In the Eyes of a Young Conscious Puerto Rican on What Black August Has Meant to Him

BY ERNESTO SANTIAGO

Black August is a month with many memorable days, a month with history that has and must always be remembered and thought! The youth of 2004 don’t know their history never mind knowing anything about Black August. As a Puerto Rican who knows what Black August is I feel that George Jackson must never, never be forgotten!

It’s been 33 years since they system murdered George, a young man who found the struggle in Prison who wrote about what he found & how he grew and learned while in prison. I came to prison a young 21. Didn’t know anything about Black August, didn’t know anything about Political Prisoners or P.O.W.’s. I didn’t know about the Indians & what they tried to do to them. I thought thanksgiving was a good thing. I didn’t know that Puerto Rico was a colony of the United Snakes. You see they didn’t teach me anything about real history; the people’s history in school. They taught me Christopher Columbus was a great man.

My parents were afraid to speak against the system since the United Snakes terrorized them in Puerto Rico when they were young. You see I became conscious in prison and Black August was another wake up call that the system was trying to extinct the conscious back then and is still is trying to extinct us, The People Today.

I feel that August to me might be the most important month of the year! The Revolution has to be started on August! We the people in the spirit of George must show this Capitalist System that there will be no more days on ours side to remember! This System, who has a long history of Oppression & Death on People: August 6 Hiroshima, August 7 Jonathan Jackson, William Christmas & James McClaim murdered, August 9 Nagasaki, August 21 George Jackson murdered, August 22 Huey Newton killed.

These dates are a few of the times The System has attacked. We must teach everyone especially the young of today who have turned to drugs & gangs and are blinded by all the material things that they can’t even afford but are influenced by, that’s being made by slave labor & wages in Third World countries & sold for hundreds of dollars in this Kapitalist Kountry!

George Jackson found out the realist of what was happening while in prison & used to teach others the truth about Black August. As a Puerto Rican I not only became consciousabout what “Black August” is but on what Black People as a whole have gone through. There aren’t many conscious black brothers here besides maybe a few in the Nation of Islam & Muslim Communities, etc. Black August is trying to be extinct by The System. I’m looked at as a crazy person because I am against The System. I can imagine what I’ll be labelled when I plan to speak about “Black August” with The N.O.I. I always speak the truth and people can’t handle the truth. When I’m seen with Fidel or Che Books I’m called a communist. Are we The Conscious Being looked at as a problem?

The Prison System these days are being packed with a bunch of ignorant boys who were peddling drugs out there. 95 Percent are Rats and don’t care. The other 5% just want to do their 5, 10, 15, years & be a citizen. The problems that were occurring when George was alive are still occurring. The System can try to hide the truth all they want but what Fidel Castro was saying after ’59 & again in ’89 is and will always be the truth, “The United Snakes” will always continue to oppress The People & The Weak Countries & Nations.

There is still so much that I have to learn but one thing that I’ve learned from my comrades is that we will overcome!

VIVA PUERTO RICO LIBRE!
LONG LIVE GEORGE JACKSON!
°AMANDLA!
VENCEREMOS!
FREEDOM IS A CONSTANT STRUGGLE!

In Struggle,
Ernesto Santiago #90304038
Federal Correctional Institution McKean
P.O. Box 8000
Bradford PA
16701 USA