Then (in 1969) it fell apart… of space cadets and proto-Leninists…

This from David Harris “Dreams Die Hard” is absolutely on point. I know I’ve posted a lot from this book, but it really really should be read by anyone who gives a damn…

If 1968 was the year when everything seemed to come together, 1969 would be a year in which a lot of it seemed to come apart.
During the second weekend of January, I attended my last organizational meeting of The Resistance. It was supposed to be a conference of chapter representatives from all over California. I arrived with Joan [Baez] when the conference was well into its second day. By then, the conference had split into two mutually antagonistic camps.

The first faction, the proto-Leninists, wanted to give up draft resistance organizing and turn to something more “militant” and “working class.” They were not into theories of “oppression” and “imperialism.” The second faction, the space cadets, wanted to give up [page break draft-resistance organizing in favour of “alternative life-styles.” They talked about founding communes in New Mexico and co-ops in Mendocino County and commencing the new world immediately. The space cadets had complicated everything even further by ignoring the conference rules. Each Resistance group was supposed to send only two representatives, and all of them complied except this new-age lobby, virtually all of whom were from Los Angeles.

(Harris, 1982:261-2)