Select this to read [the Whole Story].If you want to know about my own personal political development, as I remember it went like this: I could see that segregation and nuclear bombs were wrong and stupid. That wasn't hard. However the only other people who seemed to agree, and to want to do anything about it, were socialists and communists, so of course I became a socialist too.
Select this to read [the Whole Story].
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I was around and active during the Vietnam War and before. I was active in the peace/nuclear disarmament/civil rights movement in the late 50's and many of my classmates went to Nam, my brother went to Canada and I worked with AFSC's CO program.
I think there's still healing needed. Truth IS a great healer. I'm not sure most people are ready yet for the truth about Viet Nam, Korea, WWII, nuclear energy or several other myths our government has perpetuated.
No one's ever asked for an account of my experiences. I find that as I'm writing this, I still feel pain and sadness (as well as a memory of the incredible energy and elation felt as so many people from a complete cross-section of the country started joining the opposition to the war).
I may not be able to answer all the questions you ask without writing a book! I'll start and also add some random memories that just occur to me. My time is somewhat limited so you'll probably get bits and pieces...
Your activism spanned the peace/nuclear disarmament/civil rights movements. I think the movements evolved from each other. Do you agree? How would you compare them?
I became aware of civil rights issues when I was about 7 or 8 years old. My father was called before the HUAC (House Un-American Activities Committee). I remember that one of his friends killed himself because he couldn't get a job to support his family after being called before the committee.
I began going to demonstrations against the hearings when I was about 13. Dad was also a member of SANE. In 1959 I walked from Livermore to San Francisco on the Easter Peace Walk.
I never articulated in my mind a separation between the peace/disarmament and civil rights movements. Some of my friends went to the South for the Freedom Rides, we organized picket lines at Woolworths, took part in prayer vigils during executions at San Quentin, and worked for the Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty. (I still have my SNCC button from 1962.) It seemed at the time that if we didn't DO SOMETHING, the hate/distrust/fear would destroy the world.
In 1960 I witnessed an above-ground [nuclear] test. I was devastated and completely astounded (words can't convey). How could anybody who had EVER seen this say that nuclear power was a good thing for the world?!?
It's evident to me that you came from a pretty special family. Have I understood this correctly?
(About your comment on the the courage needed for activism, many times I've felt that it requires more stubbornness than courage.)
I don't consider my family "special", but out-of-the-ordinary, yes. My mother is a community, grassroots activist. She organizes in her neighborhood, town, county. Her focus has been individual empowerment. She's one of the first (all of my life) in the "think globally-act locally" movement. Dad made public stands for human rights, world peace, unions, nuclear non-proliferation. He died at age sixty. Three of their six children are "activists."
Select this to read [the Whole Story].
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I lived in Berkeley during the 1960s. My mother worked at the University and was a socialist, so i was a red-diaper baby. I went on my first peace march in 1961, at Easter. I took part in civil rights demonstrations and anti-war demonstrations on a regular basis. I was tear-gassed often.
Select this to read [the Whole Story].
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as you requested, some free associations:
yes, i agree that [the Vietnam War] was a rite of passage, in several respects. it was the first time that i felt i was not just a passive traveller in society, but an active player with a stand and a power that could be felt. it was a major source of generational identity. i remember how the war suddenly became a real thing when i realized the boys i knew were eligible to be drafted. it made the world large and small at the same time - large because my perspective now included something much bigger than my previous high school concerns, and smaller because vietnam did not feel far or distant. it was the first time i felt that it was my turn to take a stand.
joined: yes, i think joined is the right word for me. my family has always been organizers; labor activists, civil rights activists. i was a high school student when the moratoria started, and i was approached by a peace group just by happenstance to be an organizer on the high school campus. i said yes because all my life i had been taken to marches. but when i started working with this group the issues took on a larger life. it connected me with people who thought a lot about peace, not just regarding this war. and, when i started organizing and saw the hostile reaction, it gave me true feeling of "oh, shit, there's *lots* to be done - better get going!"
i was a high school student when this began, so my parents never let me go to any of the marches in dc. my role was to organize simultaneous marches and protests in my home town. now, i grew up in a white privileged family in a white privileged suburb. leading my first march was the first time that i was on the other side of the system. i was shocked by the rage and fury this march for peace and an end to the killing inspired. we had to be surrounded by police for our own safety. people tried to throw things at us and hit us and splash us with paint. it really made me begin to think about what made people have such a strong stake in supporting the war, with frightening conclusions....
i also did a lot of fundraising to bus people to the dc marches, and i became aware of how limited most people's concept of social consciousness was. very few could see any personal benefit from ending this war (remember, privileged: had lots of ways of keeping their *own* kids out.) i was accustomed to my parents, and was shocked at all the lip service, no action, no sense of an intangible good.
and as to the sixties, well they seemed more like a call to arms than a madness to me. i remember standing in a service with my father while he tried to explain to me what had happened to martin luther king, and going to the strategy session of the civil rights group he worked with afterwards. it seemed unreal until rfk's death, when the picture finally jelled for me. i remember going to see rfk's coffin just because i felt a need to really witness it, to be a part of the changes that were happening.
and i guess i believed that we were changing the world. that we would bring about world peace. that we would bring about a time of human understanding and caring.
Select this to read [the Whole Story].
