GET WOKE, White People!

Bill Ayers

The world-wide outpouring of rage immediately following the inauguration of Donald Trump was dazzling and heartening. Women in the lead, connections and intersectionality in the air, humor, art, determination, solidarity—the people rising, the popular opposition on display. I loved so many signs waving in the streets of Washington: “Fight like a girl!”; “If my uterus shot bullets it would have more protection than it does now;” “If it’s not intersectional, it’s not my feminism;” “I love my nasty mom.”

 

We can and we must build a broad social movement in fierce and effective opposition to Trumpism, and for a world in balance.

 

It’s time to organize a powerful resistance.

 

And that means in part getting smart, paying attention, waking up in new ways.

 

White folks need to get over the illusion of innocence.

 

I remember years ago watching a sequence from the documentary, “Shoah.” The…

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I voted…early.

Bill Ayers

I voted.
Early.
No illusions that a billionaire’s ball is either a reflection of popular will or a mandate for what is to be done; no dreams that pulling a lever fulfills my ongoing responsibility as a socially engaged person or could possibly realize my most hopeful vision of a just and joyful world; no fantasies that the process is either clean or fair or honest.
But I voted.
Because it’s a fundamental right. Because people who are denied that right demand it and fight like hell for it all across the globe. Because I remember the courage of African-Americans on the courthouse steps in Mississippi and Alabama enduring hatred and humiliation, risking violence and death for access to the ballot. Because the right to vote is secured with blood. Because the right to vote is, then, sacred.
But four billion dollars? Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Finance, Big…

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Don’t use Staples.

Fred Klonsky

As a state-wide elected delegate to the NEA RA I get reimbursed for most of my expenses. I have to fill out forms and provide receipts as it is carefully monitored by the IRS.

And who knows? Maybe the NSA too.

Rather than make copies of the forms at home, I normally go to the neighborhood Staples.

But not this time.

I am boycotting Staples. And so should you.

The United States Postal Service and Staples have teamed up to place mini-post offices in Staples stores. But not pay union wages to the employees that work in these USPS outlets, employees will be paid minimum wage.

The American Postal Workers Union is saying hell no.

They are asking us to boycott Staples.

Last weekend the American Federation of Teachers voted to support the boycott.

Then the USPS and Staples pulled a sneaky bit of bait and switch.

They issued a…

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Goodnight Sweet Poets

Bill Ayers

Passages

One is responsible to life: It is the small beacon in the terrifying darkness from which we come and to which we shall return. One must negotiate this passage as nobly as possible, for the sake of those who are coming after us.
—James Baldwin

When Maxine Greene passed away on May 29, 2014, I felt that I’d lost more than a friend and a beloved teacher; I’d lost a significant part of myself as well. She was so vivid and powerful and animated one moment and then suddenly gone. The air left the room.
Many of us who loved her so much gathered to share stories and memories as we consoled one another—and we will do so again in a large public space in the Fall—and we laughed and we cried, always reminding ourselves that she had lived a long life—96 years!—largely of her own making and her…

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