August 9, 2020
Everyone was talking about Juneteenth 2 months ago. Everyone was also retweeting #BlackLivesMatter and protesting. Now that it’s August, what have you seen? It’s very noticeable that for a lot of people, Black Lives Matter went away and wasn’t a concern anymore. Now that it’s Black August and we have something to celebrate instead of a negative incident to hashtag, the care and support have come to a halt. I for one was very disappointed with myself for only hearing about Black August a week ago for the first time. As I have done my research to write this, I have found that Black August is the celebration of freedom fighters.
Black August started in the 1970s, when George Jackson, an author and Black Panther in prison, was assassinated by guards in the middle of a prison rebellion in California. George Jackson had served ten years of his sentence for stealing $70 from a gas station and was in solitary for seven and a half years. Jackson as well as Fleeta Drumgo and John Cutchette were all charged with the murder of John Mills, a white prison guard in January 1970. They allegedly killed him in response to three Black prisoners being shot in a prison fight three days before by a different officer named Opie G. Miller after no warning shots were fired from a guard tower. Jackson, Drumo, and Cutchette were later called the Soledad Brothers.
The unfolding of these events caused an uproar and gave even more power to the Black Panther movement, as the Soledad Brothers fought for the movement even behind bars. Black August is to give praise to those who risked their lives while fighting for freedom for Black people in America. The term “political prisoner” was also used to identify the freedom fighters who were imprisoned, meaning that they were incarcerated due to criticizing the government for their imprisonment. Black August is to celebrate and remind us that power is with the people and that when we stay up, the government will be exposed for who they truly are when they try to silence us.
Haeli Ross, Communications Director
UC Santa Barbara
