Notes from Underground
Ayers: I agree with that. I think victimology is immoral. I don’t think you can build a moral frame from portraying yourself as a victim.
Malcomson: The thing that bothered me about the Skip Gates situation — I can understand that his first reaction would be, oh here it comes. But it worries me that maybe he was steeped in that kneekjerk victimology.
Ayers: We missed all that — we’ve been on vacation.
Dohrn: No, I read about it. … The thing is, to be a black man in America is to be constantly aware that you can be stopped by the police for no good reason, and humiliated. And it is an experience that the president has had, it’s an experience that the attorney general has had. It doesn’t matter how prestigious you are, or how wealthy you are, you can’t get a cab to stop for you. You can get thrown up against the side of the car. You can show your ID and it shows you’re, whatever, a professor of here a professor of there — whatever … Probably nobody was a saint in this situation. But, the chances of it happening to a white man in that situation are much smaller. That’s just a fact. That’s why the response, including by the President, was so visceral.
Ayers: It is a teachable moment.
Walters: Can we talk about Race Course? What do you hope readers will get out of it?
Dohrn: We were asked to write it by the poet Haki Madhubuti, who lives in our neighborhood and is a friend and a contemporary of ours. And the fact that Third World Press [founded and headed by Madhubuti], which is the largest and longest-lasting independent black book publishing company in the United States, asked us to write it meant that we said yes right away. He wanted us to write something that was part memoir — so, using the question of being parents and taking care of our parents and our work and life around children and justice, and children and education — to answer the question why, for four decades, we’ve been kind of fixated on the role of white supremacy and racism in American life, as white people. So that’s what the book is an effort to address.
Walters: Did you learn anything about yourselves while writing this book, come to any new conclusions?
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on the cover
Railroad!
Proposed lines ‘set rich blood a-tingling’ in early 1900s
Some Other Proposed North Coast Railroads
Choo-choo Fantasies
Exposing this east-west rail nonsense
seven-o-heaven
Undeterred Will
Will chides Andrew for lack of attention to detail and makes plans for his inevitable victory.
Recent news story
May 17
Safe Solar Watching
May 10
Trees, Please
The beauty police keep a sharp eye on Caltrans as it studies ways to make Broadway safer
May 3
Super Pay
For super work, say the county's five supervisors
Today
44th Annual Kinetic Grand Championship Race
STAFF PICK / events, art, outdoors, sports, for kids, free / 9 a.m.-6 p.m. A 3-day, 42-mile kinetic sculpture race over land, sand, mud and water! LeMans start at the Noon Whistle on the Arcata Plaza. Follow the race through Manila, Eureka and into Ferndale on Memorial Day for the Glorious Finish. kineticgrandchampionship.com. 889-3024.
Flow 2012 Fashion Show
STAFF PICK / events / 8 p.m. Arcata Theatre Lounge, 1036 G St. Student designed and produced clothing. Fundraiser for Arcata Arts Institute. $35/$25 students. artsinstitute.net. 822-1220.
Woodside Preschool's Rummage/Bake Sale
events / 8 a.m.-noon. Woodside Preschool, 900 Hodgson St, Eureka. www.woodsidepreschool.com. 445-9132.
Lanphere Dunes Restoration
STAFF PICK / outdoors / 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Meet at Pacific Union School. Help remove non-native invasives at the Lanphere Dunes Unit of the Humboldt Bay National Wildlife Refuge. Tools and gloves provided, wear work clothes and bring water. Carpool to the protected site. 444-1397.
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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.