Bill Ayers

https://pilsencommunitybooks.com/events/39125

BJ Richards, our Sister/Friend/Co-Madre/Partner passed away on June 12, surrounded by her family and embraced by children and parents far and wide. She was a huge force in early childhood education, and her impact is legendary. Alex and John and Judi and Maya and Dede created the circle—we were holding hands with her and Dandara, her beloved daughter, when she left us.
I worked side-by-side with BJ for almost a decade, and she inspired my first book, THE GOOD PRESCHOOL TEACHER, where there’s a lovely picture of BJ as a new mom, and Dandara as an infant. My next book, WHEN FREEDOM is THE QUESTION ABOLITION is THE ANSWER, includes this glance backward at our time together at BJs Kids:

In those early years we were part of a homemade communal childcare community on the Upper West Side of Manhattan called BJ’s Kids. Fairness was a central value, and the deeply radical and profoundly ethical slogan of the Wobblies from a hundred years earlier was a poster on the wall: “An injury to one is an injury to all!” That standard was easily grasped by preschoolers.
We tried to speak an anti-oppressive language at BJ’s—“firefighter,” not “fireman”—and our block area fought racism and sexism: the figures included a Black woman doctor, a Latina firefighter, a male nurse. Reality imposed itself, however, and it was clear that the firehouse across the street was staffed by all white firemen. On a field trip Caitlin, one of the four-year-olds, asked the fireman showing us around when we would get a woman firefighter in the station, and our guide exploded in derisive laughter: “A woman! We don’t want any women! The neighborhood would burn down!” That’s not fair, Caitlin said, and back at school she dictated letters to BJ addressed to the mayor and the newspapers.
We built solidarity between kids and adults, and with everyone in reach. Solidarity, not service, and not hierarchy. There was an open promise of acceptance, care, and repair at BJ’s. No one was a target of instruction; everyone was a dynamic and growing part of the whole. We dove freely into the wide, wild world, and swam as hard as we could toward a distant horizon, powered by experimentation, discovery, and surprise, always asking the next question and the next, and then the next.
BJ was raising abolitionist children, people who would grow up to stand against subjugation, people who together could construct shared spaces of fairness and kindness, folks who would be a prelude to the possible, willing to ask the big questions: What kind of world do we need to build in order to live free? How can we build it here and now?

Episode #101: Tea and Reparations with Aaron Hughes and Amber Ginsburg

https://rick-ayers.medium.com/percival-everetts-james-and-the-literature-of-resistance-5214d11a56ad

Dear Ones:

Rachel DeWoskin and Writers for Democratic Action have written a one-act play echoing Sinclair Lewis’ 1936 exhortation against fascism, “It Can’t Happen Here.” It’s called “It Can’t Happen Here—Again!” (see below)

We’re mobilizing little DYI productions to be performed everywhere on July 19, including in prison. It’s both fun and important.

Please join this little insurgent community-in-the-making.

THXXX

Bill

“IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE—AGAIN!” 

An InvitationTo Stand Against

The Forces Determined to Destroy Democracy

WRITERS FOR DEMOCRATIC ACTION

A Play!
An Homage!
A Nationwide Gathering! 

A Call to Action!

Join us on July 19, 2024

DIY!

In the 1930s, fascism was sweeping through Europe and Asia, and in 1936 it was America’s turn. The New Deal was generating savage push back. Would he be re-elected? Would American democracy survive?

On October 27, 1936, one week before the election, those

questions were raised by a coast-to-coast production of a play that premiered simultaneously on 21 stages in 17 states.

“It Can’t Happen Here” by Sinclair Lewis was seen that night by thousands of people who heard its warning of a coming dictatorship, “when parade grounds become encampments.”

On July 18, 2024, at the Republican National Convention in

Milwaukee, Donald Trump will accept his party’s third consecutive nomination to be their candidate for President of the United States. 

The next day, on July 19, Writers for Democratic Action will issue a call to action with a newly written one-act stage presentation, “It Can’tHappen Here—Again!” 

Our play dramatizes the stakes of the 2024 election by reminding us of the threats of 1936. We warmly invite you

to join us. “It Can’t Happen Here—Again!” can be performed in theaters, but also in book stores, schools, libraries, bars, sites of worship, parks, living rooms, and any other space where people  are still free to gather.

“It Can’t Happen Here—Again!” will sound the alarm loud and clear, providing folks with a concrete way to respond (in person and online) to the catastrophe we’re facing.

On that one night in July, legions of citizens and residents from all across the nation can come together to say “Yes to Democracy!”

Voting is a burning issue this year, and this event will fan those flames.

Please join us! Help us create national solidarity against the rise of American fascism by presenting your own version of our easily mounted five-player script on Friday July 19, 2024. Do it in your local bookstore or place of worship or community center or school or town square or backyard. Do it wherever you can gather folks together to entertain, move, and motivate. Do it to help create the Beloved Community that we need and want

to live in!

Contact us here, and we will give you what you need:

WDApresentsICHH@gmail.com

For more information: http://www.writersfordemocraticaction.org/ICHH