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Die Standing: From Black Panther Revolutionary to Global Diversity Consultant
November 24 @ 3:00 pm - 4:30 pm EST
The Baton Foundation will host Elmer Dixon as he talks about his journey from co-founder of the first Black Panther Party chapter outside California to diversity consultant.
About the Book
This powerful memoir, with a foreword by former Black Panther Party Chairman Bobby Seale, sets the record straight about the altruistic mission of the Black Panther Party. Historically, members of the Panthers have been maligned in media, movies, and minds as angry, gun-toting, misogynistic thugs. During his tenure, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover declared the Black Panther Party “the greatest threat to the internal security of the country.”
To the contrary, the Panthers started a free breakfast program for children, distributed free groceries to families, opened schools, founded health clinics, and provided patrols to protect people from police abuse. Today, their 10-point plan serves as a blueprint for social justice movements in the United States and abroad.
In Die Standing (Two Sisters Writing and Publishing, 2023), Dixon describes how heavily armed Panthers confronted police to protect Black drivers. He also takes the reader into suspenseful scenes inside the Panthers’ homes and offices.
The book shows how, after 16 years in the Party, Dixon began working as an EEO officer and training manager for a large organization for which he developed and implemented trainings. He also monitored accusations of sexual harassment and racial discrimination.
Die Standing offers Elmer Dixon’s inspiring story and action-oriented teachings to help propel social justice movements forward by creating a world in which Black and Brown people are safe to live, learn, and prosper.
About the Speaker
Elmer Dixon is a Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) consultant. His expertise in the field is rooted in his identity as a revolutionary committed to working for equality and justice.
Inspired by the Black Liberation Movement of the 1960s, Elmer was 17 years old when he and his older brother, Aaron, co-founded the Seattle chapter of the Black Panther Party in 1968—the first chapter outside of California.
After guiding the chapter to local prominence by providing essential services to Black and Brown people in his multicultural community, Elmer served as director of the Al Davis Girls and Boys Club in Tacoma, Washington’s predominantly Black Hilltop community. He then became Training Manager and EEO officer for the Seattle Parks Department, creating and implementing anti-sexual harassment policies, recruiting women to non-traditional jobs, and investigating sexual harassment complaints. Dixon’s success in that position led then-Mayor Charles Royer to appoint him to his cabinet as director of the city’s Citizens Service Bureau.
Elmer’s EEO work impressed the founders of Executive Diversity Services (EDS), who recruited him to a new career providing high-level DEIB training to national and international businesses. In 2010, Elmer became the organization’s president.
Elmer has been a guest lecturer at JAMK University of Applied Sciences in Finland for the last 13 years, and teacher at Espeme University in Lille and Nice, France. He is the current president of SIETAR USA, and routinely presents at SIETAR Europa. His recent TEDx Talk is “Stories from the Revolution’s Front Lines.”