Current Events and a Recent Interview
Bill Ayers interview
With the Arab Spring and the Occupy movements there seems to be a distinct parallel between what is happening now and what was happening in the 60’s: the summer of ’68, world uprisings, the Civil Rights movement, the general malaise with the establishment. What is your take on Occupy?
1). It’s tempting to make comparisons, but I resist. Humanity plunges forward, circumstances shift, unpredictable upheaval and fickle fate allow us to redraw the maps of the known world. What’s consistent is this: people find ways to resist what they find unjust and unacceptable—not everyone all the time, not neatly nor universally, certainly not predictably. And our responsibility—personally, collectively, generationally—also remains the same: to make a concrete analysis of real conditions, to open our eyes to the world around us, to act on whatever the known demands. We are fortunate to live at a moment when hope and history rhyme, and when a participatory, popular movement for justice and peace is in-the-making.
Occupy is an expression of hope and an invitation to pay attention at this unique and expectant moment. It’s an