The Black Power Mixtape 1967-19752011

Stokely Carmichael:
Now, let us begin with the modern period of - I guess we could start with 1956. For our generation, this was the beginning of the rise of Dr. Martin Luther King. Dr. King decided that in Montgomery, Alabama; black people had to pay the same prices on the buses as did white people, but we had to sit in the back. And we could only sit in the back if every available seat was taken by a white person. If a white person was standing, a black person could not sit. So Dr. King and his associates got together and said, "This is inhuman. We will boycott your bus system." Now, understand what a boycott is. A boycott is a passive act. It is the most passive political act that anyone can commit, a boycott. Because what the boycott was doing was simply saying, "We will not ride your buses." No sort of antagonism. It was not even verbally violent. It was peaceful. Dr. King's policy was that nonviolence would achieve the gains for black people in the United States. His major assumption was that if you are nonviolent, if you suffer, your opponent will see your suffering and will be moved to change his heart. That's very good. He only made one fallacious assumption: in order for nonviolence to work, your opponent must have a conscience. The United States has none... has none.