this post was submitted on 02 Nov 2025
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Chapotraphouse
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Walking around with guns wasn't what made them successful, it was building an actual connection to the people and working to build dual power structures to provide for them and to prove to them a better alternative system can exist, the arms came along as a necessity to protect from harassment in order to continue their programs.
You can't have people running around willy-nilly with guns, and you definitely don't want chief targets for state persecution going around willy-nilly in hot situations without a trained and disciplined force to do that willy-nilly running around.
Also money. You're gonna have people run around all day peacefully observing federal agents, they need to get paid because they're gonna become persona non gratas in the workplace the moment it gets leaked they're in a left-wing militia policing the streets.
This. This post. Sadly 9/10 times the Black Panther party comes up it's always about their guns and not the feeding kids, solidarity, dual power etc.
everyone who wants to play communist comes for the looks and the action but always disappears when theres work to be done rizzing up some warehouse workers into knowing how and why they hate their bosses, slapping tasty food together for folks in need consistently, and going to endless meetings!
Being a communist is as boring and mundane as being a normal person who wants to actually have nice things without selling a kidney to keep a roof over their head
I really wish people understood this right here. It's so important if we're to achieve anything tangible. How can anyone expect a person to be a big communism builder, in a system that will isolate you, when you do so openly, someone has to provide alternative means to acquiring a shelter and food, at the very least. Communism isn't supposed to be some kind of a martyrdom cult where you sacrifice yourself for the "greater good".
I run into this kind of thinking sometimes in my own work. Comrades want the left to "get serious" and start doing "cool shit" like having guns and confronting the police. I want that too, but we aren't there yet, and I think that kind of talk comes from a place of frustration with the current level of organizing. People don't want a decades long struggle built on countless conversations and committee meetings, they want a final, dramatic confrontation with capital right now that will decide everything forever. I think it's the same thing behind doomer-type rhetoric about how the government is about to "really crackdown" or that you're going to get arrested for being a commie or whatever.
Trying to figure out how to keep things grounded and realistically plausible without sounding overly pessimistic and ending up turning people away is one of those frustrating things, isn't it? That we just got to keep on dealing with, because this is always going to be effected by our current conditions and there's never gonna be a "perfect" answer. At the end of the day it is a collective effort and we can only do the best we're able to, life's already hard enough under the boot of capitalism.
People want the Great Patriotic War, but without industrialization and collectivization beforehand.
somewhat, but i think it's also not entirely unjustified paranoia because the state has shown it is willing to infiltrate and try to crush even the most tiny marxist reading clubs let alone actual big orgs
I guess I mean, not so much that there won't be state repression, but there is a kind of rhetoric you see mostly online, sometimes in person, where folks will talk like it's about to be over. That some kind of apocalyptic wave of reaction is imminent that will shut down all hope forever. It's that kind of rhetoric that I think stems from the same place of wanting finality now instead of living in protracted, liminal struggle.
I hate to be "that guy" but the guns actually came first, and what built the panthers' reputation was their armed patrols.
The pivot to community organizing came from when Newton was imprisoned and Seale became the leader of the party. He re-oriented the party towards free breakfast, free clinics, etc.
The other aspect of their success imo was that they recruited existing student groups and gangs and re-oriented their existing activities into the Panthers' project. Protection rackets run by gangs became the funding source for the free breakfast program. Student groups became student strike committees, etc.
Black Against Empire is a great read for anyone interested in the panthers.
That's completely fair
The free breakfast program was an example of that community building. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Breakfast_for_Children
Yeah honestly there's a lot I didn't consider; another thought that occurred to me is that we currently have a president and government that doesn't mind pulling out all the stops and clearly doesn't care how it looks; I also admittedly don't know enough about everything the black Panthers did (I do recall they had a breakfast for kids program that the government got going themselves to take that away that connection)
How did the Black Panthers fund themselves? It's hard to get programs off the ground because we're all poor...
I'm not studied on the history of the black panthers. In a very simple explanation, marxist-leninist party formations rely on having a pool of membership who pay dues to a sufficient degree that dedicated cadre members of the party can officially go on the party payroll to become a professional revolutionary who's life is dedicated to fulfilling the will of the party.
In addition to the other answer - grant writing and selling newspapers.
Trotskyism intensifies
Many chapters were former gangs, and they continued to run shakedown rackets. For example, they'd go through the community asking for funds for the breakfast program and if they didn't abide, they would picket them out of existence.
Imagine having that level of influence now... goals