Transcripts For CSPAN3 Black Panther Feminists 20160227

Which is why we are event a couple of thank you before we get started. The black History Month committee and the life of student affairs, the dean, and as always the staff and make these event possible. Thank you. [applause] so let me introduce our wonderful speakers this evening. Salamishah tillet is an associate professor of english and African Studies at a faculty member of the center for gender sexuality and women studies of university of pennsylvania. She has a phd in the history of american civilizations, and english, from harvard, and any mat from brown. She received a ba in english and africanamerican studies. Her most recent book, by Duke University press, examines how contemporary African American artists, writers, and intellectuals remember antebellum slavery within the postcivil rights america to challenge ongoing exclusion of africanamerican citizens for a model of racial democratic future. In 2010, she did a special issue of ethiopia. Her work has appeared in many different outlets, including American Literary history, american quarterly, novel, research and african lurkers african literatures, and many others. She is currently working on a book on the civil rights icon, nina simone. She is also the cofounder of a long walk home, a Nonprofit Organization uses art in the fight against violence against girls and women. Thank you, and welcome. [applause] our other guest of honor this evening is who also elevates us with her presence tonight, is lynn french. She was a member of the black Panther Party from 1969 until 1973, working chicago, oakland, berkeley. In the party, and how nice to be able to say stuff like this in the party, she worked in a variety of areas, including newspaper circulation, labor, finance, Breakfast Programs, food and clothing giveaways. She walked picket line during the boycott in oakland and was instrumental in starting Childcare Centers in berkeley and chicago. After leaving the party, french lived and worked in cambridge, mass from 73 until 76, where she cofounded and coadministered International Day care centers. During those years, she was employed as the Cambridge Somerville Community Representative for the Massachusetts Office for children. Since graduating law school in 1979, french has worked in Community Development and housing policy and washington, d. C. , working on a Global Alternatives to gentrification. You should know, we care a lot about. She worked at the council of the District Of Columbia until 1997, the permanent housing and Community Development as Program Development administer any senior policy advisor for homeless and specialneeds housing in the executive office of the mayor and washington, d. C. She now serves as executive director of hope and home, a transitional housing program. She also works with tenant groups and nonprofits seeking to develop affordable housing. Welcome. [applause] ms. Tillet i want to thank you for joining us this evening, and thank you for host, especially becky who sent an email this fall, inviting us in encouraging us to attend. By launching black History Month here. We are honored. To be here and be in the presence of all of you. In the room and in the world, and the cyber world. Were going to do an interview conversation format, primarily because lynn knows so much, but also esther experience and also because her experience and expertise is so broad. We want to continue the conversation about women in the black Panther Party that sparked for me with stanley nelsons documentary, and inspired the piece i wrote in the New York Times, about the party as a feminist space. And what that means. Do you want to say anything before we jump in . Ms. French no, go ahead. Ms. Tillet what is the story, how did you join the Panther Party, what drew you to the panthers of chicago . Ms. French i dont know if its a straightforward story. When i graduated from high school in 1963, the world was so different from the way it is now. And the only options out there for africanamerican women seemingly were either you clean someones house, you became a schoolteacher, or you married someone who betake your who would take care of you. None of those options in Body Division i had for myself and my life. I have to say, as an aside, i come from a long line of women who knew themselves and spoke their minds. I worked little with sncc. I was a little younger than sncc people. I joined in 1968, i was living in chicago, illinois. I was a student, i met bobby rush and fred hampton when they were organizing the illinois chapter. It was the First Organization that i had been in that, in the first place, i saw the same we have a vision for our selves and our world and we arent asking for permission to be these people or to envision this world. This is a world want to build. We want to have our own agency, to live our lives the way we feel we should love them, rather than having someone giving you permission to come to the restaurant or permission to come to the theater. We wanted to assert ourselves. I saw it was within the party, women had equal status to men. It didnt even occur to me that this was a feminist action, but just that we were asserting ourselves to build a world that we thought would be the world we wanted to pass on to our children. To me, its all part and parcel for the same thing. Ms. Tillet one of the thing that was interesting, and in doing the research, the fact that the other party by the time the Panther Party, by the time you joined in 1968, was over two thirds women. It struck me as both amazing on one hand, but also, there is a sense that these women werent the rankandfile. The dominant images that we still have our africanamerican men, with leather jackets and berets. I wonder what do you think causes the disparity between the reality, as you all lived it, and are imagination and memory of the time. Ms. French in the first place, i really believe all if not most most if not all of the women who joined the black Panther Party were leaders. They had the same vision of building a world. I think there are a couple of things with the image that was drawn. We were considered a huge threat to the United States, to the status quo. And so the image that was reflected in the newspapers, if you look through the newspapers of that era, just show us as this broad brush of some black men with guns who, if you dont watch out, theyre going to wipe us out. They never looked at us with any depth or saw any complexity, what have you. Thats never how we saw ourselves. If you look through our black panther newspaper, we are very positively displayed, in the art and the articles. I think its more and then, because the whole history with the fbi and J Edgar Hoover calling us the number one threat to security in america, we were then what isis is considered now. We were not going around bombing people, we were just try to assert ourselves and build world. Because they were chauvinistic, they just thought it was coming from men. They arrested a whole lot of the guys. And the women went unnoticed in a lot of ways. They didnt see us with any complexity. I was arrested, dont get me wrong. [laughter] ms. French but they saw as a black male thing. I think thats a repeating pattern ever since africanamericans have been in this country. Whether with slaves or during the great migration, or the contemporary times that black men, within the imagination of mainstream American Culture are seen as a threat. In which is pretty curious, i a think it says more about them that it does about us. Ms. Tillet i listened to a conversation that you did a few years ago, when you talked about the Panther Party being the most progressive place to be as a woman, in the late 1960s. You touched on that a little. I think it was striking a lot of people is unusual or new or curious, in the sense of we dont think about black nationalism in the black Panther Party as a place of progressive gender politics. And even by the early 1970s, even a place in which newton is writing a piece about gay and lesbians are people being part of the movement and ending homophobia. Theres another thing about the myths of the Panther Party dominated, it was highly sexist. Ms. French thats why we were the vanguard. Thats why the name of the movie is black Panther Party, vanguard of the revolution. We were the advanced fight. The party evolved from the black power movement. 