I do not expect the white media to create positive black male

Hear the fiery words of Huey Newton, co-founder of the Black Panther Party, spoken as both shield and sword: “I do not expect the white media to create positive black male images.” In this saying lies a truth born of struggle, a truth forged in the fires of injustice. Newton does not speak with the softness of comfort, but with the sharpness of clarity. He names a system that has long sought to define, distort, and diminish, and he calls his people not to wait for fairness from those who benefit from their oppression, but to seize the power to define themselves.

The white media, in Newton’s age and in ages before, often cast the black male in the shadow of criminality, poverty, and violence. Rarely did it show the builder, the scholar, the father, the visionary. Thus Newton declares: do not expect those who profit from distortion to offer you dignity. The task of creating positive images rests not with those outside the struggle, but with the community itself. His words are not despair, but a summons to self-reliance, to the sacred work of reclaiming identity.

History reveals the roots of this struggle. From the days of slavery, when newspapers printed justifications for bondage, to the Jim Crow era, when films like The Birth of a Nation poisoned public perception, the white media often served as a weapon to cement oppression. Rarely did it tell the stories of leaders like Frederick Douglass, educators like Booker T. Washington, or inventors like George Washington Carver. And when it did, it framed them as exceptions, not as proof of a people’s resilience. Newton’s insight was clear: a people cannot wait for their oppressors to paint them with justice; they must hold the brush themselves.

Consider the work of Ida B. Wells, who in the late 19th century defied the hostile media of her time. While newspapers downplayed or justified the lynching of Black men, she traveled the nation, documenting truth with relentless courage. She created her own record, refusing to let distortion have the final word. In her life, we see Newton’s teaching lived out: when the gatekeepers of stories cannot be trusted, the oppressed must become their own storytellers, their own publishers, their own prophets.

The meaning of Newton’s words extends beyond race and into the deeper human condition: never expect those in power to define you with justice. They will define you with utility, with fear, with control. Only by seizing the right to name yourself, to create your own positive images, can you step into freedom. His declaration is not isolationist, but protective, a shield against the naivety that waits for justice to be gifted by those who have no incentive to give it.

The lesson, then, is clear. If you are misrepresented, do not wait for others to rewrite your image. Build your own presses, your own platforms, your own voices. Show your children the heroes the world ignores. Speak your truth even when the great towers of media turn their faces away. In doing so, you create not only positive images, but a legacy that no distortion can erase.

Practical steps rise from this wisdom. Support creators and storytellers from within your own community. Share and uplift works that reflect truth and dignity. Teach the young not only history’s sorrows, but its triumphs—so they know they are descended from greatness. And above all, guard your image fiercely; do not let it be shaped by those who would profit from your diminishment.

So remember Newton’s words: “I do not expect the white media to create positive black male images.” It is a call to self-definition, to resistance against distortion, to the heroic work of creating truth where lies abound. Walk this path, and you will not only free yourself from false mirrors, but build a legacy of light for all who come after you.