Women and the Weathermen

Abstract

In 1964, Civil Rights activist Stokely Carmichael stated that “the only position for women in the movement is prone.”  While perhaps meant in jest, women did struggle to find their place in activism in sixties America and in the revolutionary protest group the Weathermen in particular.  Despite the lead role in the group held by Bernardine Dohrn, masculine bravado was the norm in Civil Rights and Black Panther Protest movements; their hyper macho attitudes in part prompted by attempts to label them as queer or as ‘sissies’ for protesting the Vietnam war.  During this politically turbulent time, most radical groups struggled with intersectionality, and many women adopted what are traditionally thought of as ‘male’ behaviours in an attempt to find acceptance.  After the accidental killing of three of their group in a Greenwich Village townhouse bomb explosion, the remaining Weathermen members went into hiding for many years.  My essay argues that their time underground reveals a maturing of their ideals so that while not divesting themselves completely from the violent protests they were known for, it does show a changed approach that allows them to align themselves more with other radical feminist groups they had previously disregarded.