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Black Power Quotes

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Black Power Quotes

“One unfortunate thing about Black Power is that it gives priority to race precisely at a time when the impact of automation and other forces have made the economic question fundamental for blacks and whites alike. In this context a slogan “Power for Poor People” would be much more appropriate than the slogan “Black Power.” However much we pool our resources and “buy black,” this cannot create the multiplicity of new jobs and provide the number of low-cost houses that will lift the Negro out of the economic depression caused by centuries of deprivation. Neither can our resources supply quality integrated education. All of this requires billions of dollars which only an alliance of liberal-labor-civil-rights forces can stimulate. In short, the Negroes’ problem cannot be solved unless the whole of American society takes a new turn toward greater economic justice.”

JusticeRaceEducationPovertyEconomicsAfrican AmericansBlacksBlack Power
Book:Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?
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“There is, as well, a tactical side to the new emphasis on self-defense and the suggestion that nonviolence be abandoned. The reasoning here is that turning the other cheek is not the way to win respect, and that only if the Negro succeeds in frightening the white man will the white man begin taking him seriously. The trouble with this reasoning is that it fails to recognize that fear is more likely to bring hostility to the surface than respect. Far from prodding the "white power structure" into action, the new militant leadership, by raising the slogan of black power and lowering the banner of nonviolence, has obscured the moral issue facing this nation, and permitted the President and Vice-President to lecture us about "racism in reverse" instead of proposing more meaningful programs for dealing with the problems of unemployment, housing, and education.”

PoliticsFearPowerRacismRespectNonviolenceAfrican AmericansBlacksCivil Rights MovementBlack Power
Book:Down the Line: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin
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“Stay Woke, Stay Human (Sonnet) BLACK is Brave, black is Leaderly, Adventurous, Conscientious and KINGly. LATINO means Loud, Loving And Tenacious, latino means Ingenious in Obscurity. WOMAN is Wonder Obstinate, woman is Miracle Awake, and Nature-incarnate. PRIDE means Passionate and Resilient, Indefatigably Daring in Endearment. MUSLIM is Merciful, muslim is Unbending, Sincere and Lively, Insightfully Magnetic. ASIAN means Amiable, asian means Strong, Inquisitive, Ambitious and Neighborly. Hateless, Undivided, Mindful And Neurodiverse - that's HUMAN. Mind carries its own detergent, stay woke and stay human!”

PrideDiversitySocial JusticeFeministEqualityCivil RightsActivistWokeBlack PowerDei
Book:Azad Earth Army: When The World Cries Blood
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“Often ignored by civil rights historians, a number of campaigns led to trials and even convictions throughout the South. These cases, many virtually unknown, broke with Southern tradition and fractured the philosophical and political foundations of white supremacy by challenging the relationship between sexual domination and racial equality.”

FeminismCivil Rights MovementBlack Power
Book:At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance--A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power
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“The Puerto Rican movement of the 1960s and 1970s can be defined by its consistent calls for a radical transformation of U.S. society while simultaneously promoting the independence of Puerto Rico. Known as El Nuevo Despertar, this "New Awakening" of Puerto Rican radicalism was inspired and shaped by the growing militancy abroad and at home. Black Power, youth unrest (particularly against the Vietnam War), the War on Poverty, national liberation struggles in the Third World, Chicano and Native American militancy, gay and lesbian rights, and second-wave feminism are all part of the context that shaped the movement.”

FeminismCivil RightsVietnam WarPuerto RicoBlack PowerPuerto RicansPuerto Rican Movement
Book:The Trouble with Unity: Latino Politics and the Creation of Identity
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“You better shut your big blubber lips.” We would call each other “jungle bunnies” and “bush boogies.” We would talk about each other’s ugly, big lips and flat noses. We would call each other pickaninnies and nappy-haired so-and-so’s. “Act your age, not your color,” we would tell each other. “You gon thank me when I’m through with you, Ima beat you so bad, I’m gon beat the black offa you.” Black made any insult worse. When you called somebody a “bastard,” that was bad. But when you called somebody a “Black bastard,” now that was terrible. In fact, when i was growing up, being called “Black,” period, was grounds for fighting. “Who you callin’ Black?” we would say. We had never heard the words “Black is beautiful” and the idea had never occurred to most of us.”

BlackProudAssimilationBlacknessBlack PowerBlack Is BeautifulBlack Struggle
Book:Assata: An Autobiography
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“No two individuals, it would seem, could be further apart politically than [Eldridge] Cleaver and [George] Wallace. Cleaver, on the one hand, embodies and articulates the rage that has gripped large segments of the black community in recent years. Born of desperation and despair, this rage has produced burnings and lootings in the ghetto as well as a philosophy of black separatism that represents more a withdrawal from an intimidating and unresponsive white society than a positive program for political action. This rage was also the source of Cleaver's influence. He could ride its powerful currents to fame and notoriety--which the mass media were more than willing to heap upon him--but he could not begin to propose a solution to the injustices that had produced it. Indeed, to assuage the anger and frustration in the black community would have threatened his own base of power. Wallace, on the other hand, has often been called the embodiment of white racism and reaction. That he is, but, more precisely, his preeminence was a result of the fear which gripped large sections of the white community throughout the country. The Wallace movement grew to frightening proportions not because of anything that Wallace did but because the politically polarized atmosphere in the country called forth the need for a man who would represent the fears and the very worst instincts of millions of people. While Cleaver and Wallace seem on the surface to be so very different, they are both simply the manifestations of the same social evils. Black rage and burnt-out ghettos are the product of the economic deprivation of Negro Americans; and white fear and the Wallace vote are the result of the economic scarcity that motivates whites, particularly those in the lower middle class, to feel that they must protect the little they have against the rising demands of blacks. The conditions of deprivation and scarcity, and the consequent growth of racial hostility and political polarization, formed the context within which the events of 1968 unfolded.”

