BLACK AUGUST 2024 AND POLICE BRUTALITY!
10 YEARS SINCE MICHAEL BROWN!
by 'bro Zayid' Muhammad
Black August, the time to affirm Black Resistance to Oppression, has come!
This year marks the 45th observation of the tradition!
It happens to also mark the tenth anniversary of a police killing that led to epic uprisings, the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri!
At the heart of the observation of Black August is inspiration from courageous Panther legends George and Jonathan Jackson, (George was assassinated on August 21, 1971 and his little brother Jonathan was killed in an extraction mission on August 7, 1970).
In practice, Black August is also about lifting up support for Black political prisoners.
Given the intensity in the air on the national landscape with the July 6th police killing of Sonya Massey, a single mother shot in the face by a Springfield Illinois police officer, an outrage that spawned actions in almost 40 cities on July 28th as a National Day of Mourning, and given the tense political landscape with fascism emerging and the sanctioning of the Gaza Genocide, and where the police are being weaponized to attack those who are protesting that Genocide, we thought that it would be timely to focus on police brutality for this moment.
Black August has its origins inside the California prison system with the Black Guerrilla family and people like Khatari Gaulden who were nurturing the concept when he was killed in prison on August 1, 1978. The following year, surviving elements of the Black Panther Party and emerging elements of the New Afrikan.Independence Movement would begin to observe the practice in earnest.
Other key revolutionary moments that make up the inspirational core of Black August include the Nat Turner Uprising, launched on August 21, 1831, the ritual launching of the Haitian Revolution on August 14, 1791 with the Bois Caiman gathering, or the actual launch of hostilities on August 22, 1791, the revolutionary birthdays of Marcus Garvey, and in recent decades, of Fidel Castro on August 17th 1887 and August 13, 1920 respectively. Panther Blue Notes which include the deaths of Huey P Newton and Safiya Bukhari, August 22, 1988 and August 23, 2003, and the bold Birth Notes of the ‘implacable Maroon’ Shoatz and Chairman Fred Hampton, August 23, 1943 and August 30, 1948!
With its West Coast origins, the Watts Uprising, an uprising covering the widest area of territory at that time, and yes, driven by the scourge of police brutality, is also a key centerpiece of inspiration (August 11-15, 1965).
So let’s dive in.
The very beginning of Black August requires the remembering of the 1943 Harlem Uprising, the second of Harlem’s three major uprisings. It was August 1st of that year that saw a police officer shoot a Black soldier in uniform who was defending a Black woman when all hell broke loose.
In the contemporary era, it was on August 8, 1978 that the Philadelphia police would attack in Apartheid fashion the MOVE family in Powelton Village with tanks, water hoses and live fire. Pioneers of Environmental Justice who were also advocates of armed self defense, MOVE sought to defend themselves as best they could. At some point, an officer was killed by friendly fire, and all of the participants were brutally beaten in spectacle fashion, especially the late Delbert Africa, whose horrific beating was captured on live television while he was peacefully surrendering. They were all charged with the officer’s death and endured prison time of 40 years each, with two of them, Merle Africa and Phil Africa, dying in captivity.
The valiant Dr Mutulu Shakur was born on the same date August in 1950 incidentally.
On August 9th, 1997, Abner Louima, a Haitian immigrant was savagely beaten and sodomized by NYC police officers after he was taken into custody after breaking up a fight at a party in Brooklyn. Officers viciously sodomized Louima at the precinct by ramming a plunger up his rectum, producing life-threatening permanent injuries that required several surgeries to save his life. The protest response saw a sea of angry marchers shutting down the Brooklyn Bridge creating a protest tradition with their actions. The action prompted a federal investigation that saw the officers go down federal charges, something that rarely happens.
On August 14th, 1998, on the anniversary of the ceremonial launch of the Haitian Revolution at Bois Caiman, Brooklyn based activist J Andree Penix Smith lost her son Justin at the hands of the Tulsa Police. Justin was chased without cause and when he was finally stopped, he chose to go down fighting in anticipation of the abuse he saw himself facing. Was that the spirit of Black August igniting Justin’s resistance? Why not? His mother has become an ally to other mothers since then.
August 27th 1994 saw the police killing of double amputee Edward Mallett by Phoenix Arizona, a double amputee, because he “looked suspicious” to the police!
