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I thought that “yellow journalism” had a reputation as bad as Lobsinger. I thought it had gone out with the Hearst newspapers, that its only remains were in such rags as the Inquirer. I was wrong.The Fifth Estate has become, in recent issues, the worst piece of journalism that I have ever seen. The early editions seemed promising as spokesmen for Detroit’s youth.

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In effect, rock has become the white man’s jazz. Bob Dylan, had he been born black, would surely have found a place somewhere in the jazz revolution; and a white Archie Shepp (the mind boggles!) would feel quite at home in a rock group like the Mothers of Invention (who have, by the way, a composition dedicated to Archie in their book). Not that the two musics are actually merging.

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It couldn’t happen in Detroit!

That was the proud proclamation of our city’s leaders all summer long until that fateful morning of July 23. Detroit had supposedly been the nation’s leader among big cities in making civil rights progress.

That is, Detroit was tops in fake tokenism and self-deception. There was bragging that so many Black people here were in positions of prominence and relative wealth. But, obviously, these successful people only represented an infinitesimally small portion of the Black community—and even many of these middle-class oriented people, who still feel the brutal whip of discrimination, were quietly hoping for the summer revolt which finally exploded on one of the first hot Saturday nights in a relatively cool summer.

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Kitty Genovese died in Queens while fifty people watched.

Thomas Poindexter lost his seat on the Detroit Common Council when it was reported that he saw a crime being committed and did not even bother to call the police.

Two nameless hippies were arrested on Prentis on Tuesday night August 8, while all the flower folks and their bike-less motorcycle type colleagues just stood around and gaped. Two cops had just walked on their beat down Prentis, gotten lost in the shadows then reappeared from the alley at the end of the block where they had started out. They had two handcuffed prisoners. The prisoners, somewhere between teenyboppers and hippies looked to be about 19 years old. They stooped as they walked down the street hands bound behind their backs.

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Marshall McLuhan, better known as the Ombudsman of the Hipsters, hates the twentieth century.

Yet, in his cheerful 19^th 21^st century way he has patiently dissected the corpse (if haphazardly) and has shown us all a glimpse of the invisible Cancer of Media, without so much as flinching, without a single four-letter word. He obviously takes pride in his zealous but essentially dispassionate style—he has learned the scientist’s way of overwhelming; he has come up with his own version of E equals MC squared, and has categorically dared all onlookers to light the fuse.

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Under this seemingly innocuous heading we initiate what we think is the first joint effort music column in literary annals.

The Fifth Estate’s heroic radical stance required something more than a bland record review column and this added something is what we hope to accomplish. The format and topics of each column will constantly change as the mood strikes us. So in the words of Jim Gurley, of Big Brother and the Holding Company, “Watch Out!”

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Send to the Fifth Estate, 1107 W. Warren, Detroit, Mich. 48201, phone 831–6800

All unclassified ads must be paid in advance by mail or personal delivery.

For Sale: IBM Executive electric typewriter, excellent condition, all we have left to sell. Trans-Love Energies, 4863 John Lodge, Detroit 48201. Call 831–6800 and make an offer. Will take electric Smith — Corona portable in trade, or will listen to what you might offer.

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H. Horatio Humphrey, United States vice-warlord, was welcomed to Detroit last week by a 200-man anti-war picket line in front of Cobo Hall.

Humphrey was in Detroit to speak about riots and other such domestic problems at the National Association of Counties Convention. Official U.S. policy on riots, according to Humphrey, is that the government is against them.

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The Trans-Love Energies operation in the Warren-Forest community has undergone a number of changes lately, according to spokesmen for the hippie cooperative, of which the Fifth Estate is a member group.

The Artists’ WorkZshop, located on John Lodge, has been joined by the group for economic reasons. “We just couldn’t make the rent anymore,” said Trans-Love head John Sinclair, “and the building had pretty much outlived its usefulness to us. We’re hoping that some community group will take over the building and put it to better use.” The Artists’ Workshop Press, at 4863 John Lodge, will remain operative as headquarters for the Trans-Love publishing and printing operation, and will also continue to serve as office quarters for Trans-Love Energies, The Sun, and Detroit LEMAR.

