they were concerned about me listening to a Stokely Carmichael speech from 1967, 40 years ago. Who talk about shooting other people all the time, but the fbis not looking at them. They are looking at me, because im listening to this speech from 40 years ago. The fbi is still scared of this man. He does not have nearly the same influence in our community that he did then. [end clip] so, i was saving that for later. That was not the clip i wanted to show [laughter] because i knew that you are going to respond like you did, but i think it is still pertinent to the point that you are making and why this is so dangerous, why the movement is still considered so dangerous. Rapper todayappe talking about being stopped at the airport because he is listening to a Stokely Carmichael speech from what is 1967. That saying about where we are today . Here . Here can we go from it is like we have gone backwards another 40 years. Jones i think they went to ieeat lengths to put that geno back in the bottle. Whenever theyhem could into the party, and for the rest, it was punishment and incarceration, and that has continued. I was really surprised when i kurss over the highway. I think that they had to put down the black radical movement in part because it inspired so many other movements and parts of what was happening in america trying to model themselves on the panthers and people like Stokley Carmichael. They went to all that x ends and length and involvement to make it happen, and now i feel like ,hey just cant roll that back they cant say sorry, we messed up, we cannot have all those people in prison. Coverage ate media the time of Stokley Carmichaels activity in the black power era was extraordinarily twisted and they tried to make him seem all sorts of things, expose arrests, they wanted to talk about him and even one congressman said, he should be the subject of the rhetoric is retroactivel birth control. The way they try to demonize and tried to isolate the information you could get from stokely or any of us was horrendous. But in sweden come i was quite different. In fact, they were quite curious and they would let cameramen go anywhere and talk to anyone they wanted. Sweden also had a different policy about covering america. They did not follow the u. S. Views of itself or the vietnam war. Media,ld read in their stories of what they called the other america. This is about the Civil Rights Movement, the black Power Movement and this is not about fear, i was about news. That is footage of stokely in sweden. People were going around the world and making it clear what the black movement was about, and it was very exciting and stokely was charming, sexy, and exciting, handsome, and people were attracted to him. That was not allowed here. People who were attracted were cordoned off in one room, and a lot of times they would be all black. So there were perceptions formed in the media which were entirely different. That is what they wanted to perpetuate, hate white people, code that was what it was all about. , this ise people what the fbi wanted to think of these movements were about, so they could justify their abuse. Caner we know this and we see this throughout American History, the controlling of ideas the idea of controlling , our imagination. Imagine this process, a very democratic process. It was in hierarchal process with the black Panther Party and the black Power Movement as well. You had these charismatic figures like this young woman when here, and i remember she came on, she became an iconic figure in that sense in really married to a major xmen for the black Power Movement and was also connected to the black Panther Party. Those are the kind of ideas which are incredible which came from visual ideas. They wanted to control that certainly. They wanted to cut this and sever that. Host a little too visionary . Danny glover yeah, and because they are charismatic, as kathleen was, stokely, or many of the others, or huey himself. The moment you saw huey sitting in that chair, the question as always, as young people even when i was young, when i saw those Young Students from that organization working down there, i wanted to be like them. I was like 14 years old, 15 years old. I wanted to be like then. M. Imagine that you will had he newton, this gorgeous man, people wanted to be like him. You had to suffer that idea. Severhe had testo that idea. Michelle now i would like to try to get to the clip i was looking for before, which on my pages Stokley Carmichael. Can we try that one again . Yeah . Hm, it got out of order somehow. That is the one you just played. Maybe you didnt play the whole thing . Perhaps . Where is anthony . This is it. Call president johnson on the telephone trying to get hold of dr. Martin luther king but they said he was in there oil from theo rockefeller, couldnt get no diamonds from his mind. If i would enjoy the american no, so i said, burn, baby, burn this is for the fbi. That is the hotline. [laughter] this is like, man, nothing is wasted. Everything takes a different form. What form will you take when you die . The next thing was when he was burning the flame, and he said, this is for the fbi. Andas maybe a fiery speaker he had passion and ideas, but he was a calm, cool, collected person. These were just words, it was just song and words. A few years ago, i was listening to the Stokely Carmichael speeches while i was prepared for any record that i was working on. It was shortly after 9 11 and i was making a reservation on Jetblue Airlines to fly to california. When i got to the airport, the fbi, cia, and tsa intercepted me and took me in a back room and started questioning me about this Stokely Carmichaels speech that i was listening to. They probably had some sort of bug or tap or something, but they were very concerned with me listening to this Stokley Carmichael from 1967, 40 years ago. Rappers,angster rappers who talk about shooting people and killing. But the fbi is not looking for them. They are looking at me because im listening to the speech from 40 years ago, and it shows you the power of those words. It is that they resonate even until now. The fbi is still scared of this man. He doesnt have the same influence over our community he did then. [end clip] michelle so you got to see it twice, it was so good. [laughter] talk about int to reference to that clip is this sort of behind the scenes look at the leaders of the movement. I never saw this kind of footage before. What was it about these the young swedish filmmakers, journalists, which allowed them this kind of access, and why would they look for that . Because they could do what they wanted. They were not told by their editors do this, do that. I saw footage in the film that completely blew my mind. I do not even remember swedish tv particularly, but in all to area, algeria first they showed images of the building where we were. No one in america has ever seen the building of the International BlackPanther Party, other than one picture in york times magazine. One magazine in 19 17, december 1. That is the only picture i have ever seen. You cannot turn on the tv and hear some of what our leaders are saying, but in this film you hear one of them saying, yes, we want to reach the level of the vietnamese and make our provisional revolutionary government, but we have not gotten to it. Can you imagine . Fbi would not allow because the United States is at war. That is part of it, the politics of war, anticommunism, and the insanely psychotic level of white supremacist madness we were being subjected to. And apparently they thought that it did not affect us. That we were not responsive. With whitego along supremacy, and facts, which challenged it very openly and condemned it and made fun of it. We had a whole movement around the country and around the world repudiating it. So this is probably in the context of the vietnam war, of being disrespected, the name cigar called, etc. It might have had something to do with how they responded to this, but it also intimidates the press and the people. They are afraid. They are afraid to know this information. Glover and another part of the black Power Movement was that it internationalized, the struggle here of africanamericans, the collaborations with the in vietnam, algeria. This is right after the algerian liberation, and also connected with the african liberation to support groups within the, on on the continent whether it was anc, it in some sense had an enormous power and resonated with people. So now the Civil Rights Movement for all intents and purpose was an internal struggle in the United States, dealing with racism, White Supremacy. Now we begin to ponder the question of a system of capitalism. All those began to frame the discourse. So you are making alliances in algeria, connecting to vietnam and other movements aro