New Black Panther Party Holds Strategy Summit
On Saturday, Oct. 13, about 100 New Black Panther Party members from all over the country gathered at a Holiday Inn in downtown Atlanta for the National Black Power Summit, co-billed as 鈥淭he Attack on Black America.鈥�
, the NBPP national chairman, gave a scalding keynote address in which he noted defiantly 鈥渙ur rise is co-dependent on the white man鈥檚 demise.鈥�
鈥淲ho do I mean when I say, 鈥榯he white man鈥�?鈥� asked Shabazz, pacing back and forth in a small ballroom. 鈥淲ell, I mean the goddamn white man.鈥�
Shabazz assembled with his black-bereted and 鈥揵ooted soldiers to strategize ways for his black separatist group to capitalize on the highly publicized Jena 6 case and subsequent rash of racially charged incidents involving hangman鈥檚 nooses. Such overt signs of white racism are just cause for black Americans to become militant, Shabazz said. He discouraged the idea of black people 鈥渨aiting鈥� for racial tensions to ease, saying 鈥渢hat sounds like f----- talk, and I hate f----- talk.鈥�
The NBPP discussed plans to hold a Nov. 3 rally in Charleston, West Virginia, to protest the rape and torture of Megan Williams, a black woman who was brutalized by six whites. Shabazz heralded the presence of the NBPP in Jena, Louisiana, at the massive Sept. 20 protest march, despite reports that NBPP speakers were when they advocated violence.
Black Power Summits have been held intermittently since the 1970s, including one bizarrely featuring KKK and neo-Nazi leader Tom Metzger. No white supremacist leaders spoke at this year鈥檚 event, where Shabazz鈥檚 speech was partially drowned out by the music from an African-American family鈥檚 wedding reception in the ballroom next door.