PoliticsRaceRacismCivil RightsRace RelationsBlack PowerSeparatismGeorge WallaceEldridge Cleaver
Book:Down the Line: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin
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“In response to the demand for more black culture and history, the national bourgeoisie of the U.S.A. has adopted a technique different from that of their neo-colonialist puppets in the West Indies. Having that security which comes from the possession of capital, they feel confident in making certain concessions to black culture in their educational institutions and media of public communications. As always, they concede the lesser demand to maintain the total structure of white capitalist domination, hoping to siphon off young blacks into a preoccupation with African history and culture divorced from the raw reality of the American system as it operates on both the domestic and international fronts. That gambit must not work. Imagine the juicy contradictions — Rockefeller finances chair on African history from the profits of exploiting South African blacks and upholding apartheid! Black revolutionaries study African culture alongside of researchers into germ warfare against the Vietnamese people! We blacks in the Americas have missed the opportunity when a more leisurely appraisal of our past might have been possible.”

CapitalismAfricaWhite SupremacyBlack PowerAfrican American HistoryTheory And PracticeAfrican HistoryIdeological WarfareSuperstructureRevolutionary Struggle
Book:The Groundings with My Brothers
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“One of the major dilemmas inherent in the attempt by black people to break through the cultural aspects of white imperialism is that posed by the use of historical knowledge as a weapon in our struggle. We are virtually forced into the invidious position of proving our humanity by citing historical antecedents; and yet the evidence is too often submitted to the white racists for sanction. The white man has already implanted numerous historical myths in the minds of black peoples; and those have to be uprooted . . . It is necessary to direct our historical activity in the light of two basic principles[:] Firstly, the effort must be directed solely towards freeing and mobilising black minds. There must be no performances to impress whites, for those whites who find themselves beside us in the firing line will be there for reasons far more profound than their exposure to African history. Secondly, the acquired knowledge of African history must be seen as directly relevant but secondary to the concrete tactics and strategy which are necessary for our liberation. There must be no false distinctions between reflection and action . . . If there is to be any proving of our humanity it must be by revolutionary means.”

Black PowerTheory And PracticeTactics And StrategyHistoriographyAfrican HistorySuperstructureBlack RevolutionRevolutionary Struggle
Book:The Groundings with My Brothers
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“I began to realize that the stability I had felt all my life was actually a mix of resignation and illusion. I had resigned myself to living a life of struggle, accepting the oppressive nature of capitalism, racism, ad patriarchy as simply the way it was. I had grown not just accustomed to oppression but comfortable with it.”

Travel WritingBlack Women QuotesBlack PowerQueernessBlack Feminist
Book:Are We Free Yet?: The Black Queer Guide to Divorcing America
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“Virtually the entire inflow was therefore Asiatic, and all but three or four thousand of that inflow originated from the Indian subcontinent... It is by 'black Power' that the headlines are caught, and under the shape of the negro that the consequences for Britain of immigration and what is miscalled 'race' are popularly depicted. Yet it is more truly when he looks into the eyes of Asia that the Englishman comes face to face with those who will dispute with him the possession of his native land.”

LooksEyeFacesThreeBlackRaceFourLandThousandShapesConsequenceCaughtPossessionImmigrationIndianBritainNativeAsiaDisputesEnglishmenFace To FaceHeadlinesNative LandBlack Power
Author:Enoch Powell
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“There are a lot of people who believe that the individual can't make it himself. And that's why people want to join up in various herds - herd formation. So you become part of a herd, a group. Group power of some kind. There's an awful lot of group power people in our country [the USA] - Black power, Chinese power, Indian power, woman power. Everyone is putting in together.”

PeopleWantBelieveKindCountryTogetherIndividualBlackGroupsVariousOur CountryAwfulChineseIndianUsaFormationHerdsWomen PowerBlack Power
Author:Frank Capra
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“The civil rights movement didn't deal with the issue of political disenfranchisement in the Northern cities. It didn't deal with the issues that were happening in places like Detroit, where there was a deep process of deindustrialization going on. So you have this response of angry young people, with a war going on in Vietnam, a poverty program that was insufficient, and police brutality. All these things gave rise to the black power movement. The black power movement was not a separation from the civil rights movement, but a continuation of this whole process of democratization.”

