All language subtitles for Baldwin.

-[man VO] Ladies and gentlemen.

I'm very pleased to
present to you...Jimmy Baldwin.

[applause and cheers]

-I'll tell you a
story, if I may.

Many years ago, when
I first came to London...

I was in the British
Museum, naturally...

[laughter]

and one of the West
Indians who worked there

struck up a
conversation with me

and wanted to
know where I was from.

And I told him I
was from Harlem.

And that answer
didn't satisfy him.

And I didn't
understand what he meant.

"I was born in Harlem, I
was born in Harlem Hospital,"

I said.

"I was born in New York."

None of these answers
satisfied him and he said,

"Where was your mother born?"

And I said, "She was
born in Maryland."

And I could see, though
I didn't understand it,

that he was growing more
and more disgusted with me.

He was becoming more
and more impatient.

"Where was your father born?"

"My father was
born in New Orleans."

"Yes," he said.
"But, man, where were you born?"

[light laughter]

And I began to get it, you know?

And I said-- well, I said, "My
mother was born in Maryland,

my father was
born in New Orleans,

and I was born in New York."

He said, "But before
that, where were you born?"

[laughter]

And I had to say,
"I don't know."

I could see that he
did not believe me.

I tried to explain, you know?

"There's no way for me--"

He said, "Don't you
care enough to find out?"

And I tried to explain that if
I were originally-- originally

from Dakar or from
wherever I was in Africa,

I couldn't find out where it was
because my entry into America is

a Bill of Sale.

And that stops-- you know,
that stops you from going any

further.

At some point in our
history, I became...

Baldwin's Nigger.
That's how I got my name.

Now, you know, that
really cannot be considered,

you know, my fault.

It can't be considered the
fault of the cat at the British

Museum, either, that I don't--
that he doesn't know that I

can't find that out.

And I tell you that story to
dramatize the nature of the

distance created--
created deliberately.

Because when I
became Baldwin's Nigger;

it's also very
important to point out.

I was handcuffed to another
man from another tribe whose

language I did not speak.

We did not know each other.

And we could not speak to each
other because if we could have

spoken to each other we might
have been able to figure out

what was happening to us and
if we could figure out what was

happening to us we might
have been able to prevent it.

We would have had, in
short, a kind of solidarity,

which is a kind of identity,
which might have allowed us--

which might have made
the history of slavery

very different.

The history of slavery in
the North American continent,

I mean.

Well, that didn't
happen and here we are.

One of the most terrible
things-- well, one of the most

difficult things -- because it's
some which one has and wants to

resist as he had said and
also to use -- is that, in fact,

whether we like it or
not, I am an American.

Now, that is not--
I'm not Lyndon Johnson.

I'm not saying
that as, you know,

"I'm an American!"

I don't mean that, you know?

[laughter]

Alas, I mean
something very different.

[laughter]

But I do mean that I was
formed in a certain crucible.

My school really was the
streets of New York City.

My frame of reference was

George Washington
and John Wayne, you know?

[laughter]

But I-- you know, I
was a child, you know?

I'm a child open his
eyes on the world,

who usually sees; there
is nothing else to use.

And you are formed
by what you see.

The choices you have to make and
the way you discover what it

means to be Black in New York.

I don't know how you discover
what it means to be Black in

London but I know what it means
how you discover that in New

York and then
throughout the entire country.

And I know how as you grow older
you watch in the richest city in

the world, you know, and
the most-- the most famous,

the richest, freest
nation in the world.

[laughter]

In the Western World.

I know how you
watch, as you grow older,

literally, now this is
not a figure of speech;

the corpses of your brothers and
your sisters pile up around you.

And not for
anything they have done.

They were too young
to have done anything.

And in any case, too helpless.

But what one
does realize is that...

when you try to stand up

and look the world in the face,
like you had a right to be here.

When you do that, without
knowing this is the result of

it, you have attacked the
entire power structure of the

Western World.

If I one fine day discover...

that I have been lied to...

all the years of my life,

and my mother and
my father were being lied to.