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Curious.

The same people who built the old Detroit, which the people burned down because apparently they didn’t like it much, have been selected to build the new Detroit.

Mostly they have already built the new Detroit. It is called Southfield and Oak Park and Bloomfield Hills and Birmingham and Westland and Harper Woods and Grosse Pointe and Livonia and Madison Heights. That is the new Detroit. They built it in the ‘fifties while we weren’t looking.

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With the exception of one or two judges, the Recorder’s Court of the city of Detroit has never acted as anything more than an extension of the police department. The police can only hold a suspect for 72 hours. Recorder’s Court can do it for the rest of your natural born life.

Except for the volume of cases involved it will be impossible for the court to return to normal. It never departed from it. And while various sections of Detroit’s power structure were brought into sharp relief in recent weeks -Recorder’s Court surpassed itself.

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NEW YORK—Dr. Benjamin Spock on August 1 called President Johnson “the worst betrayer of the American people” for recklessly escalating the Vietnam War.

“He (Johnson) was elected by an overwhelming majority who believed him when he promised to avoid escalation in Vietnam and avoid the sacrifice of American soldiers,” the famed pediatrician said.

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“Do you love it, do you hate it

There it is, just like you made it”

—The Mothers of Invention

You have to live in the middle of the city to know what is really happening there—otherwise all you have to go on is what the “newspapers” and people tell you, and they very definitely have a vested interest in keeping the real news from you. The official responses to the Detroit insurrection have very little to do with what was actually happening, and people will soon find that out, although it may prove to be too late to do them any good.

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“The words that describe what’s happening in the Haight this summer are ‘Free,’ ‘Now,’ and ‘Do It.’”

The most spectacular development of recent months is the acquisition of a 482-room hotel in the area south of Market Street by the San Francisco Diggers. The hotel, located at 256 Sixth Street, was condemned some time ago by the City.

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Ronald Powell crouched inside the car. So did the other four men.

Already wounded in firing that had lasted for five minutes, later Mr. Powell said, “I was just waiting for the bullet that would be fatal. It was horrible.”

Charles Dunson, the driver, reached up and shut off the engine, hoping the police and national guard would think they were all dead. Mr. Dunson was also wounded.

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The calendar is prepared by Fifth Estate calendar girls Karen Kovac and Naomi Epel with cooperation from Detroit Adventure. Copy deadline is the 6^th and 22^nd of each month and should be sent to the Fifth Estate, Calendar 1107 W. Warren, Detroit, Michigan 48201.

SUN the 16^th

HEAL along with Oral Roverts at Cobo Hall. Sponsored by North American Baptist Convention. Call Cobo for ticket info. 8/16

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Somewhere in Washington D.C. there resides a President’s Crime Commission, and on this Commission there is a man called Dr. Richard H. Blum. Dr. Blum is one of six doctors reporting on narcotics and drug abuse in the United States.

In his report, Blum stated that he thought alcohol the most dangerous drug Americans use, that smoking “Marijuana may be less harmful than drinking,” and “there is no strong evidence that marijuana (or any other drug) is a cause of crime.”

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Powerlessness and the lack of control which black people are allowed over their own community was not a major cause of the Detroit rebellion, Mr. Lomax tells us.

Nor was the cause the culture of violence which the United States has perfected; a culture which would make it UnAmerican for black people not to use violence as a means to effect social change.

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The first meaning in The American College Dictionary defines “reform” as “...the improvement or amendment of what is wrong, corrupt, etc.; social reform.”

But how does Governor Romney define the term? One can only assume from the public position he has taken that reform is the furthest thing from his mind. Ever since Con-Con, Romney’s gubernatorial launching pad, his opposition to a state graduated income tax has been patently clear. But now when the state supposedly needs money, he doesn’t fight the addition of this new tax to the polyglot of provincial personal state taxes already in existence.

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The San Francisco Mime Troupe is now in the process of planning to tour the United States and Great Britain during the Fall and Winter of 1967–68 with its anti-war commedia dell’arte, “l’Amant militaire.”

