PNFPNF@aol.com wrote:
>
> As for the Black Panthers, I met someone working as a driver, a couple
> years ago, in the East Bay who reminisced on his time working in Oakland with
> the BP doing aterschool care; there was also that aspect of the Party.
> Personally, I remember Bobby Seale's friendliness and frankness when he'd
> come to the PFP office when I'd be working there; generalizations about the
> Panthers as "criminals" or whatever seem not only rightwing but silly, even
> now.
> Paula
It is public record that COUNTRY JOE AND THE FISH dedicated their TOGETHER LP to
the memory of Bobby Hutton the young Oakland teenager who was killed by Oakland
Police for being a Black Panther. i remember well walking up the steps of the
Black Panther house in Berkeley back in the 60's with a thousand dollar check
for their "breakfast program" for school kids. i am proud of doing that.
Revolutionary work has its My Lai's because "war is hell". The big difference in
the so called 60's generation (and any generation for that matter) is between
those who do something and those who do nothing. I remember well the atmosphere
of the American War in Vietnam and grew up with the realities of segregation and
racial hatred it was a living hell! Some of us did what we thought was best,
some of us did nothing but watch and wait.
I personally feel that the existence of the Black Panthers empowered black
Americans in a very important way. Most people are reluctant to admit that the
Viet Cong and the National Liberation Front and even the North Vietnamese Army
committed "war crimes", but isn't all war a crime and aren't we all prisoners of
war, declared and undeclared. Blaming soldiers for war is like blaming fire
fighters for fire. And blaming the Black Panthers for crimes as they struggled
for the simplest of American rights and freedoms is silly.
cheers, country joe mcdonald
-- "Ira Furor Brevis Est " - Anger is a brief madness
country joe Home Pg <http://www.countryjoe.com>
country joe's tribute to Florence Nightingale
<http://www.countryjoe.com/nightingale>
Berkeley Vietnam Veterans Memorial <http://www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/Links/Comm/vvm>
Rag Baby Online Magazine <http://www.ragbaby.com/magazine>
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