1965, when that phrase was used, it jumped out there quickly and a lot of African Americans my age were more pulled the black power than at that point decisions and all that. It ins,itizens to s and especially in urban areas. All that. But once we got started, and started talking about what the world should be, and what people should be, we really werent i dont know if we were black power. I know we saw ourselves as a positive image. But we had allies in chicago. We started the first rainbow coalition. There were the young lords who were chicano, the young patriots, who were hillbillies from appalachia, and came to chicago. There were chinese organizations, there was a whole variety of organizations that were our allies. They organize themselves around the same principles as our 10 point program. And we started the rainbow coalition, we took old Richard Nixon and we painted over top of him and painted different colors. That was in 1969. We really evolved from just being black power to really seeing a different world. Ms. Tillet can you tell us a little bit about thesncc women . The sncc women . You were too young to be one of them, but Kathleen Cleaver said by the time she arrived in oakland, her image of black womanhood was so tied to those early moments of sncc, and the organizing they saw. Create a model of what kind of active as she wanted to be. She never doubted for a second that women should be leaders, because thats what she inherited from sncc. Ms. French when i was young, i would go to sncc demonstrations. Sometimes, without permission. I didnt yet have the agency to say this is what im going to do. I believe that women from sncc and women from the black other party are cut from the same cloth. When you think of sncc women, and what they faced across the south of the bombings in the registering people to vote, took a lot of courage to do with they did. There was still more to be done by 1965, but they really unseated segregation in the south. And again, it was largely the women, an organization that were doing that work. Some of the women i most admire. Ms. Tillet i guess another thing i have been thinking about was when you were describing it the state surveillance, state suppression of the movements being this revolutionary vanguard people during the reign of nixon, and the kind of backlash from the Civil Rights Movement, but also the rise of the silent majority, we know what came with next and. Nixon. Part of it is that the men were primarily targeted. But you did speak about how you have these two things going on. Women are also being arrested, Erica Huggins talks about this in great detail. But also the fact that men were targeted left space for women kind of rise in the party and enact leadership positions. It seems almost like a contradiction. Ms. French i think we had leadership additions from the beginning. But as time progressed, people were aware of there being more and more women than men because of that. For example, in chicago, women were in the leadership from the beginning. But once fred hampton was murdered in his sleep, in december 1969, a whole lot of people left the party wholesale. They were scared. And with good reason. Some people stuck it out, and some people didnt. But they were not making any bones about really lashing out at black men. I understand i saw we talked about our mutual feelings about chicago. Im very much feeling whats going on in chicago now, because to me, its a continuation from the time of the great migration, when people one for mississippi to chicago wholesale. The Chicago Police department was like being another kkk, keeping people in place. Theres a history of men rising to the position of being competitive, to become an alderman. Its a very powerful position, and at least two of them were murdered. One in broad daylight by 45 Police Officers in the 1920s. It happened again in the 1960s. Just before i moved there. It is a very powerful thing going on there. Ms. Tillet lets talk about chicago. We call it a second home, your radicalizing and being involved in the party, i do a lot of community and political work in chicago as well. Chicago i was there last week. On a panel on chiraq, which is very controversial. Ms. French and a very controversial mayor doesnt like it, so who cares . Ms. Tillet exactly. But this repetition of violence. With a ritual of whites of supremacist violence against black bodies. Ms. French its like they have permission to do it. Ms. Tillet in a way, they do. I was thinking about organizing and home in the square, kind of being a site of torture for many recently. Ms. French even though its been widely publicized. I dont know if you all know that. Theres a place in chicago where police will take the whole building, and they will contain someone, mainly africanamerican them or latino males, take to this place, and torture them and try and beat confessions out of them and all that. And because they havent yet officially arrested them, theres being detained it, theres no way to even know they are there. You could be looking for someone and calling around, even call the Chicago Police and say do you know where joe is . And they will say no, we dont know where joe is. Rigell may be being held and being tortured. Joe may be being held and tortured. Its still going on. The thing i was leading to before about Chicago Police. When they murdered fred hampton, it was a really horrific circumstance. Have iphoto i dont know if any of you have seen this. Its a powerful photo of policemen carrying freds body out of the apartment number under a blanket, you can sort of see his feet sticking out, theyre laughing. I read somewhere recently they have these annual i dont know if they are get together times, or something, one secure. When they meet. In the picture that i saw from this meeting was they have it mounted on the wall. They are still celebrating remembering that is the good old days when they murdered fred. And they really got away with it. What has changed . What iset so, part of not new, but i think is inspired by the work that youve done is the kind of emergence of these organizing ms. French we are very hopeful about that. Ms. Tillet it is striking that the panthers were not only two thirds women, but young. The majority of people were under the age of 25 years old. Now we have this corresponding movement of black lives matter. There are number of organizations, youth driven organizations. Sometimes that glorifies the old guard, sometimes is at the forefront of the movement. Butow we are in new york, what is unique about chicago, in terms of obviously, there is deep state repression, and also real entrenched segregation. It seems to me there is also the possibility for all kinds of , crossfertilization, coalition building. S a hotbed of activision activism. Ms. French when i lived there, theyre all kinds of organizations. I see that link between mississippi in chicago, where it wasnt just black folks who migrated, but white people. One time during the 90s, i brother and i went to a Bar Association meeting in chicago. And he hadnt really spent any i dont know if you never been to chicago before. Hes a lot younger than i am. We were walking down the street, and he commented, this is the whitest place ive ever been. Theyid its almost like are in mississippi and they want us to get off the sidewalk and get out of our way. Its something he picked up there. Its always sanctioned. New york, chicago, and l. A. Are in the category of their own, in terms of big cities in this country. Chicago ise three, still like the old south in a lot of ways. With all those millions of people, its still a very vulcanized place. There is still a lot of segregation there. There are a lot of places that people dont go, things that people dont do. Just amazing to me. Bluesduced some wonderful , but you really see why people have the blues. [laughter] i didnt know i thought you were going to save produced barack obama. Thing, speaking of chicago, your direction to the party through professor, charles hamilton, ms. French he didnt introduce us to the party. He cowrote a book with sophie carmichael, i guess it was 1967 or 1966 they wrote this book together called black power. I dont know that people still read it, but i considered a classic. And he top Political Science at a black college. Everybody was thinking that way was fighting to get into his classes. And from that, we organized one of the first black student unions. Now, i guess everybody takes that for granted that you have a black Student Association at your school, but that was even a radical thing. And we were organizing. And we needed a speaker. One of our classmates, bill hampton, said i have this brother who is a really good speaker, he belongs to the naacp youth movement, we should invite him. And thats how we met fred. And right around that time, Martin Luther king was assassinated. It was sort of like a melting pot going on there. Some kind of i dont know. Ms. Tillet a catalyst for different activity. Is, inuestion i have terms of gender equality and Racial Justice. Even today, while we have black lives matter, we know black lives matter comes from a two of the three women who founded black lives matter and the term spoke at penn. One of the