If I discover that, in fact,
though I was bred and bought and

sold like a mule...

that I never really was a mule.

If I discover that I was never
really happy picking all that

cotton and digging
in all those mines

to make other people rich.

And if I discover that those
songs the Darkies sang and sing

were not just the innocent
expressions of a primitive

people but extremely
subtle and difficult;

dangerous and tragic...

expressions of what
it felt like to be in chains.

Then by one's presence, simply,
by the attempt to walk from here

to there...

you've begun to
frighten the white world.

They've always known
that you were not a mule.

They have always known that
no one wishes to be a slave.

They have always known that the
bales of cotton in them-- in the

textile mills and entire
metropolises built on Black

labor.

That the Black was not
doing it out of love.

He was doing it under the whip.

The threat-- The threat of the
gun and the even more desperate

and subtle threat of the Bible.

Now, then...

one is watching,
according to me,

in the streets of
Southeast Asia.

What must be considered...

as a final act of the white,

Christian European
industrial drama.

Speaking as an
American reading the news,

and looking at the pictures,
the streets of Saigon resemble

nothing so much to me as
the streets of Detroit.

And in both cities, precisely
the same war is being waged.

That war...

may it
spread to engulf the globe.

And lets speak plainly.

We know, everybody knows, no
matter what the professions of

my unhappy country may be, that
we are not bombing people out of

existence in the
name of freedom.

If it were freedom we
were concerned about,

then long, long ago we
would have done something about

Johannesburg, South Africa.

If we were
concerned with freedom,

boys and girls,
not as I stand here,

would be perishing in
the streets of Harlem.

We are concerned with
power, nothing more than that.

And most unluckily
for the Western World,

it's consolidated its power on
the backs of people who are now

going to die rather
than be used any longer.

In short, the economic
arrangement of the Western World

proved to be too
expensive for most of the world.

And the Western World will
change these arrangements or

these arrangements
will be changed for them.

This is what is beneath all the
rhetoric and all those rather

shameful speeches
coming from my President.

[light clapping]

This imposes on us, then, a
very considerable burden.

I, for example, do have in
principle at least a choice

of...

how can I put it?
Of becoming a good American.

I can make a living --
[laughs] at least I could.

I'm well enough
known to be an ornament.

[light laughter]

In short, I could ally myself...

on the side of what I most
seriously consider to be a

criminal nation.

But if I can't do that, then I
have to examine all the reasons

I can't and find it in myself
to precisely the terms of my

connection with other people.

One has tried, I
tried for a long time,

in my own person,
in things I wrote,

in things I said.

I don't mean that I was
alone but I'm using myself as an

example...

to convey to my
countrymen -- white and Black--

the nature of our danger and
where we were going to go if we

could not resolve the situation
in our cities and in our

streets, in our houses, if
brother could not deal with

brother because in
American continent

they talk about
the color problem,

but the truth is, that no white
American is sure he's white.

[laughter]

And every American Negro,
visibly is no longer an African.

And we know what happened.
And we know who had the whip.

So it was not my
grandmother who raped anybody.

[laughter]

Well...

if the day comes, when you
realize, and you don't want

to realize it, that you
cannot make yourself heard,

that the people who--
you are addressing a plea,

for them and for you and the
plea is a very simple one.

It's saying, "Look at it."

Forget all the mountains of
nonsense that have been written,

and everything that's been said.

Forget the Negro problem.

Don't write any voting acts.

We had that.
It's called 15th Amendment.

We earned the Civil
Rights of the 1964!

What you had to look at is what
is happening in this country and

what is really happening is that
brother has murdered brother

knowing it was his brother.

White men have lynched Negroes
knowing them to be their sons!

White women have had Negroes
burned knowing them to be their

lovers.

It is not a racial problem,
it's a problem of whether or not

you're willing to look at your
life and be responsible for it

and then begin to change it.

That great Western House I come
from is one house and I'm one of

the children of
that house, simply,

I'm the most despised
child of that house.