Sandra Archer as Corallina and Peter Cohon as Pantalone in the S.F. Mime Troupe’s L’Amant Militaire. Photo: Erik Weber

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If there’s anything more disgusting than a person who has no guts, its a person who has half-guts.

For example, Rep. John Conyers, Jr. For the past several weeks I’ve been writing about the wonderful job he was doing in fighting passage of that horrible “flag-burning” bill.

I suggested to producers of the Lou Gordon TV show on Channel 50 that this would be an excellent topic for a debate. They agreed. Rep. Conyers agreed to appear at first, but when his opposition was going to be Richard Durant, the highly articulate ex-Birchite and present chairman of the 14^th District GOP, Conyers welched.

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Attendance at the 2^nd Detroit Triple Fan Fair the weekend of June 17 and 18 peaked at approximately 150 and audience enthusiasm burned with a hard, gem-like flame, despite program changes and setbacks.

Buck Rogers comics were among many at convention

The purpose of the Fair was succinctly set forth: “To preserve rare material and to further the appreciation of Comic Strips, Films, and Fantasy Literature as genuine Art Forms.” Many fans at the Park Shelton Convention were therefore rather testy about the illustration from former EC artist Wally Wood’s Witzend, which accompanied my earlier pre-Fair article in a recent Fifth Estate. The panel depicted Wood’s Animan defrocking a stacked lovely. When I mentioned that he had drawn the pornographic centerfold (Orgy at Disneyland) in the current Realist, Wood’s stock sank even lower at the dealer tables.

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Send to: The Fifth Estate, 1107 W. Warren, Detroit, Mich. 48201, phone 831–6800

Unclassified costs 50 cents per line per week. Figure 5 words per line. A word is a word, including I and 2 letter words. A phone number is a word. Street numbers are words. Abbreviations should be sensible. (No limit on number of lines)

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By withholding our participation, we are saying ‘No’ to the continuing barbarism of the Vietnam War. We are responsible for our actions. We openly say ‘No’ to conscripted military service.

Our refusal to participate in the madness of the Vietnam War in no way implies a renunciation of our country.

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from L.A. Free Press (UPS)

Last week President Johnson signed into law the 1967 draft law extension thereby allowing the government to impress young men into involuntary servitude ‘til at least 1971.

In every respect the revision intensifies the coercive and regimentive features of the old law. Here are the gruesome details of the extension, which will be in effect.

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LA Free Press — First of all, please forget everything you’ve heard about the Diggers, because it’s mostly a bunch of crap.

To begin with, the Diggers are what happened when the Hell’s Angels met LSD and got turned off violence to psychedelic love.

The central cadre running the hippie hostels day by day is made up of guys with names like Motorcycle Richie, Tobacco, Little Wolf, Apache and Tiny.

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a review of

The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931–1934) and Vol. 2 (1934–1939). Edited by Gunther Stuhlmann. Swallow Press/Harcourt, Brace & World. $6.95 each.

“Creation,” says Anais Nin, “is a source of action, a directive which alters the course of human life.”

And anyone who reads these diaries will find them revolutionary, destined to take their place with the great transcendental works.

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The dangerous MC-5, Detroit’s heroic “avant-rock” band considered by many the musical electronic equivalent of STP, has been run through the mill lately and may yet come out of it smelling like roses.

Their current trouble started when Uncle Russ Gibb booked the San Francisco rock band the Jefferson Airplane for a Ford Auditorium concert the end of June. The MC-5, who had been promised an appearance with the Airplane when they arrived in Detroit, were informed that they couldn’t play the concert without joining the American Federation of Musicians local in Detroit.

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As the result of an appeal brought on June 23 of the court-martial of the Fort Hood Three, Pvt. First Class Jimmy Johnson, Pvt. David Samas and Pvt. Dennis Mora, the sentences of Jimmy Johnson and Pvt. David Samas were reduced from five years to three. Dennis’ original sentence was three years.

They were the first GIs to publicly refuse orders to go to Vietnam, and challenged the right of the government to send them to an “illegal, immoral and unjust war.” They were court-martialed and are serving their sentences at Ft. Leavenworth.

