1969

Last night my daughter and I watched the film, Judas and the Black Messiah. To me it was as shocking for what it reflected about today, when police still kill African Americans with impunity, than for the events of 1969. I don’t think anything about J. Edgar Hoover’s rabid pursuit of communists and any other group he considered a threat to a white, male, privileged way of life would surprise me.

Afterward, however, when my daughter asked me what I remembered about Fred Hampton’s murder in 1969, I had to admit I didn’t remember anything. My trust in government institutions and the media was low then. In 1967 I had marched in Washington to protest the war in Vietnam. All I wanted to do was have my voice heard, and I was shocked and afraid when I saw soldiers pointing guns at me. I witnessed friends being tear gassed at that march only to read in the New York Times the next day that it had not happened. I believed that “Tricky Dick” deserved the sobriquet.

And yet, if I did read about the raid that killed Hampton, I probably believed that the Black Panthers had a cache of weapons and the police were justified in firing.  Most of what I had read portrayed the Black Panthers as a violent, anti-white group, omitting their commitment to social justice and the free breakfast programs and health clinics they established in Black communities.   

I also pointed out to my daughter that 1969 was a time in my life of minimal involvement in political or social issues.  She was a year old. I was back in school to finish my Bachelors. We had just moved into our first apartment as a family, and I was trying to adjust to what was expected of me as a suburban wife and mother.  I felt equally removed from the students at school and from the other women I met. I was struggling to find my own identity and, I am ashamed to say, I doubt I had much interest in the struggles of others.