The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, March 23, 1983, Page 4, Image 4
Ex-Yippee Hof
By Srnan G. Hand
Ex-Yippie leader Abbie Hoffman
presented his unique brand of optimism and
determination to fight for social change to a
record-breaking audience of about 450 in the
Russell House ballroom before spring
break.
Hoffman, considered one of the most
audacious and famous of the 1960s radicals,
is a diminutive man with a crown of curly,
graying hair, a beard and a monk's bald
spot. He came out with a plaid scarf
wrapped around his neck, but quickly
discarded it.
Hoffman said he wasn't feeling well and
kept swigging from a bottle of Robitussin
cough syrup.
"A LOT of people say I've changed, that 1
seem to be more mellowed out now," he
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miu. x iic lut-as auu issues commmee nas
put me in a motel, and I brought this as a
souvenir. It says, 'This tag is not to be
removed under penalty of....
"Unlike Mr. (Eldridge) Cleaver, who I
understand was here recently, I have not
been reborn," he said.
Hoffman spoke briefly about the atmosphere
of the 1950s when he was growing
up in Worcester, Mass., that helped turn
him and thousands of other young people
like him into the rebellious youths of the
'60s.
"Things are quiet around the campuses
these days, and I can relate to it. I went to
school in a period much like this known as
the '50s. We knew nothing then and we did
even less," he said.
"THE THING we paid attention to was
nuclear war, which was real, real im1
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fman speaks a
portant," he said. "People all over the
neighborhood were digging up their lawns
and putting in fallout shelters.
"Responsible, reasonable, rational
scientists from places like MIT would go on
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goes off, be sure and cover your eyes from
the flash."
Americans were taught to worship the
concept of "big," he said. Americans
wanted big bombs, big split-level ranch
houses and 2.4 kids. But as the '60s came
along, millions of young people turned their
backs on those ideas, he said.
Hoffman, who was trained as a clinical
psychologist, began his career by working
to improve local ghettoes in Worcester, and
then going on voter registration drives in the
South in the early '60s.
HE BEi iME deeply involved in Vietnam.
His nti-Vietnam War work brought
him national recognition.
"It's strange talking about the war," he
said. "A poll last year of high school
students in Boston showed 75 percent could
not identify Vietnam on a map, 35 percent
did not know the United States had fought a
war there, half of those that did know
believed China and/or Russia had fought as
well, and when asked how many were killed,
the average answer was 2,000 on all sides.
"This was the war that ended in 1975 and
had been going on for 12 or 20 years in this
country, depending on how you count it, and
more than a million and a half people were
killed."
Ho'fman said this ignorance on the part of
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the way history books gloss over such
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'A poll last year of high school
students in Boston showed 75
percent could not identify Vietnam
on a map....'
? Ex-Yippie leader
Abbie Hoffman
subjects. "It's a complete pack of lies," he
said.
HOFFMAN ALSO spoke oil civil
disobedience in this country, as well as its
military history.
"This country, in its fairly young history,
has been involves! in 197 military excursions
abroad. We've been to the halls of Montezuma
12 times. We've invaded Central
America exactly 26 times; 13 times we've
visited Nicaragua.
"Contrary to what you might think, war is
a very popular sport," Hoffman said. "It's
wilder than Superbowl fever even. You get a
chance to sing all the old songs, wave the
flag, burn all the hippies ? I mean everbody
has a jolly good time in war."
CONCERNING THE Vietnam War, he
said people stuck to their guns, telling the
government to bring the troops home.
Before long, it was a national movement,
hundreds of thousands strong.
"I think the resistance to the war in that
whole period is something the American
people should be proud of," he said. "The
alternative was to live in a police state.
"I believe in democracy and I teach it and
I believe it's as radical as it was 200 years
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ago because it involves taking power away ?
from the very few that have it and
distributing it among many. Democracy, to
be true to itself, demands dissent.
"We should be teaching disrespect for
authority and not the blind obedience
preached by the Moral Majority and jerks
? ^ ? - -
ime u. uoraon L.iaay," ne said. The
audience cheered.
"I COME to you as somebody Watergated
long before it was fashionable," Hoffman
said. "Twenty-seven thousand pages of FBI 9)
files; more than 30,000 pages from five or
six other agencies, Naval Intelligence even.
They thought I went underwater."
He said that before he went underground,
the FBI committed three burglaries against
him, 155 illegal wiretaps, character
assassinations and numerous assaults and
other violations of his civil liberties. He said
these are only the incidents he knows about
from government files to which he has had
access.
7)
"They (the Federal government) could
not understand the motivations for turning
backs on the '50s by people who could have it
all, so they hired a psychologist to analyze
me ? $28,000 this government spent to
psychoanalyze me," he said.
Hoffman sued Richard Nixon for $17
million after an Oval Office tape between
Nixon and his chief of staff became public.
In it, Nixon suggested that "thugs" be hired
to beat up protestors such as Hoffman,
whom Nixon specifically named. Hoffman
said he was beaten up after this. ))
t\ iviuivin aiier ine suit was announced,
the Supreme Court decided Nixon was
exempt from all civil suits.
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