Being a leftist — or worse, a child of leftists — in the mid-20th century meant constant harassment from the FBI. From my childhood in the 1940s and ’50s through the upheavals of the ’60s, I only told them one thing: take a hike.
Chan Davis, died last month at 96, faced down McCarthyite blacklists and imprisonment to pursue a brilliant academic career. Davis knew how to change and learn from political experience, but he always remained loyal to his socialist principles.
I defected to the GDR 70 years ago, finding neither Utopia nor the hunger, poverty and misery American media might have led me to expect. I hope that new generations learn from the GDR, and not only from its blunders, nasty habits and limitations.
Reader Comments: Ukraine War; Peace Movement; Starbucks; Supreme Court and Gerrymandering; Huge Union Win at MIT; Red Scare; Anti-Corporate Radio is Everywhere; Labor Against War in Ukraine; Walden Bello; Announcements; more...
The postwar Second Red Scare successfully smashed the American left. But in the midst of its devastation, a small number of old leftists refused to be shut up by the climate of fear. Without their heroism, the New Left could never have emerged.
Political participation is key to resisting efforts to prohibit the discussion of “controversial” ideas. Those flexing their political muscle to regulate what gets taught in classrooms understand this. Those of us doing the teaching need to as well.
Reader Comments: Hiroshima Cover-up; Racism; Retiree healthcare; Sports; Labor History, Disney; McCarthyism; Marxist parties; China; Announcements: Ethel Rosenberg; Harold Washington; International Trade Union Forum - Ecology, Social Transition;
In legislatures across the country, Republican lawmakers are introducing bills to curtail what educators — in public schools and universities — can say and teach about racism and sexism. It's a new McCarthyism...
How a new investigation into a 1951 spy trial exposed long-running injustices committed in the name of US security. The Rosenbergs’ story is as relevant to our times as it was 70 years ago.
At one time this magazine tangled with the FBI, the Atomic Energy Commission and Joseph McCarthy
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