Black Panthers White Lies | Curtis Austin | TEDxOhioStateUniversity

Transcriber: Brandon Muschlitz Reviewer: Denise RQ Good afternoon. I have been known for many things throughout my life. I have been known as a son, brother, husband, educator. But in 2008 I became known as a criminal. And I became known as a criminal through a very curious series of circumstances. At the time I was teaching at a university in Mississippi, teaching History of the Civil Rights Movement, and I needed a car. So, I did what most people would do. I went online and found a car. This car I found was in Des Moines, Iowa. So I was going to fly to Des Moines and drive the car back.

A few weeks before that, I had a book signing and I actually ran out of books at that book signing, but people wanted the books, so they gave me cash, wrote me checks, and said, "Next time Yes." You come through town, bring the books with you." And I said, "Okay." I would do that. I knew that when I drove this car back from Iowa, I would have to pass through this town, so I took the books with me. I packed my things, went to the airport, checked in, and went through security. And then I hear my name over the intercom. "Curtis Austin, come back to the check-in desk." And so I do it.

I return to the check-in counter and there is a group of airport police and TSA agents surrounding my bag, hovering over it. And they have these books and they're looking at these books. And the book has this photo on the cover. It's a book about the Black Panther Party. And they are bewildered. They're baffled, you know? They have this

black

man, he has a one-way ticket to Iowa, no clothes, no toiletries and all these books. And then they said, "Well, we're going to have to call the FBI." I said, "Wow! The FBI? Why?" He says, "Well, that's what we do in situations like this." And that's what they did.

They called the FBI. And the FBI came to the airport. TSA and airport security escorted me upstairs, put me in a room, and an FBI agent came into the room and started questioning me, but he had this book. He was reading this book and then he was asking me questions, he was looking at the book and he was asking me more questions, and this interrogation lasted for hours. And I finally got up the courage to say, "Am I under arrest?" And he said, "No, we're just asking questions here." And I said, "Well, does that mean I can leave?" And he said, "Yes, you can go." So that's what I did.

I left. I found another flight. I went to Des Moines. I bought the car, drove it back, dropped off the books, and went back to work. I didn't think much more about it. I mean, I thought it was strange, but I grew up

black

in Mississippi and you get used to strangeness. (Laughs) And I don't think about it anymore until one day I talk to my boss and she says, "Curtis, we have a problem." And I said, "Okay, what kind of problem do we have?" She said, "Well, I have realized that you are a criminal and we cannot allow criminals to teach at the University." A criminal?!

Wait a minute. This is a classic WTF moment for me, right? (laughs) I don't know what's going on and neither does she, but she says, "I think you should call the FBI." That's what I do. I call the FBI, I tell them who I am and why I'm calling, they look me up in their system and the woman I'm talking to says, "Yeah, it says you're a criminal." I said, "Well, what did I do?" She said, "I don't know." I said, "When did I do it?" She said, "I don't know." I said, "Where did I do it?" She said, "I don't know.

In fact, I don't have any more information. Maybe if you call the U.S. Attorney's office, they can give you more information. She gave me the number for the U.S. Attorney's office. I called them. They looked me up in their system and the person I spoke to said, "Yes, it says here that you're a criminal." And I asked the same set of questions and got the exact same set of answers, "I literally don't know." over two years to remove this felony from my record. I came to understand that the felony was on my record because I had written a book about the Black Panther Party.

You may be familiar with the Black Panther Party. They are not, it was an organization that began in 1966 in Oakland, California, as an effort to prevent police brutality and the murder of black people, a number of other issues affecting the black community, such as health care, housing. , full employment and justice in the courts. They wanted blacks to be tried by juries of their peers because up to that point they were all being tried by

white

s. As they organized around these issues, the press vilified them, demonized them, and told

lies

about them. In fact, one of the

lies

is that it was this group of black men who wanted to go out and kill

white

people.

That's what they were about. Could not be farther from the truth. The fact of the matter is that in the Black Panther Party, the majority of people in the Black Panther Party were not men, they were women. And a few years after her party started, most of the leaders of the Black Panther Party were women. So it just wasn't true that there was this group of black men going around killing white people. Another lie that has been told about this organization is that it was racist and anti-white, and they simply didn't like white people at all.

Well, that's not true either, and I'll prove it to you. The Panthers would find out what the problems were in their communities and try to solve them. For example, they realized that children were not learning in school and that they were not learning because they were hungry. So they decided to feed the children. They were going to feed them before school, so they created these free breakfast programs. And the way they created these programs was to go to grocery stores in their communities, ask the store owners if they would donate milk, bread, eggs, meat, cereal and other things that people eat for breakfast, and these The store owners said yes and donated these items.

