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Kilson Says Black Power Meaningless

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"Like so much else in American society, Black Power is crude in conception, crass in inspiration, rugged and opportunisticv in mode, and devoid of aesthetic," Martin L. Kilson Jr., assistant professor of Government, stated in an article to be printed in the British monthly Encounter.

Kilson said that Black Power leaders see politics as "a proper place to seek therapy for one's social-psychological disabilities." He said that "the rubbish-can of history" awaits those who perpetuate "ritualistically satisfying but politically meaningless action" instead of serious politics.

In another article to apear in the Harvard Journal of Negro Affairs of the Association of African and Afro-American Students, Kilson called the demands of Black Power leaders for a separate Negro state an expression of "a politically bizarre black radical infantilism."

No Solutions?

Black Power advocates are wrong in thinking that no solution for the condition of the Negro masses is possible within the existing power structure, Kilson said in an interview yesterday.

If they would "support Tom Atkins for city councillor instead of alienating the social system," Black Power leaders might see what can be done within the existing institutions, he said.

"Kidnaping a man for seven hours," as in the recent sit-in against a recruiter from the Dow Chemical Company, is no way to present the aims of the Negro or the Left to the typical American, Kilson said.

Kilson also stated that Black Power's "deep-seated racist tendency and outlook" makes it unacceptable to him as a political form.

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