Читать книгу We Want Freedom - Mumia Abu-Jamal - Страница 11

Reflections

introduction to a new, revised edition

Many years ago, before I wrote my first book (Live from Death Row), I was in a lively discussion with a friend of mine. His name is Terry, Terry Bisson. He’s a well-known writer of sci-fi, a genre that I love, and we were talking about something we both loved: books. He’s actually quite a shy guy (amazingly, many writers are shy. I should know. I’m one of them!), but he confided in me, “This is my third book, and I’m quite proud of it.”

“Which one are you proudest of, Terry?” I asked.

“That’s hard, Mu. It’s kinda like saying who’s your favorite child. How can you do that?”

“I understand, but I wonder how it feels to write a book and let it go into the world. What if it bombs?”

“I look at my books the way a bird looks at her chicks: some soar, some stagger, and some fall to the ground. They’re all yer babies! But you can do the best you can when you write ’em—then, you let go. They soar—or fall.” From that conversation, I learned that every book has its own destiny.

That conversation arose out of the depths of consciousness when I learned that the book you’re holding—We Want Freedom—was being republished. I felt the flush of joy that this work infused with boyish wonder and political toil and terror was being reborn; cast again, upon the winds of fate.

We Want Freedom’s republication comes at a time that can only be considered serendipitous: the era of mass Black (and multi-toned) outrage at the brutality of the State. Ferguson was smoldering. Then Cleveland. Staten Island. The Bronx. Chicago. Baton Rouge. Falcon Heights. I thought of sisters and brothers now gone from us; soldiers of the Black Revolution, like Zayd Malik Shakur; Safiya Bukhari; Geronimo ji-Jaga; Dr. Huey P. Newton; Fred Hampton … and the list goes on. How would they have interpreted—and responded to—this “new” age of protest to attacks on Black life? They would have perhaps started by pointing out how old this legacy of protest and resistance is.

I missed them all—my lost friends and comrades—yet felt uplifted by the young sisters (yes—mostly sisters) emerging as leaders of this new movement. Their cry—that Black Lives Matter has a historic resonance that anyone with ears and memory can’t help but hear.

The drums. The drumbeats of protest; the calls to angry, seething masses to stand up against this profound indignity. It harkened back to the brief window of Occupy, reflected the Spanish indignados, yes. But it’s boldness gave breath to that which so many in power hoped—wished—had become moribund—the Black Panther Party.

We Want Freedom argues, and hopefully demonstrates, that Black rebellion has deep roots in American soil; its seeds have sprouted across the centuries. As we will see the Black Panther Party emerged from this long history of struggle for Black liberation. History repeats itself in wild, wonderful, and unpredictable ways. Black Lives Matter also belongs to this tradition. We can see some parallels between the founding and message of both organizations. For the Black Panther Party the observation and filming of the police was an early tactic and the unjustified killing of a black man by police gave a focal point to the anger born of years of injustice. We Are Michael Brown and We Are Denzil Dowell. From the streets of Oakland the news of the police murder of a black man spread via the first issue of the Black Panther newspaper—the social media of the day—and of course by people getting together and out in the streets. Both movements made the “controversial” statement—this murder is not acceptable and the insistence on the personhood of Black people was grounded in a movement for social change. Both movements were founded and led by young people and you better believe that the politics and strategies of both movements pissed people off … royally. The Black Panther Party located their message in a strong organization, a clear critique of the existing structure, and a demand for change. It is my hope that Black Lives Matter, which has the luxury of looking at the history of the Black Panther Party, will continue to develop their critique and program.

But history, properly understood, is often a cycle where social forces battle for supremacy positing contradiction against contradiction. Sometimes resistance surfaces where it is least expected and popular culture provides a window into a hidden social reality—causing shock, consternation, and delight!

Consider a recent phone call between me and a sista-friend.

“Did you see it? Did you see IT?” she squealed with excitement when picking up the phone.

“See what?” I replied startled.

“Did you see Beyoncé perform at the Super Bowl? She slayed it! She murdered it!?”

“Whachu talkin’ ’bout, girl? What did she do?”

“You didn’t see it?”

“I ain’t see nuthin’— I ain’t get my property yet.”

“Oh My God, Mu— She did a halftime tribute to Malcolm X—and the Black Panthers!” she screamed.

“You shittin’ me, girl!—Beyoncé did that?”

“Yuuuup— and they slayed it— it was for her new song, ‘Formation.’ She performed surrounded by somethin’ like 30 sistas wearing black berets, leather, everything! It was amazing!”

I was speechless. I stuttered.

Her excitement was infectious, and as I saw it through her eyes, I saw something beautiful—and yes, “amazing.”

“The cops are furious,” she added with a chuckle. This triggered my own deep, belly laugh.

