I don't think of myself as a particularly nostalgic person. Bill Ayers More Quotes by Bill Ayers More Quotes From Bill Ayers The only people who have never had a problem with me speaking in their venues are independent bookstores and libraries. Universities and humanities councils have canceled me, but never an independent bookstore. Bill Ayers independent humanity people It's the height of the Cold War, but I grew up in apolitical family and politics wasn't on the agenda. Bill Ayers height agendas war Every relationship is an experiment and what one learns from it is so fascinating. Bill Ayers experiments fascinating When someone who's always been in your life is gone, it's a stunning adjustment of your own identity. Bill Ayers identity gone life-is I thought in 1965 that my job was to convince most Americans to be against the war. So I spent summers knocking on doors, handing out literature, trying to talk to people who didn't agree with me, trying to get them to see the war was wrong. And by 1968 a majority of Americans did oppose the war. Bill Ayers summer jobs war What was on the agenda was school and social life and those kinds of things. So I was the middle of five kids. So I had the great advantage of being able to play up to the older kids and play down to the younger kids and I think that's part of what propelled me to become a teacher at some point in my life. But it was a comfortable childhood. It was a privileged childhood. Bill Ayers teacher kids school The world spends two trillion dollars a year on military, and of that two trillion the United States spends one trillion. We have a bigger military than the rest of the world put together. We have 150 foreign military bases. Bill Ayers military two years Martin Luther King was only an activist for 13 years and every year he changed and every year he became more radical. By the end he was calling for revolution. People don't know this because they go to too many prayer breakfasts on his birthday. Bill Ayers kings prayer years I always say your body is the temple of your spirit, why not decorate it? My kids say, no, no, your body is the temple of your spirit, keep it clean. I'm covered in tattoos and I get a tattoo every time I write a book. I get the tattoo from the book. Bill Ayers tattoo writing book Living in a bubble as I said in a featherbed of privilege. That's why leaving home, leaving the prep school and going to the University of Michigan in the early '60s was a moment of awakening and to go to a place like Michigan and to see suddenly a world in flames and the injustices all around was quite a wake up call. I lasted a year and a half at Michigan before I dropped out and joined the merchant marines and I was a merchant marine for my sophomore year then I came back to Michigan. Bill Ayers marine home school Injustice anywhere is an assault on all of us. That means that we all can get busy. Bill Ayers injustice busy mean I taught. I lectured at universities. I spoke to my students. I spoke in certain public forums. But what I didn't do was respond to microphones being thrust in my face and saying, what is your relationship with Obama and are you an unrepentant terrorist? Bill Ayers taught students faces To be a human being is to suffer. But it's the unnecessary suffering, it's the suffering that we visit upon one another, that really should be stopped. Bill Ayers unnecessary should suffering In terms of my own behavior and activity, the funny thing about regrets and saying "I'm sorry," is that there's so much I would do differently and want to do differently moving forward. Bill Ayers regret sorry moving When I was young, communism, which had a certain allure to me, was clearly a failed experiment in the Soviet Union and in China. And yet, anti-communism was as bad. Bill Ayers allure unions communism The passions and commitments that ignited my activity as a student are the same passions and commitments that I have today. Bill Ayers passion today commitment One hundred years from now, we'll all be dead. It's hard to believe. One hundred years from now, everyone we see every day will be gone. Bill Ayers gone believe years The truth is that the antiwar movement was powered by the working class. The students were the ones that got the media and so forth, but it was the soldiers on the ground who really energized the antiwar movement in the late Sixties. Bill Ayers media soldier class I've said for thirty years that capitalism is an exhausted system. But now you can see the handwriting everywhere. And one especially horrifying part is the fiscal crisis. Bill Ayers handwriting exhausted years I don't think saying "I was wrong here, I was wrong there" absolves you of anything particularly, nor does it get you into heaven. Bill Ayers doe heaven thinking