And it because the American
people are unable to face the

fact that I the fact
I'm flesh of their flesh,

bone of their
bone, created by them.

My blood, my father's
blood is in that soil.

They can't face that!

And that is why the city of
Detroit went up in flames!

And that is why the city of the
Saigon was under martial law.

I know that in 400
years in that house,

they do not know who I am and I
cannot marry their daughters or

go to their churches.

I would have to be a much more
stupid man that I am to believe

they know anything at all
about those people in the Asian

jungles.

According to me,
they liberated me,

before they got around to Asia
and it was liberation difficult

to bear.

Many didn't survive it.

It seems to me though that
the great is difficulty that we

face.

It's first of all to excavate
our actual history and I'm part

of the history which
occurred in the Caribbean.

And you were part of the history
which occurred in Harlem.

And one's got to find the terms.

One's gotta accept that and
find that how to use that.

And one's got to
decide, I think,

that the actual and the moral
basis on which the world we know

now rests, are obsolete.

It must be changed.

And as far they are
obsolete, they are wicked.

And as far they are
obsolete, they are oppressive.

It is simply not conceivable
that for another 500 years or

200 years or 100 years that
the Blacks of South Africa,

for an example, should
live and die in the mines,

being treated like animals
to make other people rich.

That is simply not-- the
civilization which is doing

this, by doing
this, dooms itself.

It is not possible to agree
with it nor it is possible to

compromise with it.

Freedom is not--

Freedom is a much--
much overused word and it

may not be as real as slavery,
which is a very concrete thing.

But freedom is what one's after.

And as it cannot, I
suppose, be given,

then it obviously must be taken.

They are many ways to take it
but before we can discover this,

we have to discover how
to reunite ourselves,

in terms on which we
can speak to each other,

the terms in which in
fact, to put it bluntly,

we can plot against the master.

And unless, anyone
misunderstand me,

I'm not really talking about
color and I'm not talking about

race.
I don't really believe in race.

I don't really believe in color.

But I do know what I see.

I do know

that in the very same way

that the American
Negro situaion...

man, it's
everybody in the country,

and now it is visible!

What happened in Detroit is the,
is perfectly logical and the

lesson is plain.

What happened says, "If I
can't live in this city,

you can't live in
this city, either."

When a city goes-- everybody in
the city is under martial law.

If I can't walk out
and buy a loaf of bread,

safely, neither can the
housewife that's why he's on the

range, learning
how to use a pistol,

in the land of the free
and the home of the brave.

[laughter]

They are confusing
themselves with the Indians.

No, they're back
on the wagon train.

But we all know who's in
the streets of America.

We know to whom we are referring
when we talk about crime in the

streets.

We know the son of the President
of Pan-Am is not in the streets.

Only one person in
the streets -- that's me!

And they're plotting to
shoot me in the name of freedom,

dignified by law, and
I'm supposed to agree.

I'm supposed to agree.

No, no.
No sir.

I won't be dishonoring no more.

At last, the party's over.

The question is
what shall we do?

Everyone knows that the
question is in everybody's lap.

From Washington
to London to Bonn.

Everybody knows it.

They are trying to
figure out what to do.

We should figure out what to do.

Thank you.

[applause]

Thank you very much.
Now you're suppose to

talk to me.

[laughter]

Now, I'll sit down.

-[man] Why do you
call a man Negro?

Why don't you just
call him a Black man?

There's no country of the
Negro, do you know that?

-[James] Yes, I'm aware of that.
I know that.

-[man] So why do you
call a Negro not Black man?

-[James] Can I
try to explain now?

-[man] Yes.

[laughter]

-[James] Listen.

It was not I -- nor any Black
man in America -- who invented

the word "Negro."

It is not I who wrote that
on my birth certificate.

It is not I who
invented that language.

I understand the
purpose of your question.

There indeed is no
country called Negro.

I know that.

But you must understand, too,

that I can not change my
vocabulary over night.

I may agree with you.

But we've been called-- we've
been called-- and we've called

ourselves American Negros
for over nearly 400 years.

