by #teamEBONY, October 21, 2016
“I don’t know what Black Lives Matter does, so I can’t tell you how it compares to what the Black Panther Party was. I know what the BPP was. I know the lives we lost, the struggle we put into place, the efforts we made, the assaults on us by the police and government – I know all that. I don’t know what Black Lives Matter does. So if you can tell me, I’ll give you my thoughts.”
Singer and former Chairwoman of the Black Panther Party (BPP), Elaine Brown, doesn’t seem to be a fan of the Black Lives Matter movement.
The above remarks were made during a recent interview with Spiked Deputy Editor Tom Slater. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Black Panther Party, and like many critics of the movement, Brown doesn’t take the party’s comparison to the Black Lives Matter movement lightly.
“There is no comparison,” she told Slater. “The next wave of young people running out here, who are complaining and protesting about the murders of young Black men and women by the police all over the country, they will protest but they will not rise up in an organized fashion, with and agenda, to create revolutionary change…”
Black Lives Matter erupted in the wake of the police-involved shooting death of 18-year-old Mike Brown in Ferguson, MO. Brown was unarmed at the time, and many expressed anger through riots and other violent means in protest of police brutality, particularly the killings of Black people by white officers.
