OCR Text |
Show White Activists Change Politics Autumn Stimulates Reappraisal. By MARK SOMMER Liberation News Service WASHINGTON, D.C. (LNS) If last summer was a season of frustration frus-tration and hopelessness for young American radicals, autumn has become be-come the period of self-appraisal White activists, finding themselves them-selves shunted off from the increasingly in-creasingly independent black movement, move-ment, are now being obliged to take account of their own politics, and perhaps to change those politics. As recently as a month ago, one longtime long-time SNCC worker was able to remark re-mark with witty disdain that the American radical movement was "a black panther with a white tail." But the panther is changing. White leftists, after months and even years of idealogical and tactical drift, are beginning to define themselves them-selves as other than the tail of someone else's movement. In fact, it may be the birth of a wholly new animal. That animal, with all of its contradictions con-tradictions and complexities, is showing itself most clearly in its relation to the anti-war movement. On October 21, In Washington, there will be another mass march to protest the Vietnam war. Like the April Mobilization that preceded it, the Washington march is a volatile vola-tile coalition of many left groups. The "invitational list" to the Administrative Ad-ministrative Committee of the Mobilization Mo-bilization includes on the same piece of paper Dr. Benjamin Spock of SANE, Stokely Carmichael of SNCC, and the New York DuBois Clubs. Six months ago, such a coalition co-alition was still possible, if not completely workable. Today, it is more a wish and a regret than a reality. . Within the functioning Mobilization Mobili-zation itself, there are many and disparate elements. The bulk of the energies being exerted by moderates moder-ates (SANE, certain New York labor la-bor unions, Veterans for Peace) are aimed at producing the largest possible pos-sible mass of protestors to petition their grievances with the Johnson Administration. Like the April demonstration, dem-onstration, the October march is seen by the moderates as a forceful force-ful witness of conscience and concern; con-cern; and this one is all the more powerful because it will march directly di-rectly to the Pentagon and address itself to those who are carrying out the war. But the Mobilization directors have seen fit this time to allow more direct and aggressive forms of protest to take place if not under un-der its immediate sponsorship, then not under its strict prohibition. This alone is a development of recent months. (In the preparations for the April march, the Mobilization heads flew ten members of a group planning mass draft card burning to New York to tell them the Mobilization Mo-bilization would have nothing "officially" "offi-cially" to do with it). In October, not only draft cards will be burned, but most probably flags, television sets, and five-dollar bills: and this time, the Mobilization plans simply to avert its official eyes. More significant than that, perhaps, per-haps, is the establishment within the Mobilization itself of a "Direct "Di-rect Action Project." Seeking to move "from dissent to resistance," as one leaflet declares, the direct - action group will carry out disruptive dis-ruptive action "over a sustained period of time." The group's first project was the scattering of antiwar anti-war leaflets on the floor of the Senate Sen-ate during the opening ceremonies of the new session (a move vociferously vocifer-ously condemned by all five Senators Sena-tors on the floor at the time). Since then, groups have picketed, blocked the entrance, and sought to enter the Selective Service national headquarters head-quarters in Washington. But what makes this march different diff-erent from all others, if anything, is the prospect of massive civil disobedience dis-obedience at the Pentagon building on October 21. Jerry Rubin, a director direc-tor of the Mobilization and a militant mili-tant in its context, is thinking in terms of ten thousand or more sit-down sit-down protestors who will block the above-ground entrances to the Pentagon Pen-tagon for up to three days. "They may arrest us or they may just let us sit," Rubin says. No matter what, it's going to be pretty disruptive." dis-ruptive." Nevertheless, he declines to predict what exactly will happen. hap-pen. "Hopefully, everybody will do his own thing, says Rubin, "whatever "what-ever stage they're at." Rubin and Cornell University Professor Robert Rob-ert Greenblatt, a co-chairman of the Mobilization, are quick to define their ultimate goals, and their reasons rea-sons for staying within the Mobilization. Mobili-zation. "We are not petitioning the President for an end to just this war, says Rubin; "if the war ended today, it still wouldn't change anything any-thing fundamental in the society. We're trying to build a mass revolutionary revolu-tionary movement that will be able to assume power." The rhetorical gap between Jerry Rubin and the radicals outside the Mobilization is negligible; but the directions of their energies are ultimately ul-timately very different. One amateur ama-teur political philosopher explains the difference in quasi-Freudian terms: "The Mobilization people," he says, "are still working within the framework of 'patriarchal politics.' poli-tics.' When they want to change something, they ask, beg, or demand de-mand it from Big Daddy; they define de-fine themselves in terms of Big Daddy. The radicals outside" the Mobilization the community organizers or-ganizers are into a system of 'fraternal politics' where Big Daddy is no longer alive (or at least, no longer relevant) for them. They're looking for chance over a long period of time, from the very bottom bot-tom up." |