In October of 1966, Stokely Carmichael gives a speech called Black Power. During this time there is a war between blacks and whites. Strokely was black and his audience is mostly white people at the University of California-Berkley. In his speech, his main argument was white people are the problem. The white people are in charge but they are not getting involved with the issue. The failure to pass the civil rights bill was influenced by the violence of whites who were implying that blacks were actually the violent ones. The whites are violent because they are killing kids and women in Vietnam, killing and beating blacks voting, and they are committing police brutality.          

Strokely tone in this story is angry, fed-up and he is exhausted of being treated wrong. He is angry because it has taken a long time for blacks to have their rights. It took writing a law to get whites to understand that blacks can do what whites can do. He is fed-up with the whites because blacks are not being treated equal. The blacks have no power and every time they react the whites show them disrespect. The blacks are tired of trying to prove them selves to white people and they are tired of explaining to whites that they will not hurt them.

           The Vietnam War is being fought by mostly whites because whites want to gain the power. The violent acts of white people leads to a lot of killings. Men are forced to become killers because they are being drafted. The whites are destroying Vietnam because the people of Vietnam do not want to obey the whites. Stokely Carmichael states, "The war in Vietnam is an illegal and immoral war" (253). The white people are terrorizing innocent people, including children and women. The white people are burning down homes and villages.              

            Whites are killing and beating blacks for trying to vote. Stokely says "Every time I tried I was shot, killed, beaten or economically deprived" (249). The white people are doing what they want and "taking away freedom from black children'' (Carmichael, 257). Whites are the violent ones because they are hurting anybody to get what they want, even the little children. If a black man kills a white person he will be beat to death by the whites. There is a double standard because whites can get away with killing blacks, but blacks cannot get away with killing whites.

             The white police are violent because they are so quick to kill. "The first time a black man jumps , that white man's going to shoot him"(Carmichael,259). This is creating police brutality because good or bad there is a possibility blacks can be shot. The white cops are scared, so they are doing things that are illegal and violent. They are harming blacks because they assume they are harmful. The police place an image on blacks that all blacks are dangerous. Police are trying to get rid of violence by using weapons and killing, which is violence. The police are hypocrites because they are blaming violence on blacks and they are killing blacks.      

       Stokely Carmichael's style is straightforward, he makes a point and backs it up. One point is white people think they can take away freedom, but they cannot because everybody is born free. The whites are taking away freedom by force and violence." This country is a nation of thieves, it has stolen everything it has beginning with black people" (Carmichael 254). The whites took freedom from blacks, Vietnam, and other nations. It began with the whites taking land from the Indians, than they traded blacks as slaves, and blacks still do not have their freedom. The civil rights bill took a long time to pass because the whites still need their power. They are scared about blacks having freedom because blacks may take away the power.

The word ''Black" stands out because white people are afraid of the color black. White people are the problem because they have their "own inability to deal with blackness'' (Carmichael 258). Whites think that blacks are violent, ignorant and not equal. The whites do not want to go into the black community because they are scared. They are not thinking about what blacks are going through. They made the word black mean violent because of the killing in the ghetto. Killing happens among whites, just the same as blacks. The color has made whites scared and terrified.

Whites are causing violence therefore they are not scared of violence, but blackness. They are scared of the image of blackness. The whites are "projecting their same fears and guilt's" (Carmichael 258) on blacks. Their projecting the violence that whites have committed on to the blacks. The whites are blaming blacks for any violence.  

In conclusion, the point of "Black Power" is to deliver the message that Stokey Carmichael wanted the University of California at Berkley students to know, which is how long it took white people to pass the civil rights law because they are violent.  White people are hypocrites because they say blacks are violent, but they are doing violent things too. They are not scared of violence, but they are scared of blackness. They put the image "anything all black is bad" (Carmichael, 258) in the minds of people and it will take a while for blacks to be free from white brutality.