On August 29th, 2000, Detroit police killed Errol Shaw, a young man who was a deaf mute. Shaw was “armed with a rake.” His killing, among a sea of other incidents, led to Detroit facing a federal investigation of its police force.
Just recently, on August 24th, 2019, Elijah McClain, an animal loving violinist, was stopped suddenly by the police while walking home in Aurora, Colorado. Again, for “looking suspicious.” As he was being viciously beaten, the beleaguered young man terrified for his life was heard pleading “I don’t even kill flies!” Paramedics administered a sedative that officials say ultimately caused the young man’s death several days later.
August 21, 2021, the anniversary of both George Jackson and Nat Turner incredibly, saw an Asbury Park NJ police officer shoot and kill Hasani Best, who was in a mental health crisis. Hasani’s situation was physically contained and even had responders better equipped to address the situation en route when he was killed. For the record, he was in possession of a butter knife.
Most recently another Soprano State incident saw Andrew Washington being shot to death in his Jersey City home in a mental health crisis on August 27th just last year as his family waited outside expecting the police to take him to get help. His death brought huge protests to the port city and led to the Governor signing into law a bill that is supposed to pilot the use of ‘community led’ emergency response teams, instead of the police, called the Seabrooks-Washington bill named after ‘Drew, as Washington was affectionately known in his community, and after a Paterson based Community based Violence Interventionist Najee Seabrooks, who was also killed several months earlier under similar circumstances. Activists from all over the state are still pushing for the full implementation of these community led emergency response teams.
As alluded to earlier, it was the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9th, ten years ago, that again gave the contemporary Black Lives Matter one of its epic moments. Protests ignited all over the country. This sea of protest took down a compromising Black elected official and marked the emergence of a genuine grassroots organizer from out of their ranks, Cori Bush, going to Congress and becoming arguably its most radical voice in that space. Who else has done a sit in on the steps of the Congress? However, as this goes to press, she is being targeted by defeat by the Zionist lobby AIPAC, who is seeking to replace her with a compromising buyable Black Democrat willing to sign off on Israel’s genocidal onslaught in Gaza.
Ten years later, we share these painful insights because police brutality continues to stalk us like we are being openly hunted. Please, let us remember, ten years ago, as the Michael Brown protests blew up all over the country, at the same time, from the pained spaces of Palestinian occupation, came Solidarity from those quarters in a very pronounced way. Let us understand the place of the curent police attacks on the Palestinian Solidarity Movement. coming from police in cities with Democrats and with Republicans in leadership, each often rubberstamping the abuse! That will continue! That may even expand and get worse because that’s what Fascism looks like!
So let us use the spirit of Black August to hold the line against neoliberal repression. Let us use that surge of angered mobilization that had us rally in nearly 40 cities for Sonya Massey last Sunday, and let us reinject the question of police brutality into this sickening but critical election cycle! John Lewis and Sheila Jackson Lee went to their deaths championing the George Floyd Justice In Policing Act!
Let’s put it in everybody’s face who is coming to us pandering for our vote...Everybody’s.
And Trump calls Kamala ‘the Radical Left.’ He aint seen ‘the Radical Left’ yet. In the spirit of Black August, it’s time we make everybody see us, and feel us! Him, her, everybody!
Finally, on the matter of political prisoners, the shared point of Black August practice, the courageous Mumia Abu Jamal, now in his 43rd year in prison and in spite of his predicament, has just coedited a new book, a mass incarceration reader, Beneath the Mountain, loaded with the voices of American political prisoners from over the years! It will be the subject of a number of gatherings this month! Remember, Mumia survived a Black August execution date in 1995, August 17th, as his captors sought to mock our veneration of Mr Garvey, one of our first political prisoners, but the people in the millions from all around the world stood up and said “O hell no!”
All Power to the People!
Stop Police Brutality!
By Any Means Necessary!
Free Mumia!
Free All Political Prisoners!
Fast! Study! Train! Fight!
We who like it hot call it 'Black August'!
(c)2024
*'Bro Zayid’ Muhammad is the lead organizer for the Malcolm X Commemoration Committee, a proud cub of the NY chapter of the Black Panther Party. He has an activist profile of 45 years. He is a poet and stage actor. Contact him at ‘babazayid814@proton.me...
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