Now do you suppose that because
it angers you that suddenly an

entire nation is able to
change its vocabulary?

In any case, I distrust the
emphasis on the vocabulary,

you know?

Your generation, not
mine, will call itself Black.

That's good enough for me.

That's the whole point.

My mother-- my mother's
mother called herself a Nigger.

You must understand the
nature of oppression.

The most subtle effect of
oppression is that-- what it

does to your mind.

What it does to the way
you think about yourself.

The whole
cornerstone rests there.

If you understand
that, then you can see,

I think, that even though my
mother's mother called herself a

Nigger, she managed to raise a
family and instill somehow in

her children some
sense-- some dignity,

which did not
depend on the word.

One had to learn how to use
those terms in order to survive

and even to triumph.

-In view of the situation that
is really now happening that has

gone past, how do you envision
the Black man's personality,

let's say, within 50 years?

I'm asking you kind
of just to, you know,

try to say what you can.
Tell me about it.

-[James] In 50 years?

-In the next 50 years.

[applause]

-This a reckless question
and I'll try to give a reckless

answer.

[laughter]

I don't know if this is, so,
I'll tell you what I would like

and what I hope.

I think that Black
people, you know?

There's a Black experience,
let's put it this way.

And I'm deliberately trying to
distinguish the Black experience

from the Christian-- the white
Christian European experience.

It's easier the Black
personality then has a

kind of vigor.

A kind of vitality.

And a kind of...

a sense of life, of
something in which

that is not come from here.

But comes in from
much deeper regions.

I think, the African personality
is not so compartmentalized.

I think that Europeans-- the
European personality in the main

and this implies a very
severe judgment of Christianity.

A very severe
judgement is not an indictment.

I think they are terribly
worried about the flesh.

The senses.

I think they live in checks and
balances which are really very

nearly pathological.

You see them in
relief in America.

Because an American-- in America
I precisely am the flesh,

which the
Christians must mortify.

Now, according to me and what
I hope for in the future, the

flesh is all you have.

If you mortify
that, there's no hope for you.

Everything you find out you
find out through your senses.

Everything that-- Everything
awful that happens to you and

everything marvelous
that happens to you,

happens to you in this frame.

This tenement.

This mortal envelope.

Which should be.

Instead of
beating it with chains.

And hammering nails through
it and hanging it on crosses.

It should be the celebration.

Your life, your body.

And if that concept comes back
into the world...

it will come back only through
in the Black people who've been

submerged so long.

And that will change not only
the Black personality but that

will change the world.

I've seen janitors -- Black
janitors -- in overalls prouder

than any English king.

With a much more real pride.

And that is what I
would like to see.

Any way the change of the
personality would come about in

that direction cause as-- as one
begins to come out of the mines

and strike off the
chains by some miracle,

what was nearly murdered
in Africa is still there.

Humanity can not be destroyed.

And that's what's coming back.

-You said something
earlier in one of your books.

Quite contemptuously,
I thought that, um,

you thought it irrelevant to
trace your roots back to the

village.

-[James] I beg your pardon?

-You said something
in one of your books.

Quite contemptuously, I thought,
that you thought it irrelevant

to trace your roots back
to some African village.

-[James] No.

-From what you
said here tonight,

have you moved away
from that position?

-[James] I have a problem
certain that I never said that.

[laughter]

I might have but I
very much doubt it.

[laughter]

-You said you thought it
unnecessary to trace your roots

back to Africa?

-[James] I think you're
talking about an essay called "A

Stranger in the Village?"

I was making a comparison
between the days the European's

arrived in my African village
and, you know, what they thought

of me and what I
thought of them.

And I was not being
contemptuous at all.

At all.

I was saying, "This
is what happened."

I have to look at --
this is what happened.

When they had Beethoven, Bach
and all of these things and the

Christian faith and the cross
and all those horses and guns

and boats.

I was perfectly happy in Africa
watching the conqueror arrive.

[laughter]

It was an examination
for myself of my history.

And certainly not
meant to be contemptuous.