“Wow,” I exclaimed. “I didn’t see that coming. It sounds wonderful!” Something like this doesn’t happen every day. It was a marker of how far the campaign against the police murder of Black people had come.

I thought back to the days of the late RnB and funk superstar James Brown. When he and his band released “Say It Loud—I’m Black and I’m Proud!,” it went off like dynamite—cultural dynamite. It exploded—in ears, in minds, in hearts—across America and throughout the Black world.

Beyoncé’s timing, coming as it did during the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, means something. It may be a sign that the spark of emergent consciousness has started a fire.

The timing for the reemergence of We Want Freedom therefore, couldn’t be better. Its republication both feeds and is fed by current struggles; it can add fuel to this new, bold, youth movement.

Movements—real social movements—always piss people off for they demand that which millions dread: change.

In the latter half of the nineteenth century abolitionists were shunned and denounced as crazy, as those who question the status quo always are. “How dare they call for the end of slavery!” people harrumphed. Before the war their demands seemed inconceivable to many—the enslavement of Black people was such a prominent feature of the US that even those without a direct property relationship could not imagine another world. But after the Civil War it seemed that abolitionists were everywhere—everybody was one.

Because we look at history from our own historical perspective, Lincoln, who spoke often and openly about his distaste for abolitionists, is today perceived as one!

Today, Black Lives Matter is raising quite the ruckus. If they prevail as a social movement they will become the reasonable ones. Reasonable as in, “of course Black lives matter!” who would even dare question such a thing? This is because social movements transform consciousness. They change minds. They change history.

In a white supremacist society the very notion that Black lives matter is a revolutionary idea; for America was constructed (by slave labor, I might add) based upon the idea that Black lives don’t matter. That has been the official policy of the nation-state on this continent since the 1600s at least.

In this sense, Black Lives Matter is tearing up old things—notions, ideas, beliefs, and, yes, history, to resurrect the long, arduous and tortuous Black Freedom struggle.

They have read of the Black Panther Party (and the Black Liberation Army), and recognize themselves as part of a Black radical continuum. That is their strength.

Yet, as we have suggested, “history repeats itself,” and this repetition takes both positive and negative forms.

The state is using COINTELPRO-type tactics to disrupt, misdirect, and ultimately destroy this latest incarnation of the will of the Ancestors. They will stop at nothing to prevail in retarding the Black freedom struggle. The words written in this text have documented these efforts with care and detail. It behooves Black Lives Matter activists to know what happened in the past, so as to see and sense what is happening today.

The state, said Marx and Engels, is but the executive committee of the ruling class. It exists to stabilize social relations and maintain positions of profound inequality. It is the task of social movements to transform such relations—to change them—to bring forth new ways of seeing, being, and living in islands of freedom. No one said it would be easy. But, surprisingly, it can be fun! Let this be one of We Want Freedom’s many lessons. To learn, to grow, to create new social relations can be exciting—and fun.

When James Brown and his band took to the airwaves singing “Say It Loud: I’m Black and I’m Proud!” children began singing it in the streets, it began being played in the bars and beauty shops, apartments blared it out of their windows into the summer streets. It pushed a new way of thinking into creation, and changed culture and music for millions. Just as James Brown continued to provide a soundtrack for the struggle, Beyoncé has continued to raise the issue of the murder of Black people through her videos and statements even as questions about whether she is supporting or appropriating the movement and queer and trans culture have been posed.

The reemergence of We Went Freedom, over a decade after its birth, is a sign of the hunger among the young to examine and learn lessons at risk of being lost through the dim window glass of history. It is, after all, their history; not mine. No Panther ever thought that the Party existed for us; it existed because the People demanded we come into existence and fight the fights that needed to be fought.

I have received many letters from readers of We Went Freedom over the years. One that sticks in my mind today was from Jon, a young man who read WWF in college. He wrote, “I feel cheated because this is the first time I have heard such stories. … Your words, your insights have made me and my colleagues question society and the state.” Jon concluded by thanking me for my work and I’m happy to take this opportunity to thank him for reading We Want Freedom.

I also thank Common Notions for reaching out to me and bringing this book to the next generation. It thrills any writer to know that their work is appreciated and is still being read and I am no different in that regard.

I truly believe that there is much to be learned from the experiences lived by many in the Black Panther Party. I hope our struggles—past, present, and future—prove that the Party did not exist in vain, but made valuable, and sometimes noble contributions. I hope We Want Freedom has made, and will continue to make, a contribution to this process. For it was written precisely for times such as these.

May these pages become nourishing, enriching food for the revolution(s) to come.

Mumia Abu-Jamal

“Life Row”

Writing from the windy hills of northeastern Pennsylvania

SCI–Mahanoy, Frackville, PA

Summer 2016