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Ed Sanders, 1960s

In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel dismissed obscenity charges against Ed Sanders, editor and publisher of “Fuck You/a magazine of the Arts” and owner of the Peace Eye Bookstore in Manhattan. New York City judges Ringel, Sherwin and Hoffman ruled that “Fuck You” is not obscene and does not violate the New York State Obscenity code (section 1141) and is protected by constitutional guarantees of freedom.

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The honor of launching the 1968 Presidential election campaign fell to the Los Angeles Police Department as Lyndon B. Johnson, fresh from meetings with his Communist counterpart, dropped in on June 23 at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles to grab a quick meal.

L.A. Police Chief Reddin summed up the day’s events succinctly as he debriefed his heroes in the evening: “A perfect police exercise; I am very satisfied. You can’t imagine how good you looked,” he told them, obviously deeply moved. “We’ve got many movies of this, because it’s some thing that’s never happened in this country before... We proved to them that WE own this city, not the rabble.”

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It looks like straight people will do just about anything in their power to keep the love organism from growing and spreading, just because they can’t “understand’ it and don’t know what’s happening in the world around them. If you haven’t noticed, straight people are always putting love people down, sending their kids to psychiatrists to get “straightened out, calling the police on their kids, beating hippies who try to start honest and loving business operations, stealing from hippies and terrorizing their homes and gathering places, hitting and kicking people who have no eyes to fight back, and things like that. I’m tired of it, for one, and I just wish these people would wake up and start seeing what their stupid lives are all about and how vile they are being in their relationships with each other and with us.

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The monitors were doing a hell of a job maintaining order; the cops, on the other hand, were looking more and more uptight, and more and more of them were showing up from somewhere.

A man who identified himself as a physician kept saying they can’t stop us from exercising our rights of free speech.

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The SEE, the new concerthouse opened last month by Trans-Love Energies Unlimited of Detroit, closed its doors after only two weekends in operation.

The hippy-run coffeehouse, which featured music by the MC-5, the Spikedrivers, the Passing Clouds, Billy C. and the Sunshine, and the Charles Moore Ensemble during its brief history, along with lights by the Magic Veil Light Company, ran into business snags that made operation of the cooperative concerthouse impossible, according to former manager and Fifth Estate staff member John Sinclair.

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Cover photo: Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army in Edinburgh, Scotland.

4 Insurgent Rebel Clown Army

L.M. Bogad

7 Cultural Appropriation & Shaming

Rod Dubey

9 The Myth of Che Guevara

MLB

11 Ukrainian & Russian Repression

FE Staff

12 The Legacy of Omar Aziz

Leila Al Shami

14 Left Abets Genocide in Syria

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When someone on the Fifth Estate staff over 40 years ago came up with the slogan, Fuck Authority, it was printed as a 29” X 22” poster and tucked inside a 1975 issue of the publication, then a monthly tabloid.

On the reverse side was a catalog of titles offered through the paper’s bookstore which was housed in the same space as its public office.

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The infamous Grimshaw kite case has reached its first conclusion, with an astounding miscarriage of justice.

The case, as you may recall, concerned a kite, made out of an American flag, with the inscription: “Fuck America—Go Fly a Kite” and an Egyptian peace eye symbol. The kite was hanging from a light fixture in The Sun office, 4863 John Lodge.

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As we send this issue to the printer, the ghastly Shit Show known as the 2016 American presidential election has not yet concluded, although it will be over when you read this.

While one of the candidates expressed definitively more openly bigoted and authoritarian ideas, neither challenged the basic equation of life within the state and capitalism. The horrors of war, racism, environmental collapse, and oppression will continue regardless of the electoral outcome.

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Nearly 4,000 young people jammed Into the Ford Auditorium on Friday June 30 to hear the Jefferson Airplane.

Three thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine people enjoyed themselves.

The Detroit News didn’t.

Their reporter came on like a middle aged Brenda Starr equipped only with platinum hair and a super-hostile attitude towards rock and roll, folk-rock and Grace Slick:

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A number of Detroit lawyers have indicated to Detroit LEMAR (Legalize Marijuana) that they would be interested in setting up a legal aid service for busted marijuana users if a general fund could be set up which would insure a nominal fee for those attorneys involved.