-[woman] We from
the West Indies,

you may or may
not total understand...

because we are-- we are British.

We are West British.
I mean, we are British Colony.

-[man] [inaudible]
-[woman] What?

-Quiet.
-[woman] Quiet time.

[laughter]

I mean, call it British
diplomacy if you wish, but we

are obviously,
as far as I can see,

look at the color problem

different than into
the American Negro.

[jeering]

Now that we are in England--

Now that I am in England,

I'm very glad I'm back in
England because I'm more

aware of the fact I am a Negro.

In Jamaica I wasn't aware of
the fact because it's very

cosmopolitan.

I mean in Jamaica, we-- I don't
know if you ever been to it?

We have more a shade problem.

[overlapping
chatter and applause]

Anyway the point I'm trying to
get across is I never knew I was

a real Negro until
I came to England.

I know it now --
that's why I'm here.

I am very honest.

I was here the other
night with Mr. Gregory --

Dick, rather.

[laughter]

You can't drink water from the
same glass as a man and don't

call him Dick.

[laughter]

The point I want
to get across is--

The point I want
to get across is...

which is better:
Integration or Black Power?

-Is that a question?

-[woman]
[inaudible] just explain.

[laughter]

-I don't-- In the first place I
don't see there's necessarily a

division between them.

But let me-- let me
take Black Power first.

-[woman] Yeah.

-And Integration later.

Black Power is a very
simple phrase and I don't know

why everyone gets so
upset about Black Power.

When watching the effects of
white power all over the world.

[cheers and banging]

And no one even questions it.

And no one even questions the
white power which is destroying

thousands men and women
and children in-- in Vietnam.

That power because it
is power is sacred.

-[woman] Yeah.

-No one-- No one--
No one questions it.

The power of the
Bible and the Holy Ghost.

[laughter]

[banging]

The term "Black
Power," you know,

strikes terror into many
people's minds because it

implies precisely the over throw
of the Bible and the Holy Ghost

at least they think so.

And it does actually means that.

What it means is that
Black people -- this is all it

mens -- that Black people have
in their own hands the control

of their own destiny.

That's all it means.

The English has a
great phrase for it.

They're very
proud of the phrase.

It's called a self
determination of peoples.

That's all it means.

As for Integration,
that is not our goal.

-[man] No?
-No, at all.

That is precisely
is our problem.

-It's a very
simple question.

Do you think that there is any
place for the white liberal in

the Black Power movement?

[loud jeering]

And when you
answer this question,

could you be kind
enough to give the reasons?

Because I've attended a lot of--
meetings on the subject of Black

Power at which in particular
English people feel very hurt

because you get the
line from said platform,

"We don't want you."

Could you give me the benefit
of your thoughts on this?

-I suppose "liberal" refers
to political tradition coming

out of the North of
Europe, you know,

in finding his roots, you know,
whatever it's base is in England

and in America.

But to my ear as a Black man,
a white liberal is immediately

suspect because it is
indistinguishable and one's got

to face this.

You might as well say a white
missionary because that's the

association.

And it is also alas
very often -- not always --

but very, very often the role
and the effect but deeper than

that and more important
than that there's also this...

that from a historical point of
view, no matter how miserable my

situation is...

from a historical point of
view at this hour of the world's

history, I'm advantage over
you because I'm compelled --

I'm speaking about myself
as a Black man not as a...

I'm compelled to doubt
my history, to examine it.

I'm compelled to
try to create it.

I'm trying to excavate my
history from all the rubble that

has buried it for so
many hundred of years.

That means I have to
question everything.

Where as the white liberals have
precisely opposite position of

being in the main unwilling,

as well as unable,

to examine the forces

which have
brought him to where he is,

which have
created him, in fact...

to-- to make which
must be very difficult.

To know the quite of part
from whatever his own attitude,

aspirations, morality;
whatever they may be.

His is never the less,
well he now likes it.

The power of the people-- he is
part of the people who in this

very hour are jailing some Black
boy in Mississippi for this very

hour are whipping some
Black African slave.