questions i asked them was about the intersection between Racial Justice and gender equality. And what happens when we imagine racial equality without the other components. That maybeems to me its a media response, but even with black lives matter, coming from three queer black women, really centering the lives and experience of trans, black men, and black women. There is attempt to not include that. Just sort of see it within this other tradition of exclusively around africanamerican male leadership in the fact that this movement is so consciously pushing against one model of leadership, one charismatic male leader. It is so selfconsciously trying ms. French i think it is great they are doing that. Snakellet inheriting a sncc tradition. We think about Racial Justice without thinking about where race equality. Ms. French they are all the same thing, arent they . Ms. Tillet i think theres a way in which we are conditioned to think of them as distinct. Ms. French people are conditioned, and Popular Culture leads you certain ways. Ms. Tillet to understand them. What were the challenges . Even if it were this vanguard, where people were really wrestling in real time with this progressive practices, People Living together, working together ms. French it was never easy. Because everybody came into the party being the person they were. Times we had to assert yourselves as wait a minute, you dont speak for me, you dont control me. We were dealing not only with them, but our own families and people outside who thought we were crazy. We were talking about things arrestedle i was just before fred handed was murdered. I lived in the apartment where he lived, but i happen to be somewhere else. I was arrested, at first, my parents refused to bail me out of jail. Once because they were scared. On,ather kept saying to me, everyone with common sense knows if you rock the boat, this is what happens to you. My cousin came and bailed me out. Lookingt of people were at us. You sort of had to know your own mind and assert yourself the way he wanted to be. Its never easy. Change isnt easy. Ms. Tillet how did you resolve it with your parents . Ms. French they came to the point where they were very proud. I had a grandmother who i doored, lived to be 95 years old. And she never criticized me for. Even though she may have had questions, she would say to people, she knows what shes doing. You have to respect her. Parents weremy more reacting from fear than anything else. And we did resolve that. Ms. Tillet one of the things thats interesting and unique are the multiple programs and the multiplatforms that you all were engaged in creating. Again, they call it the vanguard identity. Im not trying to link it to gender, but their issues around childcare, we can talk about that. It thatonly parts of come out of a community of think throughg to what a family can look like, family meeting a community. Ms. French what peoples needs were. You have to imagine, the Breakfast Program was our first really big program. At that time, there was no such thing as free breakfast for children in schools. Thats one of the ways we changed society. There was no notion that children needed food in their stomachs to go to school and learn. And so we started that. Its interesting to me, because i hear from women who are young feminists, breakfast, isnt that . Omens work know, men and women were cooking that food and serving it. We were addressing the children trade in chicago, we first announced were going to start this program, we had gathered all of this food to open a Breakfast Program on the west side. In the night before the program was supposed to open, the police broke in their and smashed the food and urinated on it so we couldnt open it. We had a press conference and showed what they did and talked about hunger in chicago and how there were children who didnt have enough to eat, and so many donations of food poured into us , that one of the major newspapers then ran a big series on hunger. We considered that heightening the contradiction, that things would change when you heighten the contradictions. From our perspective, it wasnt that you were necessarily doing womens work at a Breakfast Program. I dont know that i ever cooked any food there. We were all pitching and together to do that. The same with the daycare center. I was the person who initiated the idea of daycare in the bay area and in chicago. Because i had a child. Started the First Nursery School and washington, d. C. , black or white. I came from a family that believed in the value of Early Childhood education. That was what gave children and jumpstart on life. And so i fought for it. But it wasnt there taking care of peoples children. Everybody was sharing in that responsibility. Ms. Tillet i think that is part of what the thing about gender equality or the radical gender the way in which gender norms were being reenvisioned. The fact that you had men doing what would traditionally be seen as the Domestic Work as a political act. Being in this political system. Was if the public image really heteronormative, or the way the media responded to it the practice was really much more fluid. I think that part of what i find for those who know, its obvious. But a lot of people dont know. Because the is experiences and voices of the women, even though they were so significant during the Panther Party itself have been historically invisible lysed. With that comes the way you has really experimenting. Politicalr norms and orientation. There was a lot going on. And you are again, so young doing it. Ms. we were kind of finding our way. Ms. Tillet one of the things i always hear is that, given the revolution that you all envisioned has never really come to fruition because of state oppression, it did revolutionize some of the world. Ms. French we did. What Public School system doesnt have free breakfast and free lunch now for children who income . Er a certain we started Free Health Clinics my father had been president of the medical committee for human rights. And we started the first Health Clinic in chicago. And doctors from the medical committee for human rights supported us in that. And that idea of Free Health Care for people was like on thought of. And within five to 10 years, there were Health Clinics in many ofhoods across the things we said and did, even down to the expressions power to the people were right on, were absorbed by people. Even though we did never have state power. We impacted society. I. Tillet one of the things have been thinking about, in this moment, in relationship to next and nixon. And the ability for black lives matter im just thinking the sellout. I do know that many of the activists are under state surveillance. They have been harassed by police. Quite public, or not. What does it mean to have a movement in the era of an africanamerican president is black lives matter in some ways less under state surveillance . Nixon . Th right now in iowa, people are really deciding, at least two amongst the two political deciding whortly the potential candidates could be. I wonder about black lives mp, or teder tru cruz. Ms. French it would be no different than what we had with Richard Nixon. Thats the thing about society. You get these extremes. I read something in the past few days, care member where i read it. Couldeory was that you analogize with going on now with these wacky candidates, with what happened in the 1960s with Richard Nixon. Ms. Tillet you want to talk about that little more . Ms. French there was this whole notion this thing was the silent majority. And who are the trump followers but the silent majority . There are people there who genuinely feel that if theres affirmative action or if an africanamerican benefits from anything, that is taking something from them. They so genuinely believe that in their superiority, its inconceivable to them that an africanamerican look at the things they have done to obama as president. Would you ever have had a president before were people have gone around openly saying hes not really a citizen and challenging him to show his birth certificate . They do so many of noxious things that they feel entitled one time i heard before trump was actually running, i heard him interviewed, where he was complaining about the way barack obama walks. He said it was especially offensive to him the way that barack obama comes down the steps of the airplane. Just like some dude coming down the steps. And we are thinking yeah, thats what we want him as our president. But one person cant turn the tide. If anything, it puts other people more on the defensive. Theres a lot of analogies. With the Civil Rights Movements, and the backlash, people compared it to emancipation, reconstruction, the backlash against reconstruction and the rise of jim crow. Now we are starting to compare this