RADICAL POCS ORGANIZING NW BLACK AUGUST?

I am interested in helping to organize an event for Black August. Please contact me if you are also interested in doing so.

George Jackson counseled: "Settle your quarrels, come together, understand the reality of our situation, understand that fascism is already here, that people are already dying who could be saved, that generations more will live poor butchered half-lives if you fail to act. Do what must be done, discover your humanity and your love in revolution" — Blood In My Eye

Article below is from www.prisonactivist.org 2001. For updated article go to:

 http://www.blackcommentator.com/284/284_black_august_2008_nyasha_guest.html
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Black August: A Story of African Freedom Fighters
By Kiilu Nyasha

Black August is a month of great significance for Africans throughout the diaspora, but particularly here in the U.S. where it originated. "August," as Mumia Abu-Jamal noted, "is a month of meaning, of repression and radical resistance, of injustice and divine justice; of repression and righteous rebellion; of individual and collective efforts to free the slaves and break the chains that bind us."

This is the 22nd anniversary of Black August, first organized to honor our fallen freedom fighters, Jonathan and George Jackson, Khatari Gaulden, James McClain, William Christmas, and the sole survivor of the August 7, 1970 Courthouse Slave Rebellion, Ruchell Cinque Magee. It is still a time to embrace the principles of unity, self-sacrifice, political education, physical fitness and/or training in martial arts, resistance, and spiritual renewal. The concept, Black August, grew out of the need to expose to the light of day the glorious and heroic deeds of those Afrikan women and men who recognized and struggled against the injustices heaped upon people of color on a daily basis in America.

One cannot tell the story of Black August without first providing the reader with a brief glimpse of the "Black Movement" behind California prison walls in the Sixties, led by George Jackson, W. L. Nolen, Hugo Pinell, Warren Wells, Kumasi (Steve Simmons), and others.

As Jackson wrote:

"... when I was accused of robbing a gas station of $70, I accepted a deal ... but when time came for sentencing, they tossed me into the penitentiary with one to life. It was 1960. I was 18 years old... I met Marx, Lenin, Trotsky, Engels, and Mao when I entered prison and they redeemed me. For the first four years I studied nothing but economics and military ideas. I met black guerrillas, George 'Big Jake' Lewis, and James Carr, W.L. Nolen, Bill Christmas, Tony Gibson, and many, many others.

" We attempted to transform the Black criminal mentality into a black revolutionary mentality. As a result, each of us has been subject to years of the most vicious reactionary violence by the state. Our mortality rate is almost what you would expect to find in a history of Dachau. Three of us [Nolen, Sweet Jugs Miller, and Cleve Edwards] were murdered several months ago [Jan. 13, 1969] by a pig shooting from thirty feet above their heads with a military rifle."
— Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson)

When the brothers first demanded the killer guard be tried for murder, they were rebuffed. Upon their insistence, the administration held a kangaroo court and three days later returned a verdict of "justifiable homicide." Shortly afterward, a white guard was found beaten to death and thrown from a tier. Six days later, three prisoners were accused of murder, and became known as The Soledad Brothers. "I am being tried in court right now with two other brothers. John Clutchette and Fleeta Drumgo, for the alleged slaying of a prison guard. This charge carries an automatic death penalty for me. I can't get life. I already have it."

"Dialectical materialism is my bag. I identify with anyone who hates just one fascist. I don't want a piece of the pie, I don't want all of it even. I think it's rotten, should be discarded, we should start all over again. This new start should be made without individualism (read isolation) ..."

"I still think of myself as a black and an African but I can't be satisfied with myself until I am communist man, revolutionary man, and this without feeling that I've denied myself, or failed to identify."

"The black bourgeoisie (pseudo-bourgeoisie), the right reverends, the militant opportunists, have left us in a quandary, rendered us impotent. How ridiculous we must seem to the rest of the black world when we beg the government to investigate their own protective agencies. Aren't the wild hip-shooting pigs loose among us to protect the property rights of the people who formed the government?"

"The theory that all whites are the immediate enemy and all blacks our brothers (making them loyal) is silly and indicative of a lazy mind (to be generous, since it could be a fascist plot)."

"We belong among the righteous of the world. We are the most powerful. We are in the best position to do the people's work. To win will involve taking a chance,crawling on the belly, naming, numbering, infiltrating, giving up meaningless small comforts, readjusting some values. My life means absolutely nothing without positive control over the factors that determine its quality."
— Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson

Anniversary of the Death of George L. Jackson

On August 21, 1971, after numerous failed attempts on his life, the State finally succeeded in assassinating Jackson, then Field Marshall of the Black Panther Party, in what was described by prison officials as an escape attempt in which Jackson allegedly smuggled a gun into San Quentin in a wig. That feat was proven impossible, and evidence subsequently uncovered indicated a set-up orchestrated by prison officials to eliminate Jackson once and for all. Of course, I doubt they counted on losing any of their own in the process.

On that fateful day, three notoriously racist prison guards and two inmate turnkeys were also killed. Subsequently, six prisoners were singled out and put on trial — wearing 30 lbs. of chains in Marin courthouse — for various charges of murder and assault: Fleeta Drumgo, David Johnson, Hugo L.A. Pinell (Yogi), Luis Talamantez, Johnny Spain, and Willie Sundiata Tate, who became known as the San Quentin Six. Only one was convicted of murder, Johnny Spain. The others were either acquitted or convicted of assault. Pinell is the only one remaining in prison and has suffered prolonged torture in lockups since 1969. He is currently serving his 11th year in Pelican Bay's SHU, a torture chamber if ever there was one. A true warrior, Pinell never hesitated to put his life on the line to defend his fellow captives.

As decades passed, our Black scholars, like Mumia Abu-Jamal, learned of other liberation moves that happened in Black August. E.g., the first and only armed revolution whereby Africans freed themselves from chattel slavery commenced on August 21, 1791 in Haiti. Nat Turner's slave rebellion began on August 21, 1831 (coincidence?), and Harriet Tubman's Underground Railroad started in August. As Mumia stated, "Their sacrifice, their despair, their determination and their blood has painted the month Black for all time."

On August 17, 1995, Mumia was scheduled to be executed in Pennsylvania. But hundreds of his supporters, myself included, were able to celebrate his stay of execution on that date in Philadelphia shortly after the '95 PCRA (post conviction relief appeal) hearings were held in State Court. This August 17, 2001 thousands [gathered] in Philadelphia to stand with our beloved freedom fighter, our "voice of the voiceless." ...

George Jackson counseled:

"Settle your quarrels, come together, understand the reality of our situation, understand that fascism is already here, that people are already dying who could be saved, that generations more will live poor butchered half-lives if you fail to act. Do what must be done, discover your humanity and your love in revolution" — Blood In My Eye

The article above was written for the San Francisco Bay View newspaper. You can access the Bay View at www.sfbayview.com. But there's a photo spread that might only be available in the newspaper itself. Feel free to distribute widely in keeping with.......   "Each one teach one."

— Kiilu Nyasha,  kiilu1@mindspring.com