The Weather Underground was a Radical Left group that splintered off of Students for a Democratic Society in 1969; their mission was the violent overthrow of the US government. Weather Underground member Cathy Wilkerson escaped unharmed from the group’s accidental explosion of a Greenwich Village safe house in 1970. She discusses the group’s legacy and her own activism since the 1960s in Flying Close to the Sun.
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Guests:
Cathy Wilkerson
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Comments [4]
More rich rebels high on the hubris of their rebel actions only to end up committing the very actions they set out to decry. Down with the system man, down with the man, man. It's the same utter absurdity of the abortion clinic bombers.
In the end unfortunately the world is not a hippie commune, and no nation was ever formed without some grief, bloodshed and conflict.
Please relate these issues to today, when the dangers we face from an unrestrained presidency and compliant Congress and populace are even more dire.
Oh its that time again, my friends. This time we stand together for humanity, or humanity falls.
A tough question for Cathy Wilkerson:
In 1969, SDS was a huge organization, and the left, especially the student left, was a major force in the United States. A few years later, SDS was no more, the left was a shambles and relatively impotent. How much responsibility do you take, as a key organizer of the activities of Weatherman, for scuttling SDS and diverting progressive politics with ultra-left ideology and terrorist action?
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