moment, or at least what could be the next moment, to the Civil Rights Movement, the black power movement, and state repression. The rise of the silent majority, another backlash. So the current comparison would be the emergence of this radical movement that is exposing the systemic racial violence that africanamericans continue to experience, both visible and sometimes invisible, or at least unrecognized. And the kind of anxiety that comes with that double election of the first africanamerican president. Not only is the rise of the tea party itself, but present in the backlash. Theres a way in which we can maybe anticipate what could be on the horizon, be it oppression, ms. French the alternative. I consider this a third reconstruction. I think it will use learned in school is the reconstruction is the first reconstruction. And the Civil Rights Movement, midcentury Civil Rights Movement , into the 60s as the second reconstruction. I consider this a third. Im very hopeful that this will go farther. Ms. Tillet knowing that each theruction came with black Panther Party is a prime example. Beingcond reconstruction suppressed, and a very violent and hostile way, by the federal governments what is it that people in this room, or in the cyber world what is it that we can do . We know history is cyclical, were trying to break that cycle. Do we imagine another rise of jim crow or nexen, but Something Else on the horizon . Ms. French if i knew the answer, i would win the nobel peace prize. [laughter] ms. French but one thing that im hopeful about is that with black lives matter, its very touching to me, when Michael Brown was killed, to see as many white people out there demonstrating as anyone else. Maybe i hope this means that there is a new generation that maybe wont fall back on all of that stuff. Then all of a sudden, donald trump comes out of nowhere. For example, in washington, a friend of my daughters my daughter and a friend organize a thing when that happened. It was when they announced it would be no action taken, they lined 16th street. I dont know if youre familiar with washington, but is essentially shaped like a diamond. Sixteenth street is the street that goes down the longest part of the diamond. And the white house is on that path. Street fromo 16th the maryland border down to the white house, where they just had people go out a desk and stand there with candles. Thing ng may be no maybe nothing happened, but we want you to know we are watching. It wasnt just black folks out there. It was human beings out there. And that was encouraging. But i really dont know the answer to that. I wish i didnt know the answer to it. Dont want to say because things are cyclical, dont struggle. You have to keep struggling. But i dont know the answer. Ms. Tillet part of it may be different strategies. The idea of a leader full movement makes it part of the moment we are in. The kind of social media web means that things have decentralized. In some ways, that reflects the air that we are in. There also seems to be a youthful and pragmatic strategy to learn from the lessons from the 1960s, unit major figures literally assassinated. In the 1960s and 1970s, you also have people being locked up or killed off. To have a decentralized movements may mean its harder ms. French to get the leaders. At the same time, look at how many people, black women especially are just killed. The police can do things with no accountability. I think we need a society that has Police Officers. Because everybody is and honest. Some people do bad things. I just want them to go about their jobs in a way that they dont use it to exercise their racist tendencies, if somebody is murdered, to really find the murderer. Instead of just arresting the first black person out there. Ms. Tillet you are saying even if the movement is decentralized , they are targeting them anyways. Ms. French all of these crazy things. You know. There things you read about what happened in the south that pushed people into the great migration. People were faced with so much violence that they just left. Perhaps, i dont think statistically i dont know. That maybe, asms you say, is the impact of social media and people being able to suddenly film stuff. Aware ofly making us how this is everyday life. In front of our house in washington, a 15yearold kid was walking in the neighborhood i live in its been heavily gentrified. The almost like you feel a stranger in your own home town. This 15yearold kid, who lived about a block or two away in subsidized housing was walking through the block to go see his friend. And one of my new neighbors dogs it was just a little yapping dog bit him. And some people who have a fearral feeling of dogs of dogs anyways. He says to the woman your dog just bit me. See youraid let me leg, theres no blood, your pants are torn, you were ok. He was trying to say your dog bit me. And they got into a dispute about it. And her friend who was with the said maybe we should call the police. Thethey said ok, call police. He is thinking the police are going to come and protect him against this aggressive dog. He even keeps going to where hes going on the next block and the police came and they send out now in gentrified areas, they will send out six police cars for one little incident. So all these police cars pull up and he saw them, and he walked back up the block because he knew the police were coming to assert his right to be able to walk down the street. Without being bitten by an unrestrained dog. He ended up being arrested. Just things like that. They released him, but if we hadnt been standing there taping it this is a 15yearold kid. Him onsses that lead that they are arresting him at 15 years old. Scared, iaying i was didnt know if using a come back and try to hurt me or something. He was so mad. There are so many things like that to happen, its just scary that maybe they arent killing people. A young black men are being locked up or killed, and the statistics are just amazing. Its like what future do they have . At least in our Public Schools in washington, the are being educated, either. So i think it manifests itself in a different way. Part of what that story says is that we all know this. But the existence of black people, a ritual looking down the street also means you can be arrested without any provocation. We know this is true. Knowing people who have experienced this. Ms. French its like how dare you. A part of the city we live in. In the first place, washington has always been known as chocolate city. But all of a sudden, we are mocha city. Area that i live in, when i wasgrowing up when there segregation, this was where all the black businesses were. This was our neighborhood. That we fought for revitalization and got all this investment, everybody is being pushed out of the neighborhood. Call and complain to the police if you are sitting on your front porch. On a hotcanamericans summer evening in washington, thats what you do is sit on the front porch. In and say they must be out there dealing drugs, they are up to no good. Its really horrible the way that has been institutionalized. Ms. Tillet i have two additional questions. Women who arelack being killed by Police Officers. Ms. French i shouldnt make it sound like its all. They do see black men as a bugaboo. Ms. Tillet we have these cases. Ms. French like sandra bland. Ms. Tillet whose funeral i attended in chicago. Its devastating. , who wasrekia boyd killed by a Police Officer in chicago in north lawndale. Bland andly, sandra rekia boyd, theyve got attention. But when black women or black girls die at the hands of Police Officers, its rarely the catalyst for action. Ms. French because they are expendable. Ms. Tillet expendable, sometimes is a time lag or delay when the movement, even in black lives matter, has in regard to these women staff. I asked before this as well. But how do you explain the times lag, when movements are primarily led by women, when the origins are feminist. Why do you think that sometimes there is a real time lag between acknowledging or recognizing womens lives as worthy of organizing around . It is something i am wrestling with an thinking about. Ms. French i think that so much of the general culture is males and male oriented. Ms. Tillet its a maledominated culture. Is it internal . How did you all deal with this . Was there time lag . What did you feel like you were wrestling with these things in real time . Maybe you were, its just that the world didnt know you were the world and wanted knowledge it. Didnt want to ignore legit. Didnt want to acknowledge it. We just sawi think people as being oppressed. And of we looked at that particular thing. Ms. Tillet the community, they were equally oppressed. Ms. French but i agree about sandra bland. That was scary. But even beyond that, to be honest. One