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Activist, former fugitive recounts bombings, activism
By Matt Kapko
Community editor
The Lumberjack
02-20-2002
As a conclusion to the North Coast Education Summit, Bill Ayers spoke to a well-received crowd at the Van Duzer Theatre on Feb. 9.
Ayers, a professor of education at University of Illinois at Chicago, may be better known for his days as an activist and fugitive, which he re-captures in his recently released memoir, "Fugitive Days."
Ayers' book release drew intense criticism from ultra-conservatives Rush Limbaugh and David Horowitz.
Being released on Sept. 10 proved to be an invitation for the onslaught of name-calling that ensued.
Early into his talk, he offered rationale for his radical and politically extremist views.
He recalled a somewhat social awakening, in riveting words heard when attending his first teach-in during the 1960s, "You need to live your life so that it doesn't make a mockery of your values."
Starting off his discussion, Ayers said, "We in America know that 22 percent of our country's children are without healthcare, and that our nation's poorest are our children. Part of what we are responsible for is the environment in which kids live."
"Politics is interested in you, and it's coming for you," said Ayers who now focuses on education as a tool of bringing about social justice.
"You should never doubt the power of a few people working hard to do something. No one can predict a mass movement, there will be another one, many many more," Ayers said.
After many active years in the Students for a Democratic Society, Ayers founded a faction group, the Weathermen.
This splinter of SDS was formed when some member's strategies evolved to include armed struggle as a method of resolving the injustices they saw embedded in America's political agenda.
After Nixon's repeated broken promises of withdrawal from the war, the Weathermen initiated a massive anti-war protest resulting in the arrest of 68 Weathermen in 1969.
The group chose not to appear for trial and went underground, renaming themselves the Weather Underground.
On May 25, 1970, the Weather Underground issued a communiqué to the New York Times declaring a revolution against "the Establishment" while promising an attack on a symbol of what they perceived to be imperialist and/or racist institutions.
Within 15 days, the New York Police building was bombed. During the next two years, they carried out several dozen bombings, including the bombing of a bathroom at the Pentagon.
Ayers eventually turned himself in to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Thanks to the Watergate scandal and the subsequent Freedom of Information Act, Ayers found "the FBI had a written plan to kidnap my nephew to get us to come out from underground," noting his nephew was 2-years-old at the time.
Because of this frightening revelation, the two indictments of conspiracy charged to him were dropped -- with FBI reluctance.
Ayers said he refutes the notion of being a terrorist.
"We decided that we wanted to bring the war home," he said. "It wasn't intended to hurt anybody and it didn't."
"What doesn't get called terrorism is state-directed terrorism. We allow ourselves to be anesthetized and put to sleep. I think of the United States as the United States of amnesia," he said.
The life-long activist is an admirer of the anti-globalization, environmental and human rights movements. He said, "I'm more hopeful with how things are today -- not with the government, but with the people."
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