Soul Under Pressure

August 1, 2006

I've have always been interested in the more radical black movements of the 1960s and 1970s. I have always been more drawn to these movments than to the more traditional ones. Although I certainly do appreciate the advancements and sacrifices made by people like Dr. King and groups like the NAACP, SNCC, and the SCLC, I've found movements like the Black Arts Movement and the Black Power Movement to be more to my liking. In my opinion, these movements were certainly more in-your-face and defiant. And since that pretty much describes me, I feel these movements on a level that I don't feel the former ones.

However, the BPM and BAM are riddled with many negative issues. For instance, many black women believe that the groups of the BPM, such as the Black Panther Party, were extremely sexist. They feel that women were forced to take a subservient role and were abused physically and mentally. In addition, many of them accuse the prominent men of these organizations of "talking black and sleeping white." (meaning that they professed pro-black sentiments, but preferred to have sexual relationships with white women.)

So, it is not surprising that a book by one of the most prominent members of the Black Panther Party contains what can be seen as blatantly sexist sentiments.

Soul On Ice was written in 1954 by Eldridge Cleaver who was once the Minister of Information for the Black Panther Party. The book is often seen as a classic of the Black Power Movement, and many cite it as not only an extraordinary piece of literature, but a handbook for the black revoluationary.

I have never read the book, and here's why. While Cleaver was in jail on drug charges, he began to hate white women as a result of hearing about the murder of Emmit Till. (This was after Cleaver had noticed that many of his fellow Negro prisoners preferred to have white pin-up girls on their walls. He too, preferred them.) Upon his release from prison, Cleaver decided that, in order to take revenge upon the white man and woman, he would rape white women as a "political" act. He stated:

"Rape was an insurrectional act. It delighted me that I was defying and trampling upon the white mans law, upon his system of values, and that I was defiling his women . . . I felt that I was getting revenge."

This, by itself, can be sickening enough to most. However, it does not stop there. Cleaver goes on to say that he practiced raping black women in preparation for his assaults on white women.
"I started out practicing on black girls in the ghetto where dark and vicious deeds appear not as aberrations or deviations from the norm, but as part of the sufficiency of the Evil of a day. When I considered myself smooth enough, I crossed the tracks and sought out white prey. I did this consciously, deliberately, willfully, methodically."

Not only did Cleaver commit heinous assaults on white women, he practiced on black women! In his eyes, black women weren't even good enough to be the sole object of his rage! They were only good enough to be his stops on the way to the main event. As an African-American and a woman, I am horrified by this. First, it horrifies me that black men would disrespect black women in this manner. Secondly, I detest the fact that any man would disrespect any woman in this manner.

Now, I'd like to state here that, again, I haven't read the book and never intend to. I'd also like to state, for those of you who haven't read it, that Cleaver goes on to apologize for his actions by saying that they caused his "pride as a man . . . to collapse." Obviously, Cleaver doesn't rape women forever, and he does admit that he saw the error of his actions. He also says that:
"I believe that all these problems--particularly the problem between the white woman and the black man-- must be brought out into the open, dealt with and resolved. I know the black mans sick attitude toward the white woman is a revolutionary sickness. . . The price of hating other human beings is loving oneself less."

It is probably, by now, obvious that I hold little sympathy for Cleaver and much more sympathy for his victims. Since I understand that my views on this are probably jaded by the fact that I am the relative of women who have been raped, I asked other black people about what they thought of the book. I asked people who I know in real life and people who I only know on the internet.

Not surprisingly, the responses were often split upon gender lines. I personally spoke to or wrote five (three who have read the book) women about it, and their overall opinion of the book was that, "Yes, Cleaver has excellent ideas, but I can't get over the fact that he not only raped black women, but used them as practice to gain knowledge on how to rape white women."
I asked four men (all of whom have read the book), and their responses were "Yes, Cleaver did commit heinous acts against women, but he had excellent ideas."

My mother, the English teacher, always taught me that a "but" in a sentence voids whatever was placed before it. If that is true, than the women I spoke to weren't as concerned with Cleaver's intelligence as they were with the fact that he was an admitted rapist. The men I spoke to weren't as concerned with the fact that he was a rapist as they were with the fact that he was an intelligent revolutionary. All of the people I spoke to were African-American. (One man was from Zimbabwe.)

Of course, this wasn't a mass sample, and I can't make absolute conclusions based on nine people, but I believe that their responses are probably indicative of many other's. Rap albums have been named after this song. Many "revolutionary" black men on this very site cite this book as one of their favorites. It seems to me that, despite of what Cleaver has done, he has been totally forgiven by many blacks (especially black men) and his crimes are seen as not being very important in the grand scheme of things.

I fully understand that no one is perfect. (Oh boy, do I!) I also understand that some of the people I look up to have commited unsavory deeds. (Malcolm X was once a thief. Dr. King was an adulterer. Louis Farrakhan has made blatantly sexist and homophobic remarks.) However, something like rape is just not excusable in my book. (My book, not everyone else's.) Men who rape have no respect for the women they attack. They have no respect for their bodies, their rights to privacy, the control of their own bodies, or their mental well-being. It has also always been an opinion of mine that if you'll rape, you'll kill. If you have so little respect for someone's person, than killing them cannot be far behind.

So why is it that men can be more forgiving of a rapist than women? Well, the answer is pretty obvious. Most men don't have to live in the constant fear of being a victim of rape. On the other hand, from the time that they're children, women are constantly being taught how to prevent rape. We're given an immense number of rules that will, hopefully, keep us from falling victim to some demented person. Women are raped by family members as children, by strangers on the street, by husbands in their homes, by guerrillas during wars, and by guards in prisons. They're raped by acquaintances, boyfriends, fathers, uncles, cousins, brothers, soldiers, police officers, total strangers, dates, etc, etc, etc. Women can't walk alone in the dark. Women have to watch their drinks at bars. Women have to travel in packs. Women have to be wary of every male that they're alone with. (Obviously, men are raped too, and many of them have to take these precautions also. But not in the degrees that women do.) In addition, when women are raped, they are often made to feel that they are to blame for their attackers actions.

So, of course, women, who have been mentally terrorized by fear all of their lives, are less forgiving of rape. But should they be? Shouldn't men who purport to believe in equality be just as horrified?

My question for everyone is, when does someone's good deeds outweigh their bad ones?

My question for Africans/Blacks/African-Americans is, do you suppose that the acclaim of Cleaver, in spite of his actions, is an indicator of the disrespect between black men and women? (Notice that I said "between," meaning that I fully understand that it goes both ways.)