PeopleWarWholeYoungPoliticalProcessBlackDealsCitiesPovertyIssuesRightsMovementHappeningsProgramPoliceAngryResponseSeparationCivil RightsVietnamPolice BrutalityBrutalityCivil Rights MovementDetroitInsufficientContinuumDemocratizationBlack PowerDisenfranchisement
Author:Danny Glover
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“President Obama is a man who had certain advantages because of the civil rights movement. He had the opportunity to go to some of the best schools in this country - schools that train you how to run the political paradigm, not challenge it. The leaders of the Black Power Movement were challenging that paradigm.”

MenCountryRunningSchoolPoliticalCertainOpportunityBlackPresidentChallengesLeaderRightsMovementAdvantageTrainCivil RightsPresident ObamaParadigmCivil Rights MovementBlack PowerBest School
Author:Danny Glover
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“Of course, you have politics, the Vietnam war and all that monkey business. There are all kinds of reasons. At every one of those demonstrations in the late Sixties about the Vietnam war, you could guarantee there'd be a series of speeches. The ostensible purpose was to protest the war. But then somebody came up and gave a black power speech, usually Black Muslims, then. And then you'd have a women's rights speech. It was terrible to listen to these things.”

KindWarReasonPurposeCoursesBlackRightsTerribleSpeechLateSeriesAll KindsGuaranteesProtestVietnamSixtyWomens RightsMonkeysDemonstrationVietnam WarBlack Power
Author:Garry Winogrand
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“Remember, we're talking [in The Black Power Mixtape] about 1967, the year before [Martin Luther] King's assassination. We're talking about the emergence of black power, which is a discussion King mentioned in his last book, Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? We're talking about the meaning of black power and the possibility that it alienated our supporters, both white and black.”

YearsBookLastsRememberBlackCommunityWhiteTalkingPossibilityKingsChaosDiscussionSupporterLutherAssassinationEmergenceBlack PowerMixtapes
Author:Danny Glover
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“When I dare to be powerful - to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.”

InspirationalImportantUseSuccessFearWomenBlackPowerfulBusinessVisionPowerCourageSuccessfulStrengthBecomingImportanceEncouragementFeministDareHelping OthersAfrican AmericanLife ChangingServiceWomen EmpowermentDaringStrong WomenSuccess In LifeEncouragingBlack WomenNo FearBlack HistoryEmpowering WomenOvercoming FearBeing StrongProject ManagementEmpowered WomenSuccessful WomenSuccessful LifeMoral CourageStrength And WeaknessBest SuccessInspirational Strong WomenGreat WomenBecoming SuccessfulBlack History MonthWomen PowerPower And ControlStrong FemaleInspire WomenBlack History Month InspirationalGreat VisionBusiness WomanVisions And DreamsBlack PowerWomen StrengthNew VisionBlack History InspirationalInspirational StrengthStrong Powerful WomenGetting StrongerBlack Women InspirationalFamous Women InspirationalBlack InspirationalGreat FemaleStrong MotivationalVolunteerism And ServiceBlack MotivationalPower And FearConfident WomanPower StrengthSpiritual VisionWomen And StrengthEncouraging UpliftingCommon Vision
Author:Audre Lorde
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“You can't separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom.”

InspirationHumanityPeaceFreedomLibertyAddictionRecoveryOppressionLiberationPeace Of MindOppressedMuslim4th Of JulyBlack HistoryFreedom LibertyPeace And JusticePeacemakingBeing At PeaceYour FreedomPeace JusticeAchieving PeaceRoot CauseAbsolute FreedomAmerica FreedomBlack AmericaJuly 4th 1776Black PowerAmerican Freedom4th Of July InspirationalBreaking FreeFreedom And PeaceUltimate FreedomSeparate PeacePeace Inside
Author:Malcolm X
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“Never underestimate the power of dreams and the influence of the human spirit. We are all the same in this notion: The potential for greatness lives within each of us.”

InspirationalHumansDreamMotivationalRunningSpiritBlackInfluenceGreatnessNotionAthleteAfrican AmericanMotivational SportsAmerican HistoryOlympicsUnderestimateBlack WomenOur DreamsHuman SpiritMedalBlack HistoryInspirational RunningUs HistoryGold MedalsNever UnderestimateUnderestimatedOlympic GamesHuman PotentialOlympianBlack History MonthAfrican American WomenPotential For GreatnessInspirational AthleteAll BlackGreat AthleteBlack History Month InspirationalBlack PowerAfrican American HistoryInspiring AthleteOlympic AthleteBlack History InspirationalOlympics GamesOlympic MedalsAfrican American InspirationalAfrican American History MonthBlack InspirationalBlack MotivationalGreatness WithinInfluence And PowerOlympic Spirit
Author:Wilma Rudolph
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“Dr. King's policy was, if you are nonviolent, if you suffer, your opponent will see your suffering and will be moved to change his heart. That's very good. He only made one fallacious assumption. In order for nonviolence to work, your opponent must have a conscience. The United States has none.”

PeopleIfsHeartMadeStatesSufferingOrderBlackUnitedUnited StatesAchievePolicyKingsMajorsConscienceGainsMovedVery GoodOpponentsAssumptionBlack PeopleNonviolenceDrsBlack Power
Author:Stokely Carmichael
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