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1969, the new left had developed an intense and oppressive sense of
community . It is impossible to exaggerate the degree of sheer fear ,
fear of isolation, of being thought cowardly, of losing one's friends,
and of not being in on the action when the revolution took place,
that I and many other veterans of the new left felt at that convention .
Although I had been in many demonstrations , I still looked on in dis–
belief as the Harvard and Columbia SDS chapters screamed at one
another in unison chants such as "Ho-Ho-Ho Chi Minh, people's
war is going to win" or "Mao-Mao-Mao Tse Tung, dare to struggle,
dare to win ." Here were people my own age, who had gone to lead–
ing universities, who appeared to be out of their minds .
The "Weathermen," later the "Weather Underground ," were
the greatest challenge to most of the new leftists there, for however
"crazy" we said they were, Weatherman captured the feeling of alien–
ation and indeed hatred of American society and politics that had
become pervasive in SDS. This anti-Americanism was expressed in
quintessentially American terms and thus was less off-putting than
that of the more stolid Marxist-Leninists. Above all, however anti–
American it was , Weatherman promised success. At home we may
be weak, but the new left was a link in the chain of international rev–
olution including millions of people, especially "the Vietnamese peo–
ple ." The "movement" was a thing of the past. The "revolution" was
already taking place all over the world. The only question now was
whether there would be white Americans who would be part of the
problem or part of the solution.
We were not alone. The Third World was the new collective
subject of history, the new radical class taking the place of the well–
fed and ideologically blinded working class. I was both appalled and
attracted. By spring 1969, I was not averse to apocalyptic interpreta–
tions of American politics and an "either/or" style of political think–
ing. Either one stood on the side of the oppressed peoples of the earth
or was an "objective" ally of American imperialism. Either America
would be engulfed in the flames of a race war, or we could see to it
that the race war could be transformed into a - more constructive
and presumably slightly less violent - class war. At last, here were
people who were going to put their actions where their mouths were
and unite theory and practice .
The Weather statement was fundamentally new leftist in a cul-
(
tural sense as well. It promised to demonstrate that "the personal is
political." Politics was not one sphere of life separated from others.
Politics and life were to become one. No aspect of personal life was
