◆ SpookStack

é bye h 1 Pee et aL SIRE Ta RRM RT OTS rs ke et Pe ee NO aia Risi , ty Jae DRS * Al ‘ aN a seliintis A RL oe . the white counterpart of the Black Panther Party. But, that never came tobe due to the different forms of oppression the different constituencies of the Black and White Panther Par- Tles are subjected to. Black people are oppressed racially and materially; so the ten~point program of the Black Panther Party related to those forms of political oppression by making political demands for "land, bread, housing, clothing, edu- cation, justice, and peace. | The white people Sinclair and Plamondon were attempting to organize were primarily cul= ture-oriented; so the ten-point program of the White Panther Party related primarily to their cultural oppression by de- manding an open society where free dope, free sex, and free _ rock music abounded. (They did make political references as well, the principle ones being the right of armed self-defense and complete support for the ten-point program of the Black Panther Party.) . While their followers were primarily culturally oriented, Sinclair and Plamondon were themselves very political. They were thought to believe that the perverted system of values in this country was a direct outgrowth of the undemocratic pol-.. Itical system and the competitive economic system. By prim- arlly relating to their followers! cultural oppression now, they supposedly hoped to educate them to the system's role in that oppression later. They were therefore viewed as very dangerous by the power structure and were moved against. Plamondon was framedona charge of attempting to blow-up & Federa! Building in Ann Arbor and ts still In jail today. Sinclair was given a ten year jail sentence for possessing two joints and wasn't released until early this Spring. The Rainbow People's Party was founded by Sinctalr as the successor to the White Panther Party. It concentrated its efforts on local community organizing in the Ann Arbor area and linked-up with the state-wide Human Rights Party. Five Rainbow candidates, including "Pun" Plamondon's wife Genie, ran for Ann Arbor city council! seats In April under the Hu- man Rights Party banner. Part of the agreement between the two parties was that neither would support any Democratic - candidates. Sut, two weeks after two of their candidates gotelected, Sinclair, Genle Plamondon, and the rest of the Rainbow Party broke the agreement and announced thelr sup=- port for George McGovern.