You know who-- this very
hour are perpetrating those

tremendous enormities against a
[inaudible] of people who look

like me.

And furthermore, that...

his-- I hate to
use this word but in the

sense that innocence-- that
innocence can be, in crucial

moments, a very grave danger.

It can menace much, much
more than the white liberal can

imagine.

You see...

you can't, after all--

My brother's got
to say, you know--

my family --
let's put it that way --

have forged, out of
our own experience,

ways of talking to each other.

Ways of, you know, in making
deals with each other like that

because we-- it's the
same way it happen to us,

you know?

I ain't got to explain thing
to brother, David, you know?

We just look at each other.

Not even look at each other
and we both know, you know?

We both know.

Now, you can't, in some moments,
you don't have the time to

explain to
somebody else, you know?

That's how we got the
spiritual called "Steal Away."

It's not about
stealing away Jesus.

[laughter]

It's a time table, you know?

Somebody-- Somebody's
splitting, you know?

You know what to do
because he's leaving.

He's stealing away.

You can't always explain that.

And, at last, we
got to face this...

got to face this...

that in many, many,
many Black Power meetings,

you know, some of the most
eminent liberals turned out to

be working for the CIA.

[laughter]

Now, it's true, too,
on the other hand

that many-- you know, many Black
people were also working for the

CIA, but you --
in this context --

you the white liberal in this
context suffer from your color

exactly as I suffer from my
color in another and more brutal

context.

And must got to face that.

And when you face it, one can
deal with it and then it doesn't

matter.

But I don't think it serves
any purpose to get one feelings

hurt.

Because it's not the matter
of my liberation, for example.

It's also the matter of yours.

And if you're working,
we're working together it's not

because we are going to do
something for the poor Black

people because we're going to
do something for each other.

To save this really
rather frightening world.

-What was the question about
the cheered up for the average

American Negro to
it's Christianity?

My impression is one worship in
a [inaudible] twice a week and

sing beautiful songs.

-[James] The vote of the
American Negro population is a

very complicated
question to answer.

I know I can't
do it justice tonight.

The bulk of the American Negro
population is Christian or, at

least, it thinks it is.

Now, you have to--

When one begins to examine it,
you discover that there are some

very crucial differences between
white Christianity and Black

Christianity.

Even at some celebrated
churchs [inaudible] church.

And this is partly
because -- to minimize it,

to understate it --

the church is operated in the
life of the American Negro,

who was once the
Black African slave,

as his only-- his only forum.

His-- His only place
where he was relatively free.

And is also the place in
which he was able to act out,

to sing out, to dance out his
pride and his terrors and his

desire for revenge.

All those sermons
are bloodthirsty.

Their not talking about
devils and Samson and Delilah;

any of those things.

They're talking
about the master.

In a song which says-- it's
supposed to be about Samson.

The master always thought it was
about Samson only now he thinks

it's about something else.

Man says, the slave
says, "If I had my way--

If I had my way

I'd tear this building down."

That sounds like a very
happy and innocent church song.

It's lethal.

[laughter]

[laughing] And the American
Black Christian is becoming more

and more aware of what of
the real content of his

Christianity, which is not
the content of the Church of

England.

It has been one of the
incidents of our salvation.

One of the
techniques of our salvation.

And now we know it.

So whether one is a
Christian at that point,

I don't know.

It doesn't matter since one
knows how to use what one's

history is.

-[man] Excuse me.

We're going to stop questioning
for the time being and we are

going to have a few
words from Dick Gregory.

[applause]

-I really haven't got...

too much to say
but I'm very glad that I

was able to be here tonight
for my brother James and...

you're a very
groovy speaker, man.

[laughter]

'Cause you got in show business
and I guess I have to go home

and write me another book.

[laughter]

I-- I have enjoyed very well...

listening and
watching and

Jim made a very important point
that when you create an action a

writer have to watch and then
come up and write on the action.

And I think this is very
important when we read

works of a social
writer like this...

I observed you
the audience here

tonight which is
been very interesting.

