Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Spike Lee Movie Whitewashes Police Repression of Blacks
Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
17 Sep 2018
🖨️ Print Article

Robin DG Kelly, the author and essayist, agrees with Boots Riley’s critique of BlacKkKlansman, the Spike Lee movie whose hero is a Black cop who spies on Black activists. “It basically erases state violence,” said Kelly, a professor of history at UCLA. Riley wants to “focus our attention on the larger question: What has been the function of the police in relationship to our struggles for land, bread, freedom, justice and power?”

Police Repression

Related Podcasts

BAR Radio Logo
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Black Agenda Radio January 23, 2026
23 January 2026
In this week’s segment, we cover state repression and regime change efforts.
ICE Protest
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
ICE Domestic Repression in Minnesota
23 January 2026
Mnar Adley is the founder and director of MintPress News, an independent media outlet.
Ilyasah Shabazz
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Shabazz Family Lawsuit Against the FBI and NYPD
03 October 2025
The investigation of the 1965 assassination of El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, Malcolm X, was compromised by the NYPD and the FBI from the very beginning

More Stories


  • War is a Racist Enterprise
    Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
    War is a Racist Enterprise
    01 Sep 2021
    Racism is an unspoken rationale for U.S. imperialist actions.
  • We Can No Longer Avoid Raising the Contradiction of the Western Imperial Left’s Collaboration with the Western Bourgeoisie
    ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    We Can No Longer Avoid Raising the Contradiction of the Western Imperial Left’s Collaboration with the Western Bourgeoisie
    01 Sep 2021
    As the Western left has become more aligned with their imperialist bourgeoisie in the destabilization of the Global South, the radical Black tradition provides a clear approach to “turn imperia
  • U.S. Escalates Threats to Ethiopian and Eritrean Sovereignty
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    U.S. Escalates Threats to Ethiopian and Eritrean Sovereignty
    01 Sep 2021
    U.S. Special Envoy to the Horn of Africa Jeffrey Feltman recently returned from a tour of Ethiopia, Djibouti, and the United Arab Emirates. On the following Monday, the U.S.
  • An Open Letter to His Serene Majesty Leopold II, King of the Belgians and Sovereign of the Independent State of Congo, 1890
    Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    An Open Letter to His Serene Majesty Leopold II, King of the Belgians and Sovereign of the Independent State of Congo, 1890
    01 Sep 2021
  • The Harvard Crimson
    Patrick Anderson
    Realism, Idealism, and the Deradicalization of Critical Race Theory—Rethinking the CRT Debate, Part 2
    01 Sep 2021
    Patrick Anderson continues his examination of Critical Race Theory.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us