After watching the movie Night Catches Us I noticed two examples of ways in which the police or the feds (the ‘man’) exerted power over the African Americans. Both exertions were a means of control, and both were founded on a fiction.

First let me discuss the comic book, just so I can move past it more quickly. When we are first introduced to it we see it as a training manual for young Black Panthers, and then it is revealed to be a work of misinformation produced by the feds to incite young black people to violence against white power. By ‘white power’ I refer to the thoughts motivating the behaviors of those with power to control anyone who is identified (by someone who identifies them self as ‘white’ and who also has grown accustomed to a feeling of power) as ‘not-white’. Behaviors, which in any way (necessarily defined by someone who identifies them self as ‘not-white’) inhibits the freedom of a not-white (self identified) person.  The misinformation of the comic book is the first example of power being exerted over another, power to mislead a person into carrying out the desires of another (ask yourself why the feds would want black people to attack cops), and it is based on a deception.

The second is seen when the two police officers are questioning a young man while Jimmy (played by Amari Cheatom) watches from across the street. This play is much more precarious than the ostensibly anonymous distribution of propaganda comics, the two officers are taking for granted that anyone watching will be placed under the same spell as the man they are harassing. In this scene we see Jimmy in his proudest moment. He understands the magic at work (or appears to, more likely he is spitting truth fed to him by Iris (Jamara Griffin)) and stands above it and is intelligent enough to wield it properly to protect his fellow man. The magic at work is another deception, a weaker one than the comic book, not an out an out lie but rather a withholding of the truth.  Jimmy undoes their spell by revealing it for what it is – nothing, a puff of smoke, a fiction spun between two cops. He appeals to the power which the officers are agents of, and which they had misused. That is, Law. And expounded the truth which the officers had hoped to conceal, thereby arming his fellow man with the power to protect himself.

This protection is limited. Very limited. And Jimmy ruins it perfectly. After existing as the very definition to true power for less than a minute, he reveals his true nature as a petty, small minded man by insulting the officer. And we see a deeper truth begin to reveal itself before Jimmy is saved by the stranger doing a drive-by (perhaps this was planed by Jimmy, but I doubt it). The officer was prepared to beat the living shit out of Jimmy, and most likely his fellow man as well, and then arrest them both for what ever he wants to arrest them for. And he would have gotten away with it, because the hideous truth revealed in that brief moment before the drive-by was that the only reason he had not already begun the beating was because Jimmy had temporarily dazzled him with his knowledge of the law and his fearlessness in confronting the cop, and he knew he would get away with it. Because of the power which produced the comic book, and which he attempted to abuse, is ultimately on his side. That is, Law (but truly, the truth Jimmy exposes is deeper than law). A fiction. Agreed upon by the masses (once they are instructed on what to believe) and then instructed to believe it is truth. It is fiction. A puff of smoke. To affirm that it is real is a deception. To affirm that an action is ‘right’ or ‘true’ because it is ‘law’ is a deception.

Deception is a fear response.  It is seen in individuals who believe they cannot rely on truth, because if they did they would be without power. The deceptions used by the two officers, as well as the federal government in the production of the comic, exposes a fear in them of losing power. Indeed, it exposes that they are already powerless.  When Jimmy faces the officers he stands on truth alone, a thin ledge of truth perhaps but truth nonetheless, and thus he exemplifies true power. This truth is the simple fact that the man being harassed did not have to speak. A truth so obvious that the power embodying the two police officers allows for it. It has no choice, to claim that a person must speak to the police would be ridiculous. Sadly, the truth he stands on is undermined by the fiction which protects , empowers, and guides the police. It is enough to take away the officer’s power to bully information out of the stranger across the street without working up a sweat or risk any injury to himself. He who had used deception to hide his powerlessness (to bully) resorted to another fear response: anger.

His anger is evident as he strides across the street. He meets Jimmy with it hoping to get a reaction from him, producing the positive feedback loop is body is so hungry for, to release his anger. Jimmy does not give him anything though, he stands upon truth alone, and the officer is cowed. His anger begins to deplete and then Jimmy, no doubt a bit giddy with his own power, the power of truth, the one true power, calls out to the officer, stoking his anger anew. I do not know if Jimmy understood the position he was in or not. If he did then he truly was asking for a beating, and no matter how true he is, he was asking for the officer to release his anger, perhaps to allow himself the same release.

It is important, however, that he does this very foolish thing. The film makers wanted us to see this microcosm, as abbreviated as possible in a crunch for time. This is the Black Panther movement in a nutshell. Jimmy starts the movie with a strongly held belief about police officers that they are violent pigs. No matter how justified that opinion is, it does not change the fact that the cop was walking away when Jimmy taunted him. Jimmy, through his own will alone, created his preconceived notion. After demonstrating the higher path, that which was chosen by wiser activists such as Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., he showed what happens when you stray from that path and meet force with force: needless violence. Iris’ husband learned this lesson the hard way, and all the people who survive him have learned it too. All except Jimmy, who had to learn it himself, to show us. This truth, allows them to thrive in a hostile environment which proved too devious and complex for Jimmy.

Anger and Deception, both responses to the emotion Fear, a loss of power, however trivial, both attempts to take away that painful feeling.  Ask yourselves, brothers and sisters, the next time you meet these two exertions of power, “what is the fear behind this behavior?”  Understanding this will allow you to see the true power at work, as Jimmy did when he saw the officers harassing the other man. I hope you will have the strength of will to stand upon that truth and not give in, as Jimmy did, to the temptation of exerting power over someone who is already in a state of fear based anger, attempting to control the officer, to make him attack, and succeeding.  Justifying, for the officer, his own attempts to control others amplifying and affirming his anger. Do not forget, brothers, sisters, as Jimmy did (I think) that this truth upon which you stand can be subverted. The power of truth can be wholey eclipsed by the power of fiction. But fiction stands upon belief, which stands upon a persons will to believe. Truth stands upon nothing, it is its own foundation, and it remains even despite any number of opinions to the contrary.