For instance, the
fellow who's gone now

who questioned why we in America
call ourselves Negros and not

Blacks.

And well, here in this
country you refer yourself

as "Coloreds."

[laughter]

And so I think we got to
understand that all of us is put

in the same trick, you know?

In America, they charge me more
money for automobile insurance

and they will never admit that
in the Negro neighborhood they

have poor lighting on the
streets and bad streets and

small streets and
overcrowded conditions.

So I have more cars per
acre than white folks have.

So naturally I got more
accidents per acre than white

folks have.

But in here as me and my brother
was discussing today they charge

you more for license because
they say you a bad driver and

then turn around and 60 percent
of the bus drivers is Black.

[laughter and applause]

And so how you can never
understand how he gets by with

some of his stuff...

[laughter]

we can't understand
how here he gets by.

In closing, let me say this...

in vaguely asking the
gentlemen's question

here about white liberalism...

we are getting to the part
now where we are getting kind of

sassy and kind of
belligerent and, you know,

it's just like a game.

Life is a game, you know?

You'd play baseball when
you was a kid and you'd say,

"Okay, let me hit a couple."

[laughter]

And, you know, like Black folks
that have gone to wars in what I

call "white man's armies."

Without Black folks
being at the top issue line.

In America, there is no Black
people in the Pentagon and they

send us to battle.

And we have gone for years
without questioning where he was

sending me or why I was going.

And now we're saying,
"Okay, white folks,

it's your turn."

You know, I'm going to be the
General and you're going to be

the private.

[laughter]

This is the way
you going to march.

When you get through marching
over there you're going to come

back here; I might pay
you and I might not.

[laughter]

So what we really trying to say
is Black-- we say we don't want

no white
liberals -- that's right --

because, you see, the
word "white liberal" is an

unconscious racist statement
because nobody's ever admit it

that we got Black liberals
who's far more worse than

white liberals ever been.

[laughter]

[applause]

And we also say we
don't want them...

in the movement.

You see, a Black Liberal in
America is the cult doctor

because when we
demonstrate, they say,

"We shouldn't."

But after we finish, he
becomes the first public health

commissioner.

[laughter]

And so we say in that can you
come with us and cease being

white-- see, we need bodies,

and we need cats that think
Black regardless of how white

you are.

Because, you see, I have
run across Negros who's much

lighter and act
more whiter than you.

And so I have to take their
word for them if I can't take

their attitude.

And when I was in show
business and people asked me,

"What percentage of white folks
do you think is laughing at your

humor because they are guilty?"

And my answer to them was, "I
can not look at a cat and just

because he's
light and look white,

assume that he's white.

Because he might not be a white
cat and be laughing without a

damn thing to be guilty of."

[laughter]

[applause]

And so what we are really saying
is that Black Power and we don't

white folks in the movement.

You see, white is not a
color -- it's a attitude.

Black is not a
color -- it's a attitude.

[applause]

So the whitest, white
cat with, you know--

Father Groppi proved
this in Milwaukee.

The most strongest Black
Nationalist that's ever lived in

modern times was not in Africa
or not Malcolm X was a white cat

in America named John Brown.

Because John Brown caught some
wrong doing white folks and told

his son who was also white to
kill them for what they have

done to my brother.

And his son said,
"I can't do it, Daddy."

And he said, "If you don't
kill them, I will kill you!"

Now, I don't know a Black cat
yet, man, that's ready to wipe

out his family because of
somebody [inaudible] me.

[applause]

And so this whole thing we
talking about have nothing to do

with color at all, man.

It has something to
do with an attitude.

But now we shifting color.

You see, in China if you to
a funeral dressed in a black

outfit, you'd
probably be stoned.

Because in China
white represents death.

[laughter]

As hip as I am in the Civil
Rights movement -- and as many

things that I know from a
laymen's stand point -- I've had

a very brilliant education
tonight listening to you, and

I want to thank you.

-[James] Thank you.

[applause]

♪"I Shall Be
Released" by The Heptones♪