of the things that i have wrestled with, because i retired from government in 2006. Since then, ive let this Organization Called hope in the home, a program for lowincome homeless families. What we are doing is trying to help people remake their lives. Very,ummer, we had some very deep conversations with the young people in our program, because there was so much going on with violence. On one hand, you want to talk about it, you want them to struggle against it. On the other hand, you want them to survive. , its at perspective big challenge. Ms. Tillet a lot the young women i work with work with live in communities that over police on one hand and under police in other areas. Members who are incarcerated. Parents often times you have been killed within the community, or died of drug related because of drugs or drug related things. At the same time, they are also experiencing disproportionate forms of genderbased violence. Domestic violence. Whats interesting is that these girls live in this kind of vortex or deep intersections of multiple forms of violence. And perhaps because of that, they remain invisible. What strikes me is unique about the moment we are in that pulls from sncc is try to make these things visible. Andnot have competition violence. Ms. French i just read something in the washington post, in the last few days about a young woman who, as a very young teenager, was raped. And she knew, in most instances like that, they know who the person is. And after apolice, lot of this, that, and the other, she ended up being arrested and charged with lying to the police. Because whoever was doing it just got away with it. She was taken from her family, put in foster care, and went reason it was being written about, she just emerged, shes now independent. It,they forced a review of and the police chief had to admit it was wrong, theyre going to go back and reopen it. But when you think about the impact on her life, it was just horrifying. So much i keep doing that. Sorry. There was so much sexism there within the police department, it was so easy for them to say she is just lying. Into the person saying you cant believe what this girl says. That is troubling. Ms. Tillet and its a pipeline for incarceration of young girls. Its one of the key indicators of incarceration, he reportedly came out for this foundation, Sexual Assault is a precursor to being incarcerated. For black girls. Ms. French and the other pattern that i see in the work i theres dysfunction in a family, and im working with him. I can almost always tell when the mother was abused as a child. There are just certain behavior patterns that never knowing who they could trust, just having a holder for and thing. Its very sad when you see that repeated, when you see the impact that is now have on the whole family. In the mother really a struggling for her children. But it was so dysfunctional, the way she was treated when she was young. Its just horrible. Ms. Ese when it tillet one of the final questions i have for you, the current word you do is an extension of your work within the Panther Party. There was a report couple years ago about africanamerican men being pushed out due to being mass incarcerated. But the report also says africanamerican women are disproportionately being evicted. Constituteroups that workingclass African Americans, not always, but middleclass. Part ofy being either the state because they are being incarcerated, or homeless because they are being kicked out other housing. I dont know if you see in your work ms. French thats what i do the work. , i was working in city government. Homeless czar. We were trying to reform the way the city was addressing homelessness. Whenuring that time, was the Real Estate Market got really crazy in washington. And all of a sudden, these huge that you nevery thought was that valuable before , is now worth 1 million and all of that was happening. What i was saying, where i was sitting was several nights a week, going out to fire, where im sure its been arson because the owner of the building lit it up so they could we have very Strong Tenant laws in washington. If you want to change the use of the building, you have to give final notice, you have to give people money. Theyre all these laws. To avoid it, people were lighting up the buildings come all these things happening. I go there and i see a disproportionate number of black women who were there with their children, and you saw what was the function of their household . They are bewildered, now they dont have a place to live. Theres nothing else in the Housing Market for them to turn to. We would at least the landlord pay for a certain amount of putting them up in a hotel. But invariably, if they didnt have any resources, they would end up in a family shelter. I felt the between having been in a family shelter between 30 and 90 days, i could see a family lose all the fabric of their family life. That a just war it all apart. It just for it all apart. They are in places far from where they live, they try to keep the children in the same school, but the mother has little if any control over whats going on and living in substandard conditions, you just you deteriorate. And thats become the norm in washington now. You have all of this expensive real estate, and you have women feeling like they have no control over what can happen to their families. These are working women. These are not women who were on welfare, these are women who work, but they dont make enough money to pay rent in the city. And thats what i struggle for, is equitable developed. And for finding ways to help people continue their lives. I believe in my people. I dont think they should be just cast aside. Did anyone see the movie the big short, . Thats what its about. Wall street was betting against minorities and poor people. They made a whole lot of money off of it. Thats part of what led to this whole thing. Its really horrible. I think its one more question. Ms. French is it becoming depressing . [laughter] ms. Tillet its really depressing. I was thinking about we just said. That moment where he talked about seeing the mother, and recently im a mother of a and the other day i wasld listening to npr, listening to the radio, and there was a ,other, and organizer in flint and she has been organizer for a very long time, and now she has to think about leaving and she has to think about giving her daughter a bath. Know, is a ritual, you act to these ideas of ritual ritual,these ideas of the ritual of giving your daughter a nightly bath, so i am having a similar visceral response. You see people, and i hope this isnt offensive to people, but when things happen do you see anybody saying, i am flint . You know, what reaction do people have . You know, it is horrible. It is horrible. And yet nobody has come up with any solution. Salamishah but it seems to me that lynn there are still talking real estate values. They said that the problem with replacing the pipes, the houses are not worth the cost of replacing the pipes, so the thing is, the people who live in these houses are worthless because they cant they cant see they dont think it is a good investment to replace the pipes in these houses. So i am salamishah going to open this up. This is why this platform is so useful because we are able to racialt rasul that injustice is not just about Police Brutality, which it is, but it is also away at looking at individual families and how communities are impacted by systemic racial inequality and capitalism and then came up with a whole bunch of different types of solutions and programs to address that. This is, again, the era that we are in, and we are seeing almost an emergence of a hydra head, the many heads of Racial Injustice, you know, you have chicago, you have detroit ongoing, whether it is schools, baltimore, i mean, yet, the resolve to deal with these sincerelyestly requires different types of strategies and programs and revolutionary beliefs and love, i think. I just want to thank you for that. That is why the panthers are so important because they gave us so many answers. Were inspired by so many of the same things that are still happening. In fact, we should not accept them. Salamishah i am going to open it up to the audience. So i will call on people. In the green. Hello, thank you for speaking today. So my question is, first, do you think Racial Injustice is a Public Health problem, and if it is, what would be the Public Health solution that a department of health could do . Well my sister has a masters in Public Health, so maybe she could [laughter] lynn i think it is a Public Health problem. I think that violence is a Public Health problem. I dont think you can separate any of these issues from Public Health. And perhaps the fact that so and things are expensive that we dont even live in a mentally