Written by Harvey Pekar
Mostly Drawn by Gary Dumm
Edited by Paul Buhle
Published by Hill and Wang, a division of Farrar, Straus and Giroux
If you’re watching or participating in the Occupy Wall Street movement, then you might want to take a look at this information filled graphic history of the “Students for a Democratic Society”, edited by Paul Buhle, mostly drawn by Gary Dumm and written mostly by the late Harvey Pekar, who had been putting together a number of books before his death.
I can’t tell you what an intense and valuable history lesson this is of the American Left. The first thing that you need to know is that even though the American Left has very intelligent and talented people within it we kind of lost. Our goal should have been the science fictional world of Norway. We didn’t get that. The United States of the future will probably look like Mexico, full of criminal cartels, little to no safety net and a completely corrupt governing regime. But SDS did a lot of things right and we can learn from these things. Just a personal viewpoint after reading this: Progressives need their own party and they need to pay and treat their members better. Republicans are at least loyal…
The book is divided into two sections. The first section is a massive historical overview of the movement from its origins in the sixties to when it kind of petered out in the seventies to its possible reemergence in the Here and Now. We’ll see. That lasts about 54 pages. The second section deals with individual stories of the movement including Mark Naison, Paul Buhle, who apparently was involved in SDS magazine, and Heather Booth, who indirectly gave me a job canvassing several times in my life when I definitely needed the money. (SDS begat Heather Booth. Heather Booth begat the Midwest Academy. The Midwest Academy begat a number of state wide consumer groups that span the country today such as Indiana Citizen Action and many others.)
I should point out that this organization was very successful in the 60s and 70s in terms of civil rights gains, more freedom for women, organizing against the war etcetera. But it didn’t really achieve a long term structure within which to operate in like, say, a political party. It should also be pointed out that these many organizations were undermined by Cointelpro and its father like organizations. For example, infiltrating the movement and then openly pushing for some kind of violent actions. Or, in other words, they had help to fail.
Every page is full of interesting thought, theory and action. Here’s Harvey Pekar’s take on why it was hard to organize the white working class in the early 70s. I think this applies now too but you be the judge.
Bottom line: if you want to know about the hard mechanics about trying to change the world and why its so difficult (Smart people are harder to organize and don’t take as well to hierarchy…The Man will also undermine your efforts, beat you up, and close down your parks…) then this would be a fantastic first read. 4.8 out of 5 stars.
