Notes from Underground
Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn on North Coast living
(Aug. 13, 2009) A couple of Saturdays ago,my friend Ken Malcomson and I had just sat down to interview Bernardine Dohrn and her husband, Bill Ayers, at the Arcata Co-op, where they’d just purchased a cartful of groceries to take into the mountains. A young stranger came up to the table.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” she said, “but I just wanted to say how much I admire you both, and what you do.”
A lot of people know about Ayers and Dohrn. Leaders of the radical left group Weather Underground in the late ‘60s and the ‘70s. One-time fugitives. Recent lightning rods — especially Ayers — for criticism aimed at discrediting Barack Obama, with whom they’ve rubbed elbows in Chicago.
But, also, many might know of Dohrn’s and Ayers’ work over the past 40 years as professionals, lecturers and authors. Dohrn is an associate professor of law at Northwestern University. She also runs the Children and Family Law Justice Center, work for which she won a national award this year. Ayers is a Distinguished Professor of education at the University of Illinois Chicago and has written several books about teaching.
This Friday, Aug. 14, in the morning, Ayers will be at Humboldt State University talking to secondary education students. Later, at 7 p.m. at Northtown Books in Arcata, Dohrn and Ayers will talk about their new book, Race Course: Against White Supremacy, which is part memoir.
And now, the interview — during which, we note, there was one more interruption. Ayers and Dohrn were talking about how there could be farms within the city of Chicago — like compatriots of theirs are doing in Detroit — when an older woman approached the table and said, “Excuse me, I couldn’t help but overhearing. Have you heard about the Guerrilla Gardens in Chicago?”
“No!” said Dohrn, excitedly, and said she’d like to hear more about it after the interview.
(Excerpts of this interview appeared in the print edition of the Journal.)
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16 Comments
Comment / By John Fullerton / Aug. 13, 2009, 4:36 p.m.
Rather than a fawning interview which “romanticized” her violent past, I would like to have read an interview which asked her some tough questions.
Like, does she stand by her past or denounce it ? Comments like “Dig it! First they killed those pigs and then they put a fork in pig Tate’s belly. Wild!” in Dec 1969. Here she was referring to the gruesome Sharon Tate murders.
How about “We are building a communist organization to be part of the forces to build a revolutionary communist party to lead the working class to seize power & build socialism.”
How about the bombings of federal buildings & police stations in the 1970’s which resulted in the deaths of three of her fellow Weather Underground comrades ?
What about the actions of her friends ? Two of whome were convicted of murder & then she took in their children ?
She can’t chalk up all this violence & hatred on her part, to youthful exuberance. She was in her 30’s when she committed many of her felonies.
You shortchanged & cheated your readers. An opportunity lost.
Comment / By Chris / Aug. 14, 2009, 9:40 p.m.
These people should have been serving time for their crimes.
Comment / By Don Marchant / Aug. 14, 2009, 10:21 p.m.
Basking in the glow of garbage….
They should have been run out of town by anyone who recognized them.
Comment / By Frieda Dreyfuss / Aug. 14, 2009, 11:22 p.m.
So, before Obama ever entered politics, the murderous criminal Bloody Bill Ayers thought Obama was the most intelligent person he ever met. If Bloody Bill Ayers disagreed with any of Obama’s views, he would never have given him such an endorsement as the left can only call people stupid whose ideas they don’t agree with. This gives some insight into what a radical Obama is that such a murderer would think so highly of him.
Comment / By anon / Aug. 15, 2009, 2:26 a.m.
I wouldn’t justify what they may have said or done 35-40 yrs ago. But I wouldn’t justify young people who became soldiers and killed people in wars “to fight for our freedom” either. Both were mistaken. Both thought they were doing the right thing, but innocent people died. I love a man who fought in a war, who shot a gun out into the invisible night in a far away jungle to fight for our freedom, who has turned his njghtmares into a life of conscious altruism. I can love these people too.
Comment / By Old Glory Radio / Aug. 15, 2009, 7:51 a.m.
Gee…you would hardly know they were terrorists at all reading this drivel. I read it twice and can’t find the questions about the death of the San Francisco police officer and Dorn’s fingerprints…or the many other bombings and mamings? Must be coming out next week in part two.
Comment / By anon / Aug. 15, 2009, 5:40 p.m.
Maybe not asking about that stuff was a condition of the interview.
Comment / By Staley / Aug. 16, 2009, 4:34 a.m.
it’s like they never left college. Still smokin dope and ‘stickin it to the man’ after, what, four decades? jesus.
Comment / By Great Interview! / Aug. 16, 2009, 12:46 p.m.
That was very inspiring to read. You almost never get to hear that kind of perspective. Good one!
Comment / By Thirdeye / Aug. 16, 2009, 2:31 p.m.
The Weather Underground did as much as anyone to marginalize the left in this country. Ayers and Dohrn never owned up to that fact. Were their extreme acts really indiscretions borne of youth and rage, or were they just the arrogant acts of punks from privileged backgrounds who knew that others would deal with the consequences while their sugar daddies would spot them in a jam? That’s exactly what happened.
The Weather Underground was racist as hell. They viewed black people as cannon fodder for their “revolution.”
Ayers and Dohrn’s simplistic and ideologically lensed view of race relations assures they will remain irrelevant regarding the real issues of minorities in America.
Comment / By Rose / Aug. 16, 2009, 8:58 p.m.
I cannot tell you how disgusted I am with the northcoast journal right now.
Comment / By Anonymous / Aug. 20, 2009, 12:33 a.m.
Following his illegal invasions, murder, mayhem, plunder, and other crimes against humanity; like the tonnage of depleted uranium spread across the Middle-East, I hope the traitor George W. Bush can atone to half the degree Ayers and Dohrn have.
Comment / By Ken Malcomson / Nov. 17, 2009, 7:19 a.m.
Their salad looked really good!
Comment / By Why / Aug. 16, 11:47 p.m.
They’re back. Okay, whose housing the terrorists this year? Make sure your homeowners policy covers explosive devices as they have lengthly resume in building and deploying pipe bombs.
Comment / By Buzz / Aug. 17, 8:05 a.m.
If this couple had been right-wing Ruby Ridge types, most of the reactionaries commenting here would be making apologies for their youthful indiscretions and congratulating them for their continued activism.
Comment / By BiffMalibu / Oct. 4, 7:12 p.m.
Hey Buzz, You obviously know nothing of the Ruby Ridge incident in which an FBI sniper murdered a mother while that woman was holding her infant daughter. That was only one of many atrocities perpetrated on the family. The Weavers never committed a crime. Randy was acquitted in a trial in which his defense attorney didn’t even have to present a case, so obvious was the governments attempted frame up of the Weavers. The Weavers never hurt anyone, never threatened anyone. That’s a far cry from the bombings and murders perpetrated by the Weathermen. Crimes for which little Billy and Bernadine were never held accountable.