Healthy Society where people can access these things, but the only way to change this is for people to struggle against them, as no one person has the answer and no one organization can do this. It requires everyone. It is your path in life to struggle against it. About thes i teach Civil Rights Movement, i know that none of those students that i am teaching are going to major in civil rights, but what i consider is that once you have these ideas, you think of yourself as having a really bad cold. And you think you sneeze on somebody, they catch that cold. So i think we have an obligation to try to sneeze on as many people as we can to help change the way the people think about things. You chooseever path for yourself, please sneeze on them. [laughter] in the i dont know what color that is. Camel . Hi, my question was that you share the question about murdering and the Police Officers had that picture and they laughed at it and it made me think about now if a young black male is murdered, the public backlash is a thing, and we may give very clear that that is not ok, but at the end of the day, you said that young black males are still being murdered, so i guess my question is, what is the role of public backlash in these murders . How do you think it is shifting in how do you think it is symbolic in these shifting times . And you think there will be a backlash . Reading an article in the New York Times and there was a comparison of new york versus chicago, and they all say that there has been much more reform in chicago in terms of addressing how Police Officers approach things. In chicago, those Police Officers are saying that the so manyhat there are murders there is that the Civil Liberties union and lack lives matter come up so harshly and that if they do anything, they just turn their back on things. In chicago . Lynn in chicago. It is incredible that they even would claim Something Like this. In new york, they say there is at least some improvement. That is blaming black lives matter and the aclu for police . They areh, because saying that whenever they shoot someone, they now have to fill out a report on interaction. Saying that first the reporting takes too long because the questions were too involved and it takes them away from the street. And they claim that they are gun shy because of this. Salamishah hit doesnt seem that they are gun shy it doesnt seem that they are gun shy. [laughter] a person has ad mentally ill son and the police are called up, and the neighbors are murdered. Why i am feeling the way i am feeling about the Chicago Police. It is really in bread. They really feel entitled to do these things and dont feel that accountable. Eld the reason that the genocide movement was successful men were tortured by Police Officers there. This is coming on the heels of that. That,the main lawyer for he started out as our lawyer, and they were just out of law school, and they called themselves the peoples law. Salamishah and so then you have this moment of reparations and then, yet, at the same time, all of this coverup had been going on and was going on. Four years i didnt even think they had to cover it up because they werent held accountable, essentially. Salamishah yes . In the stripes. You talked a lot about how the black Panthers Movement had an average age of under 25, and the black lives Matter Movement is a very youthcentered movement. I was wondering how we can educate to sort of create the most effective Youth Organization that we can have so that it is not about reinventing the wheel . The answer, i would win the nobel peace prize. I think it is great. We used to say that youth makes the revolution and we used to be try to be very thoughtful about the ways that we even dealt with their own children because, you know, that is a quote from chairman mao, but youth makes the revolution. Your experiences are different from ours. One of the only constant things in life is change thing in life is change. So you really need to look at what will bring the ultimate change, the ultimate solution. Salamishah i guess for me what it ispiring, too, is that a Young Movement both in terms of chronology but also for who it is being led, but there are questions about what kind of black lives matter and these are really important and significant and radical because it is a different generation who has grown up with different gender identities and they are really challenging gender normative normativity. It is deeply inclusive and i think it is a movement in which you can see self correction. How do you keep on getting the marginalre most and how do you reach those who are most marginal as a way of being a radically democratic teacher . My generation, you know, the we had theseation, questions but it is really amazing to see at its best the ways in which we took for granted normative and what was being challenged, and yet there is this sense of blackness, this fluid, rich category. I think that is both like new the kind ofoing tensions and the issues that previous movements were really then, i amout and calling everybody by their color, gray, green, striped. [laughter] salamishah ok, all the way back there. Thank you both for the conversation, it is a privilege to be here for it. I have a question relating to your chairman mao reference, black Panthers Movement at its influence internationally and the kind of conversations that were happening in the height of the anticolonial movement. I was just in australia and meeting with indigenous aboriginal activists and how the black panthers inspired their movement and i just wonder what either of you have to say about the kind of global context of the Current Movement or how the International Movements shape your thinking then and now . Thank you. Lynn we were international in scope. It seems like i am always hearing about another place where people were saying that they were influenced, and it is pretty amazing. The chairman mao thing was that we looked to mao and the Chinese Revolution and it is interesting because when i visited china, some of my feelings about chairman mao might have changed a little bit. [laughter] i guess i am not giving a very you might be able to give a deeper answer to this, i just feel it is an affirmation that people feel we were just it wasnt that we were intentionally saying, lets reach out to the Aboriginal People in australia, we were just saying that this is how the world should be and how andle should be treated, it is just an affirmation that it reached so many different people in so many different circumstances. It is just amazing. Amazing. Salamishah i will just speak on what i had heard, and i was just talking about going to germany and black lives matter at a different version, there is a different German Version emerging there, and i remember following, i guess it is a group of black lives matter people, to gaza for the palestine raids, and thinking that they were rebels and coming to terms that blackness is a global phenomenon. There were these important ideas of solidarity and important ideas of blackness. A useful term that has emerged in this moment is that there is a white supra missy and white are ways and there that we think about these antiracist movements in the United States being solely about gaining access to the United States and getting full citizenship, what if we think of the antiracist movements, they have been international, right . Aboutr we think other ceremonies, even the Civil Rights Movement it is anticolonialism and we used to say that if you look at the common link between colonized societies, basically the way, maybe somebody who is an economist would view this different lake, but somebody being colonized is that somebody is coming in to conquer you and you have an asset in your country, whether it is sugarcane or gold or whatever and they came because they wanted that asset, and they could put chains on your society so that everybody is working to produce this asset for them, and then you ultimately are divorced from your own culture and your own ways of supporting yourself, so that may be even you have to start relying on them to buy groceries because you stop doing all other things. And we always thought of ourselves, African Americans, as being the archetypical colonized people, because not only were we colonize, that we were colonized for labor. Fromey totally divorced us our land and brought us here to provide free labor to build this wonderful country and, you know, so i really see that as the link that we all have in common. Thank you for being here. I was thinking about your question with regards to time and when violence happens to africanamerican women. , atwhat i thought about was least some of the statistics saying, how many of our households are raised by women . And i know with my contemporaries, if one of my friends