All over the country, in every city where there was a chapter of the Black Panther Party, and there were about 40, there was a free breakfast program. It is not likely that these white businessmen would donate to the Black Panther Party if they were truly racist. Another thing they did in the community to serve the people was create free health clinics. Once again, they went around and discovered that there were a variety of health problems that needed to be addressed. Black people were quite poor, so they couldn't afford to go to doctors or go to hospitals. So the Panthers went to hospitals and medical schools and asked doctors and medical students if they would come to the black community and treat some of these medical problems.

Overwhelmingly they said yes. Again, across the country, in cities where the Black Panther Party established chapters, there were free health clinics; although they were run by the Black Panther Party, they were populated by white people, so I don't know how they could be racist and anti-white if their signature programs were actually supported by fairly wealthy and often middle-class white people. . One of the people who was very, very good at bringing individuals, white and otherwise, into the orbit of the Black Panther Party, was a guy named Fred Hampton. Fred Hampton was the leader of the Chicago Chapter of the Black Panther Party.

He was a very eloquent speaker. He was very persuasive. Fred Hampton could persuade people that there was real injustice. More importantly, he could persuade people that they should do something to combat that injustice. So in addition to going to these hospitals and grocery stores and getting the things they needed for their programs, Fred Hampton also worked with other groups and organizations that were Latino, Asian, Native American, and even large groups of poor whites who had moved . from the south or towards Chicago from the Appalachians. They would work with these organizations and establish the same type of programs in their communities.

They were very successful at this, but the government didn't like what they were doing, so in addition to vilifying and discrediting them in the press, they began arresting their members and in very extreme cases, killing them. And that's exactly what happened to Fred Hampton. On December 4, 1969, the Chicago Police Department, the Illinois State Attorney's Office, burst into Fred Hampton's apartment at 4:30 in the morning, while he and everyone else was sleeping, and began to spray the place with bullets. He injured several people. There was a person guarding the door named Mark Clark. He was shot straight through the heart and he died immediately.

They go through the house to Fred Hampton's bedroom, they find him there, he is asleep, because he has been drugged, but he is asleep next to his girlfriend who is eight and a half months pregnant, they grab Fred Hampton by the hair and shoot him. in the back of the head at point-blank range twice, killing him instantly. That's the end of Fred Hampton. So we have to ask ourselves, what is it about this organization that provokes such an irrational, exaggerated and extreme response, that 40 years after the death of the organization, a humble professor like me can be detained at an airport, detained for hours, interrogated and then labeled a criminal simply for writing a book about the organization?

Why does Fred Hampton have to pay with his life simply for organizing around issues, that everyone...there's nothing wrong with feeding children and caring for the sick? There is nothing wrong with not wanting to be killed by the police. So we have to ask ourselves, what does this organization have? And I'll tell you. The thing about this organization is that it was actually anti-racist and set out to work with all people, whether they were middle and upper class whites, lower class whites, Asians, Latinos, and Native Americans. Anyone who wanted to help solve these problems, this organization was willing to work with them, and that was the problem.

If this interracial organization were not effective, people would not have been so against it. So it wasn't just Fred Hampton who had to pay. It wasn't just me who had to pay for being labeled a criminal. You probably saw this a few weeks ago. Beyonce performed at the Super Bowl, at the halftime show, and she and the women who danced with her were dressed in these black leather outfits, these black berets, and they were dressed that way to pay homage to the Black Panther Party. 2016 marks the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Black Panther Party and they were trying to honor this community service organization.

But what they got in return was a ton of hate mail. People all over the country say he's racist and anti-white, that he hates cops. Police officers have said they do not want to give him the security he needs at his concerts. The mayors have said that they do not want her in her city. Beyoncé is racist. Beyoncé. I mean, spicy maybe? But not racist. (Laughter) So we have to keep asking ourselves why we are told these stories about the Black Panther Party and who benefits from us knowing these lies. I want to encourage you to do your own research on the party, but be careful when you do your research because I have been studying this topic for 25 years and what I have discovered is that 73% of all newspaper articles written about the Black Panther Party were written by the FBI or by people the FBI recruited.

So there is all this villainy and misinformation. And we talked about Fred Hampton a second ago, and I just want to tell you that the family of Fred Hampton and Mark Clark actually sued the city of Chicago, the State Attorney's Office, a jury found them guilty and they paid them almost two million of dollars. . But that doesn't bring Fred back, and that doesn't stop the villainy. We have to discover the truth about this organization for ourselves and I encourage you to do so. I also encourage him to question his own biases about what he knows about American history.

And finally, I want to encourage you to reach across racial and ethnic lines and do your part to solve the problems facing our country today, because Black people cannot solve these problems alone. White people cannot solve them alone. Latinos cannot solve them alone. Unless we all come together as a people and solve these problems, they will never be solved. That's why I tell you: power to the people. (Applause)