Black Panther 10 Point Platform Applies To All Who Are Oppressed

I am not crazy about the style but I agree in principle with most of it. My comments are in the grey type. The way I see it is that most non rich are oppressed. Blacks and other minorities are oppressed much more. They are like the canary in the coal mine.  We should in principle support the goals of the Black Panthers.

Ten Point Platform


1. WE WANT FREEDOM. WE WANT POWER TO DETERMINE THE DESTINY OF OUR BLACK AND OPPRESSED COMMUNITIES. We believe that Black and oppressed people will not be free until we are able to determine our destinies in our own communities ourselves, by fully controlling all the institutions which exist in our communities.

My commentary: This is absolutely true but the devil is in the details. These institutions are often corrupt from both the inside and the outside. Many police forces are corrupt and ridding them of that corruption means electing a clean commissioner who will get rid of crooked cops and send the wrong doers to a clean DA who will prosecute them. This will require citizens working to get rid of the slime.

2. WE WANT FULL EMPLOYMENT FOR OUR PEOPLE. We believe that the federal government is responsible and obligated to give every person employment or a guaranteed income. We believe that if the American businessmen will not give full employment, then the technology and means of production should be taken from the businessmen and placed in the community so that the people of the community can organize and employ all of its people and give a high standard of living.



This could be done easily. The average corporate CEOs make close to 500 times more in salary alone than the average worker. CFOs, and upper management like presidents and VPs also make  obscene salaries. In Japan CEOs make 11 times more than the average worker. Japan has a weaker economy than the US but lower unemployment.


3. WE WANT AN END TO THE ROBBERY BY THE CAPITALISTS OF OUR BLACK AND OPPRESSED COMMUNITIES. We believe that this racist government has robbed us and now we are demanding the overdue debt of forty acres and two mules. Forty acres and two mules were promised 100 years ago as restitution for slave labor and mass murder of Black people. We will accept the payment in currency which will be distributed to our many communities. The American racist has taken part in the slaughter of our fifty million Black people. Therefore, we feel this is a modest demand that we make.

Slavery did even more harm than financial compensation cannot cure. Slavery stole the heritage of Africans. That said, I think it is naive to blame the government. The rich were the slavers and the rich control the government. If the Black Panthers want the Government to right these wrongs they need to get rid of the rich who currently own the US government.



4. WE WANT DECENT HOUSING, FIT FOR THE SHELTER OF HUMAN BEINGS. We believe that if the landlords will not give decent housing to our Black and oppressed communities, then housing and the land should be made into cooperatives so that the people in our communities, with government aid, can build and make decent housing for the people.

I think that his is a bit of a blanket statement. Landlords are in the business of rental property to make a profit. Different communities have different landlord tenet laws. Slum lords are real assholes. Perhaps a better solution would be a condo community that is governed and owed by the residents but you can't just take the property. Residents could organize, pool their resources and buy the property in a rent to own arrangement that could benefit both them and the landlord. They could hire a property management firm to run it.

5. WE WANT DECENT EDUCATION FOR OUR PEOPLE THAT EXPOSES THE TRUE NATURE OF THIS DECADENT AMERICAN SOCIETY. WE WANT EDUCATION THAT TEACHES US OUR TRUE HISTORY AND OUR ROLE IN THE PRESENT-DAY SOCIETY. We believe in an educational system that will give to our people a knowledge of the self. If you do not have knowledge of yourself and your position in the society and in the world, then you will have little chance to know anything else.


The boards of regents vary from state to state. Good luck trying to get that in the South. The goobers down there think the earth is flat. Here's the thing some areas of the country have more assholes than others. Take Israel, they somehow expect that the nut jobs in the Middle East are going to act nice and not fuck with them. Blacks would do better to avoid assholes. If they want to live in a predominately Black community then they need to control those communities. Put Blacks in the school boards and make sure that the curriculum is honest. 

I don't think that reminding young Blacks that they are oppressed will help them. They already know that. Identifying their oppressors so that they can get rid of them and liberate themselves is more empowering than remind them they have been fucked over by the man.