was murdered, there is a linchpin of both an older generation that would suffer and a Younger Generation that would suffer. So there would be this huge thatm there and this hole might exist where people cant protest as quickly, maybe then when we lose men than when we lose men. Friendswith my closest in my 40s now, they have real fear about their sons not coming home and her daughters being abused sons not coming home their daughters being abused. We are trying to figure out how to maintain some sense of home and community. How do you do that or how did you do that, living in fear . Because even in protest, you had to have lived in fear. How did you do that . Lynn we didnt have all the answers now, but i think that is the story of africanamericans in this country. Generation iser in fear, whether it is somebody who is not being compliant enough as an enslaved person, so they are whipped to death or otherwise tortured, or whether are a whether you slave woman who is sexually abused by someone who thinks or whether ither, is somebody who went in the great migration after the civil a different set of problems, i mean, that is the recurring problem, and the only thing that you can do is to be strong for yourself and your family. Because the one thing that you is the that situation love and support that you have for each other. I have three nephews. I come from a very large family. Visit three nephews who my house now in washington, and i hear gunshots in the neighborhood and i will call up and see if everybody is ok, as they say, you are so silly, what i know what could happen, you know . And then never completely goes away. The only thing you can do is stand strong. Becky has a question . Rebecca . This question is not from me, we got a question from the live stream. I know, it is very exciting. This is the first time it is her happen. Ford evening, thank you such a discussion. Iowa working on my dissertation on the black panthers party. Is wonderingo lynn what her thoughts were on the Daniel Holtzclaw case and a Sexual Assault on 19 women . [laughter] lynn what was the first part . Salamishah if you had thoughts inthe silence around women voting . Not familiar with that case. Im embarrassed. Salamishah but maybe you could meant iwhat it is dont know, i am trying to help her in her dissertation [laughter] situation inhe which black women were vulnerable in the black panthers party. And then we could talk about the Daniel Holtzclaw case. Lynn i know that there are people asserting a different thegs about black women in black panthers party, and i didnt personally experience any of that. Analogy, and maybe you wont be sympathetic to this, i recently went to cuba and a dearghter sister friend from the party, and we were at the womens we were talking with a woman who was on the central , and some butuba he asked, what do you do in terms of Domestic Violence in cuba, and do you have shelters for the women who are abused, to do you have special ways do this that and the other for them . And the womans response was in cuba, Domestic Violence is illegal. And she kept saying that back and finally it was like, ok, then if there is Domestic Violence being illegal, the man is locked up and that is basically how i feel about it, too. If i saw Something Like that, i definitely wouldnt be silent on it, but not knowing what specific things and she is talking about, i dont know what else i could say. Salamishah maybe we could talk a little bit about women who were pregnant and who were locked up by because one of the things that, at least in terms of some of the more highprofile cases that we know about with panthers women is that they were locked up and they were often pregnant, just this year, the governor of new york passed legislation for women who are pregnant, and they could be shackled while they were in labor. It is a really radical thought, i suppose. For anybody who has been whatever, i dont think i have to explain why that is so seem toy, but it does me that black panthers women experience violence because they were mothers or because they were pregnant, that we dont, you know, talk about, and maybe there is a kind of specific vulnerability for those women. Lynn i dont know i mean, i cant salamishah i mean, the Daniel Holtzclaw case, i think some people are more familiar with it now, he was a Police Officer who systematically raped africanamerican lynn the man in Oklahoma City . Salamishah yes, the minute Oklahoma City. Lynn he got locked up for one million years or something . [laughter] this personyes, but asked this question and i am familiar with the case and i do feel comfortable talking about it, again, talking about time lag, we talk about Police Violence lynn against women who were primarily sex workers, and they didnt give them priority salamishah and one of them came forward because one of the women was called the grandmother and she had no record and she was the one who felt comfortable going to the police. But again, the way certain stories are certain victims of state violence get left out and get left behind, and a lot of it has to do, we know about these against africanamerican what in Oklahoma City, but is unusual is that it was an allwhite journey jury who found him guilty of not all the charges, some of the women were more believed that others than others. Alright, so back there and then over here. Second to last row. So i heard you say earlier that you think one of the problems with police right now is how much theyre letting racism creep into their practices and how maybe there could be a system of policing iere that didnt happen, so guess i am curious, a couple of things, one of the things is that prison could exist and be more just and just sort of an extension of that, what sort of system of policing and justice and incarceration could there be . Lynn well, i personally believe that there are certain crimes that need to be punished, like a Police Officer who raped all of these women. I think within that context, prison is justifiable, it is just that we have gotten to the point now where prison is an industry in this country. They have privatized the prisons so that in many instances, they are no longer public and because there is profit to be made, it is almost like it is in peoples interest to put more and more people in so you can make more and more money, and it brings back to mine the period right wherereconstruction really horrible things happened in the south. There was this whole issue where it would be beegal for a black person to so they could do work, and if you looked at a white woman the wrong way, you could get locked up for 50 years and then you would be sent to work on somebodys plantation to pick their cotton. So i think what you have to do is try to separate whether function of legitimate punishment or wrongdoing or if it is something that is promoting somebodys private wealth. It, it isnce you do like putting people in the hole, not only should young people not be put in the hole the way the president but i think it is abusive to adults. Somebody who could be perfectly sane who is in the hole for two years, they are going to be stark raving mad when they come out, so i definitely think that there needs to be prison reform, but i cant perceive of a society where there is no punishment for wrongdoing. I just think that the people who are punishing people have to have, they have to follow certain rules for proving that someone is a wrongdoer and there has to be a really fair trial and nobody else should be profiting from their punishment. Does that answer your question . Ok. Over in the green and then over in the red. Thank you. My name is erica jones and i Teach High School history, and i just want to thank you so much for coming and being a part of this conversation. One of the questions i have for you is i am just thinking about the comment you made earlier in terms of being sort of delighted by seeing so many white people, out and march for Michael Brown. And one of the things i have been thinking about is that i love the fact that the black Panther Party was so unapologetically black and i was hoping you could think could speak to some of the tensions within the movements, and im thinking specifically about, protests anderal candlelight vigils for Michael Brown, and i have thinking about ways in which many black people see that as sort of ownership instead of just being liberation movements. Ways that that can be disrupted was hopings and i you could speak a little bit to that tension insofar as thinking maintaining safe spaces to practice liberation for black people . Lynn you know, i was just saying that i think youve got to have white people agree that black lives matter or you will still have the same cycles in this country. That is where i was coming from with that comment. We had similar things to