Who is ‘radical’

We were discussing whether the Black Panther Party was really that radical. I’d wanted my students to see that in many ways they were actually not that radical, and just responding to the harsh realities of the racist society that they lived in. Kendra, a student who actively participates in every discussion, responded to the question and argued, “the Black Panther Party made no sense. They were basically terrorists.”  Kendra’s argument directly contradicted my own belief that the Black Panther Party was actually a mostly reasonable response to white supremacy that was happening everywhere. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to tell Kendra she was wrong because that might discourage other students from participating. I also wanted to help her see how the Black Panthers may not have had many options, and that their responses to white supremacy actually did a lot of good for their communities. I also recognized my own biases, and wanted to be clear that I did not condone their use of violence. I thought of a few options to address the situation: I could ask the whole class to define ‘radical’, but that could take up a lot of the limited remaining class time; I could ask Kendra for more evidence, but I risked her feeling like I was attacking her; I could ask her to explain her point, but that could lead her to dig into her point even more; or I could leave it alone, and she might just have a simplistic understanding of the Black Panthers.