Their suggestion was that interested heads and sympathetic persons pledge a dollar or two per month to such a fund so that a backlog of available money would be made available in cases of arrests on marijuana charges.

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a review of

Small Beauty by Jia Qing Wilson-Yangas. Metonymy Press, 2016, $16.95 CAD

During a discussion hosted by Montreal’s L’Insoumise anarchist bookstore and DIRA anarchist library, the novelist Lola Lafon was asked how she includes her politics in her novels.

(A review of her 2014 We Are the Birds of the Coming Storm appears in the Summer 2015Fifth Estate.)

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Letters were mailed July 12 inviting hundreds ‘of Detroit area activists in the peace, civil rights, civil liberties and religious reform movements to a testimonial dinner honoring the Rev. David M. Gracie.

The Dinner will be held on July 21, 1967, at U.A.W. Local 174 Hall at 6495 W. Warren (at Livernois) at 7:00 p.m.

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A good peace never did come easy.

One of the real tough things about involvement in a resistance movement is your total lack of power. When LBJ (of “Hey, Hey” fame) addressed a thousand-dollar-a-couple Democratic Party fund raising dinner in L.A. a few thousand people gathered outside to tell Lyndon they didn’t like his policy in Vietnam.

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The calendar is prepared by Fifth Estate calendar girls Karen Kovac and Naiomi Epil with cooperation from Detroit Adventure. Copy deadline is the 6^th and 22^nd of each month and should be sent to the Fifth Estate, Calendar, 1107 W. Warren, Detroit, Michigan 48201.

Sat the 1^st

CONCERT—Meadow Brook Music Festival. Detroit Symphony with Sixten Ehrling. Oakland Univ. 8:30 Adm. 338–7211, ext. 2301. 7/1

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Send letters to fe@fifthestate.org or Fifth Estate, POB 201016, Ferndale MI 48220

All formats accepted including typescript & handwritten; letters may be edited for length.

I appreciate Chellis Glendinning’s criticisms of modern, Western civilization, including modern agriculture, which has been highly detrimental to ecological and social balance in the world. (See “Linear Perspective, Fences & Nature’s Glory,” FE #396, Summer 2016.)

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Send to: The Fifth Estate, 1107 W. Warren, Detroit, Mich. 48201, phone 831–6800

Unclassified costs 50 cents per line per week. Figure 5 words per line. A word is a word, including 1 and 2 letter words. A phone number is a word. Street numbers are words. Abbreviations should be sensible. (No limit on number of lines)

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UPS — Shouts of “draft-dodger” and rumors of a FBI arrest have threatened the clean-cut All-American image of the Beach Boys since Carl Wilson, 20, lead guitar, and “cuddliest,” youngest of the three Wilson brothers, refused to submit for induction into the Armed Forces on January 3, 1967.

Claiming Conscientious Objection on the basis of a conflict of values (“My duty to God is far greater than any mortal demand”), Carl’s request was rejected ostensibly on the grounds of late filing. He was indicted by a federal grand jury on April 5 and entered a plea of “not guilty.”

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Editors note: The Fifth Estate continued to win readers and supporters throughout the Detroit Metropolitan area.

The following review of the paper recently appeared in the school newspaper of Covington Jr. High School in Birmingham.

Covington student Claudia Marcun II forwarded the story to us.

Dennis Nelson

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The S.F. Oracle recently sent a missive to the Fifth Estate office asking us to warn those who are traveling west to bring: (besides their flowers and bananas) money for food and rent, sleeping bags and rucksacks, extra food (brown rice and soysauce—100 lbs. bags at rice mills for $12), camping equipment, warm clothing for the cold times, and proper I.D.

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Editor’s note: The following is printed exactly as it was released by the City of Detroit, Department Report and Information Committee.

Movie goers who once marveled at the disguises of Lon Chaney would be amazed at the many “faces” of Detroit police department detectives.

Dope smokers June Mumford and Vahan Kapegian

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