that in the 60s, like i said, we were unapologetically black. There were movements and people we had disagreements with, for example, well, i dont know if i should call any names [laughter] , i dontl, weatherman know if youve heard of weatherman in chicago. On one hand, they were big hand, but on the other they were always try to push us to do things that we didnt think they were the right things to do. So for example, they had this ofiod where they had days rage, i dont know if anybody was a historian and have read about the days of rage, where they would go to Downtown Chicago to demonstrate and they thought all of these people would turn out and they didnt and they trashed downtown and they did a lot of damage and as they retreated, they ran up into public housing. None of them were shot, none of them were shot, none of them had any longterm implications to their lives, and so some young black guys were actually shot by the police who were supposedly pursuing them. Some serioushave words with them about that. It may have even been more than words. We had to seriously register our disagreement with that, because on one hand, they saw themselves as pushing the right income up but what they were doing was being insensitive to who was paying the price for that. Even if you look at what they went underground, they went underground when fred was murdered, and they were underground for a number of years and they were bombing places and then when they turned , they iback in hadnt seen anybody pay any i am not saying that they should have been given life sentences, but could you imagine, there are still panthers who were still locked up. Can you imagine the tables having been turned on that if it had been us if we had done Something Like that . I agree that there are different sensibilities and i agree that we have to own our own movement and we do have to be true to what we seek. What i see a black lives matter is that black people are leading it. If what you want to support it, i think it is great if white people want to support it, but i think it is great that the young black women who have initiated the movement, there are young people following it, and that in and of itself to me is progressive. So i was thinking about how to ask this question. And i want you to try to get to talk a little bit more about being a woman in the party. Of things arelot controlled by a maledominated media, and you know, the images that we have, that the party was a vanguard to feminist thinking, as well as other ways. 1969, was in new haven in meetings,tended many public meetings, i cant remember a single one that had a female person up on the stage. I can visualize these images. Lynn one of the people from the period is one of my dearest friends. Is, did you ever encounter, were the men just already so completely good and perfect about their feminist ideology that those were never issues . That the men really didnt want to take the lead and they really wanted the women to be equally i mean, i just want you to say a little bit more about those times or those issues, or whether they were already worked out or if they never presented themselves . Lynn even if you have a white friend who says they agree with you, that racism is bad, it doesnt mean that you wont disagree on things. Nothing is ever completely worked out with people. Struggles continue. Iwasnt around new haven, but do know that there were women who were paying huge consequences in terms of being locked up, what also who were leading that. But, no. I guess i was just curious when were there times women were just trying to struggle to make the feminist case, or was it already made in a way . Partishah i mean, it is a of my interviewing people, trying to wrestle with this question, and you know, elaine brown in the documentary says, that the men didnt come from revolutionary heaven. And then tracy talks about, you know, a little bit about living together and the struggles. Lynn they always struggled. Isamishah i mean, everybody a product of the struggles in society, and they are trying to imagine an alternative, and yet, there were real battles, you think real public battles. Lynn you never heard a womans beget any public rally a woman speak at any public rally . I am trying to think about that and i cant remember if i did. Lynn dr. Miranda was someone who submitted to the leadership of Audrey A Jones audrea jones, and the closest chapter in new haven was led by a woman , but iy came down there didnt mean to imply that there were never any disagreements or that people didnt think that they could do one thing or another. There were people who were purged from the party for sexist things and for trying to take advantage of people. Life is a struggle and being in the party was a struggle. Salamishah i guess for me what has been most interesting is that we have had these narratives of feminism and the panthers are not part of that conversation, or at least the historical remembrance, and yet the real times and debates and the other thing i want to say is that is from my understanding, a lot of times these conversations pushed the party. Women who were befriending each other or who were fellow panthers members or who were in the newspaper or who worked in the education classes were having these conversations and were pushing the party to catch up with them, and that wasnt easy lynn no, it wasnt easy. Salamishah but it was part of the movement in the nation. Lynn we were in new haven fighting for Erica Huggins life. Heran, they wanted to send to the electric they wanted to send her and bobby fields to the electric chair, you know . You have to keep that in mind as well. Final h one more ok . Over there . I dont need a mic. [laughter] it is being taped so i think they want you to. While then i need a mic. [laughter] haven and i did go to the morning Breakfast Program. Lynn you were in new haven . Yes i was. Avenue and iress was nine or eight or Something Like that and i did go to the morning Breakfast Program. I even came back after school, you know . I had to do my homework there, stuff like that. And in the morning, the men served us, right . And then when i came in the afternoon for the afterschool program, that is when i dealt with the women more so. They would sit down and help us with our lessons and things like that, so what i noticed at that time is that there were a lot of women in leadership and it wasnt because they were like, who is going to run this, it was like it had more to do with whose job was what. The teachers had to be somewhere early in the morning, the women, so the men were the people who took care of the Breakfast Programs and stuff like that. But i recall there was plenty of women who were doing things. I mean, they were organizing and they taught me things are young age, you know . And the men, it did and seem like the media that was the one it seemed like the media was the one who showed the men in a positive light. Lots of time, the men were out in the community to make sure that a lot of the Police Brutality and stuff that was going down, they were kind of like monitoring it, and stuff, you know . Why women andsons men were where they were at a certain time, and it seemed like they were working together pretty good. And also people, you know, everybody is a public speaker. I just cant say anything more specific about that and i was never in new haven. But i do know that there are assertions, and i dont deny that there were not sexist things happen, and we struggled with them. Salamishah ok, thank you. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] thank you so much, everyone. Thank you so much for our speakers. It was inspiring and upsetting and there was lots of food for thought. You received a booklet with the next events for black History Month. We have a film showing for 12 , and we have urban Democracy Lab events, but once again, thank you. [applause] what i want to say to the young people out there, keep struggling. American history tv thatspan3 features stories include history. Professor whosity qualifies as a refugee talks about how that has changed over the last few years. Reel america, investigating the United Statess policies in vietnam. Testifiesary of state on behalf of the johnson administrations actions in vietnam. His testimony is also followed by questions. Debate featuring john f. Kennedy of massachusetts and john humphrey. This is only the second televised primary president ial debate in history. He must always search for lasting peace and look for disarmament negotiations and the workings of diplomacy and the united nations. John f. Kennedy because i believe strongly in my country and its destiny and i believe in the power of the destiny of the next president this is going to be the great factor in meeting the responsibilities we are going to face. Announcer