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Topic: The Chicago 8

Michelle
Moderator
Babbler # 560

posted 24 June 2007 04:31 AM

I'm watching a movie right now on the Chicago 8 trial. It's very interesting. Bobby Seale is incredible! Abbie Hoffman is a bit of a prick, though.

Of course, I'm only partway through the movie. Maybe he had redeeming qualities.

[Edited to say - Jesus, I'm an idiot. I wrote "8" instead of "7". It was a braino, not typo.]

[Edited again to say - hey, the movie IS called the Chicago 8. No wonder. So which is it? Wikipedia says Chicago 7 and the movie says Chicago 8.]

[Edited yet again to say - Oh, I see. It was the Chicago 8 until Bobby Seale's trial was severed from the others.]

[ 24 June 2007: Message edited by: Michelle ]

From: I've got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell. | Registered: May 2001 | IP: Logged

Boom Boom
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 7791

posted 24 June 2007 04:57 AM

Abbie Hoffman had quite a sense of humour, though, including titling his first book "Steal This Book".

From: Make the rich pay! | Registered: Dec 2004 | IP: Logged

Michelle
Moderator
Babbler # 560

posted 24 June 2007 05:47 AM

Hee.

Well, my opinion has softened as the movie went on (I just finished it now). He seemed like a bit of smug prick at the beginning of the movie, but the interviews with him "now" (which was 1987) were excellent.

The judge was a jerk, but I also felt a bit of sympathy for him, too. I mean, how do you deal with such a circus?

From: I've got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell. | Registered: May 2001 | IP: Logged

Boom Boom
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 7791

posted 24 June 2007 06:25 AM

I might have seen the film myself, although it was quite a while ago. I used to read Rolling Stone in the 60s and 70s and the Chicago 8 and the Black Panthers were newsworthy back then. I saw and heard Jane Fonda in her 'radical chic' days and some other radicals at Fanshawe College in London in either 1970 or 1971, after they had been hassled at the border by the Canadian border guard (although Fonda was herself being a bit of a jerk apparently, by treating the border cops as 'scum').

From: Make the rich pay! | Registered: Dec 2004 | IP: Logged

muggles
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 10070

posted 24 June 2007 07:50 PM

Michelle wrote:

quote:
The judge was a jerk, but I also felt a bit of sympathy for him, too. I mean, how do you deal with such a circus?

Abbie Hoffman later wrote that he thought Judge Hoffman was in on the Chicago 8/7's game - a co-conspirator I think Abbie called him. He couldn't believe that the judge wouldn't have shut down the trial. He also had nothing but good things to say about Dave Dellinger, whose autobiography is a must read (he of course has a great account of the trial). Dellinger was fond of Abbie too.

From: Powell River, BC | Registered: Aug 2005 | IP: Logged

kropotkin1951
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 2732

posted 25 June 2007 11:04 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Boom Boom:
Abbie Hoffman had quite a sense of humour, though, including titling his first book "Steal This Book".

As a teenager I gave away as many "free" copies of his book as I could find in bookstores. Oddly it went out of print rather quickly. I should have kept a liberated copy because I don't seem to have one anymore.

From: North of Manifest Destiny | Registered: Jun 2002 | IP: Logged

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