Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Dinner with...

Bobby Seale! I kid you not. I have just returned from eating dinner with Bobby Seale in Bistro 43 at the Marriot Hotel. He's here and will be speaking tomorrow, though I'll be at class and work. The WEB DuBois Society and Young Democratic Socialists brought him in, and then Austin Jackson, advisor of the DuBois Society, invited me and Matt to join them for dinner on behalf of the Chautauqua. It ended up being Bobby, his assistant and a well-known transcriptionist Grace, and nine students. So a lot of one-on-one time. It was really cool.

Though my friends are mostly losers about this.
"Guess where I'm going tonight? Dinner with Bobby Seale!"
"Who's that?"
Someone thought I was going on a date...and very nearly asked "Is he cute?" Goodness gracious; heaven help me.

6 comments:

Jon said...

Well, I remember him & am suitably impressed! What did he have to say?

Becca Farnum said...

He talked a lot about where he got to where he was.
MLK was one of his initial "sparks," if you will. He says they shared much the same philosophy, though the Black Panther party would use guns in self-defense, while MLK was strictly non-violent. We heard a lot about some of the threats that he and the party went through. He's also not an actual black nationalist, which was interesting to hear.
Overall, it was really cool to hear from his perspective versus the history books, who essentially paint the Black Panthers as the "bad guys" in the Civil Rights Movement.

Charlie said...

So, was he cute?

Becca Farnum said...

How did I know you were going to ask something like that? Daddy, I am not going to date Bobby Seale. Though he did mention how much a few newspapers focused on his sexual promiscuity. It was rather entertaining.

Anonymous said...

~stalking you~!

Also, I totally knew who he was, I just forgot his name, because I can not has brain.

Becca Farnum said...

My roommate is a freak! lol.