#SQUADGOALS (16)
By:
April 19, 2017
One in a series of enthusiastic posts, contributed by HILOBROW friends and regulars during 2017, on the subject of our favorite squads.
All I’ve got on my mind lately is fighting fascism. Despite being a somewhat conflict-averse rural librarian, I aspire to being an avenger; to wake up knowing what needs to be done and having the fortitude to go do it. I listened to Bikini Kill’s “Rebel Girl” when I was in library school and it gave me ideas.
I remember reading about the Jewish Resistance organizations like the United Partisan Organization (Fareynikte Partizaner Organizatsye (FPO) פֿאַראײניקטע פּאַרטיזאַנער אָרגאַניזאַציע) formed in the ghettos of Nazi-occupied Europe. They set up illegal printing presses and made resistance posters. They taught each other to use weapons. They sabotaged the munitions factories where they were forced to work. When their ghettos were raided, they escaped via the sewers carrying their movement’s archives on their backs and took to the forests. They were friends and rebels. Their path wasn’t easy; they had to fight their own people for the sake of the larger movement.
In addition to the righteousness of their cause — fighting Nazis was unproblematic in a way that later Jewish activism wasn’t — they had gender equity and decently cool uniforms. They knew how to strike a pose. The FPO’s leader Abba Kovner had great hair and wrote poetry. Kovner, his wife Vitka Kempner and their colleague Rozka Korczak formed a secret post-war organization called Nokmim (Hebrew for avengers), hunting down Nazis that the justice system ignored throughout the late ’40s and ’50s. All three of them lived into the 1980s; longer than Eichmann, longer than Mengele.
I don’t aspire, in my peaceful rural life, to be some sort of hero or vanguardist. I’d like to be someone who worked with her friends, got shit done, looked OK while doing it, stayed alive, and left a good-looking Wikipedia page.
“to outlive the tormentors, these too were acts of resistance.”
#SQUADGOALS: Annie Nocenti on THE WILD BUNCH | Alice Boone on PRETTY LITTLE LIARS | Gordon Dahlquist on BOWIE’S BAND | Rob Wringham on THE HOME GUARD | Jennifer Krasinski on WATERSHIP DOWN RABBITS | Annalee Newitz on ROBIN HOOD’S MERRY PALS | Adrienne Crew on THE BLOOMSBURY GROUP | Mark Kingwell on THE HONG KONG CAVALIERS | Adam McGovern on KAMANDI’S FAMILY | John Overholt on THE CLUB | Greg Rowland on THE VULTURE SQUADRON | Sara Ryan on BETSY, TACY & TIB | Chelsey Johnson on VI ÄR BÄST! | Brian Berger on THE JOHN FORD STOCK COMPANY | Sherri Wasserman on THE WARRIORS | Jessamyn West on FAREYNIKTE PARTIZANER ORGANIZATSYE | Josh Glenn on DADA | Matthew De Abaitua on THE TIME | Mandy Keifetz on THE FOUNDING FATHERS | William Nericcio on ZOOT SUIT PACHUCOS | Deb Chachra on FIREFLY CREW | Matthew Battles on THE ANIMAL FAMILY | Ingrid Schorr on THE HARLEM GLOBETROTTERS | Joe Alterio on THE USUAL GANG OF IDIOTS | Dan Reines on THE BREAKFAST CLUB | Rob Walker on LES TROIS INSÉPARABLES | Devin McKinney on 1975 RED SOX | Steph Burt on DAMAGE CONTROL | Elina Shatkin on THE HOLOGRAMS | Chris Spurgeon on THE ALKALI METALS | Carl Wilson on NEW YORK SCHOOL POETS | Barbara Bogaev on THE MOD SQUAD | Franklin Bruno on THE AACM | Judith Zissman on THE FUTURIANS | Mimi Zeiger on ARCHIGRAM | Jacob Mikanowski on THE RATBASTARDS | Lynn Peril on THE DALY SISTERS | Anindita Basu Sempere on MEG MURRY’S FAMILY | Libi Rose on THE ENIAC TEAM | Gary Panter on THE TRIBE OF HIPPIES | Peter Doyle on CORNEL WILDE BOYS | Ken Layne on THE MONKEY WRENCH GANG | Molly Wright Steenson on BAUHAUS | Katie Hennessey on BEAT POETS | Mimi Lipson on THE RUNAWAYS | Jordan Ellenberg on BOURBAKI | Michael Campochiaro on THE SUICIDE SQUAD | Deborah Wassertzug on THE BLOODHOUND GANG | Colin Dickey on ACÉPHALE | Douglas Wolk on SEVEN SOLDIERS OF VICTORY | David Smay on THE MYSTIC KNIGHTS OF THE OINGO BOINGO | Karinne Keithley Syers on BLACKLIPS PERFORMANCE CULT.
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