6. WE WANT COMPLETELY FREE HEALTH CARE FOR All BLACK AND OPPRESSED PEOPLE. We believe that the government must provide, free of charge, for the people, health facilities which will not only treat our illnesses, most of which have come about as a result of our oppression, but which will also develop preventive medical programs to guarantee our future survival. We believe that mass health education and research programs must be developed to give all Black and oppressed people access to advanced scientific and medical information, so we may provide our selves with proper medical attention and care.

Good luck with that. The most powerful force in the US is the greedy medical industrial complex.  Nobody's illnesses get properly treated in America. Chris Rock explained it 20 years ago. What the US needs is healthcare like the rest of the industrialized world has. France and Italy do health care for less that half the cost of the US and they do it 100 times better.

The answer would have been to give everyone Medicare and regulate the criminal doctors and health care corporations.

7. WE WANT AN IMMEDIATE END TO POLICE BRUTALITY AND MURDER OF BLACK PEOPLE, OTHER PEOPLE OF COLOR, All OPPRESSED PEOPLE INSIDE THE UNITED STATES. We believe that the racist and fascist government of the United States uses its domestic enforcement agencies to carry out its program of oppression against black people, other people of color and poor people inside the united States. We believe it is our right, therefore, to defend ourselves against such armed forces and that all Black and oppressed people should be armed for self defense of our homes and communities against these fascist police forces.

The Cops are out of control in many communities but I think making nice with the cops on the beat and trying to persuade them in a calm manner has the potential of cooling down the heat. Cops need to be dealt with politely but firmly. Cameras are a good idea. Citizens need to police the police.  While I would not want to see an arms race between police and the people they are sworn to protect I think we are past the point in many communities where open carry by law abiding citizens will make the cops think twice before violating rights and abusing citizens. Know your rights! Defend your rights! Remember, cops are errand boys for the criminal corporate elite.

8. WE WANT AN IMMEDIATE END TO ALL WARS OF AGGRESSION. We believe that the various conflicts which exist around the world stem directly from the aggressive desire of the United States ruling circle and government to force its domination upon the oppressed people of the world. We believe that if the United States government or its lackeys do not cease these aggressive wars it is the right of the people to defend themselves by any means necessary against their aggressors. 

I agree in part. Mostly I think that the US should stop being the cops of the world.  The corporations want these wars. It is much less about killing brown people than it is about the money the war machine puts into the pockets of the plutocrats. 

9. WE WANT FREEDOM FOR ALL BLACK AND OPPRESSED PEOPLE NOW HELD IN U. S. FEDERAL, STATE, COUNTY, CITY AND MILITARY PRISONS AND JAILS. WE WANT TRIALS BY A JURY OF PEERS FOR All PERSONS CHARGED WITH SO-CALLED CRIMES UNDER THE LAWS OF THIS COUNTRY. We believe that the many Black and poor oppressed people now held in United States prisons and jails have not received fair and impartial trials under a racist and fascist judicial system and should be free from incarceration. We believe in the ultimate elimination of all wretched, inhuman penal institutions, because the masses of men and women imprisoned inside the United States or by the United States military are the victims of oppressive conditions which are the real cause of their imprisonment. We believe that when persons are brought to trial they must be guaranteed, by the United States, juries of their peers, attorneys of their choice and freedom from imprisonment while awaiting trial. 

AMEN!!! We incarcerate more people than any other country.  Prisons are an industry. In the town I grew up in there was next to no crime so the cops would harass young people to drum up business. Most of the serious crimes were committed by the cops.

10. WE WANT LAND, BREAD, HOUSING, EDUCATION, CLOTHING, JUSTICE, PEACE AND PEOPLE'S COMMUNITY CONTROL OF MODERN TECHNOLOGY. When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. 

This is more than a Black thing. The power elite oppresses everyone.  Money is power. 


For further reading on the Black Panther Party, please visit their website at www.blackpanther.org.