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Naomi Esther Jaffe (born June 1943) is a former undergraduate student of
Herbert Marcuse Herbert Marcuse (; ; July 19, 1898 – July 29, 1979) was a German-American philosopher, social critic, and political theorist, associated with the Frankfurt School of critical theory. Born in Berlin, Marcuse studied at the Humboldt University ...
and member of the
Weather Underground Organization The Weather Underground was a far-left militant organization first active in 1969, founded on the Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan. Originally known as the Weathermen, the group was organized as a faction of Students for a Democr ...
. Jaffe was recently the Executive Director of Holding Our Own, a multiracial foundation for women.


Early life

Jaffe was born in upstate
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...
on a small family farm run by her
Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
parents. Her father, Abe Jaffe (February 3, 1909 – October 11, 2003), was a poultry farmer and her mother, Sadie Bakst Jaffe (May 13, 1908 – January 15, 2005), was an elementary school teacher. Her brother, Bernard (1945–January 2, 2004), was a musician. As a child, she was influenced by her
Communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...
relatives, their influence was reflected in her later revolutionary involvement. After high school, she went on to attend
Brandeis University , mottoeng = "Truth even unto its innermost parts" , established = , type = Private research university , accreditation = NECHE , president = Ronald D. Liebowitz , pro ...
and studied
Marxism Marxism is a Left-wing politics, left-wing to Far-left politics, far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a Materialism, materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand S ...
in a few classes with the professor and political theorist
Herbert Marcuse Herbert Marcuse (; ; July 19, 1898 – July 29, 1979) was a German-American philosopher, social critic, and political theorist, associated with the Frankfurt School of critical theory. Born in Berlin, Marcuse studied at the Humboldt University ...
.


Students for a Democratic Society

After receiving her undergraduate degree Jaffe founded a chapter of the
Students for a Democratic Society Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) was a national student activist organization in the United States during the 1960s, and was one of the principal representations of the New Left. Disdaining permanent leaders, hierarchical relationships ...
at
The New School for Social Research The New School for Social Research (NSSR) is a graduate-level educational institution that is one of the divisions of The New School in New York City, United States. The university was founded in 1919 as a home for progressive era thinkers. NSSR ...
where she was pursuing her graduate degree in sociology. During graduate school, she formed a friendship with future Weatherman, David Gilbert. While in the SDS, Jaffe worked for the independent publication '' New Left Notes'' and published an article about equal rights for women called "The Look Is You" coauthored with
Bernardine Dohrn Bernardine Rae Dohrn (née Ohrnstein; born January 12, 1942) is a retired law professor and a former leader of the left-wing radical group Weather Underground in the United States. As a leader of the Weather Underground in the early 1970s, Dohrn w ...
. Jaffe, a known member of the group
Women's International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell W.I.T.C.H., originally the acronym for Women's International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell, was the name of several related but independent feminist groups active in the United States as part of the women's liberation movement during the late 19 ...
(W.I.T.C.H.), participated in the 1969 demonstrations at the
Miss America Pageant Miss America is an annual competition that is open to women from the United States between the ages of 17 and 25. Originating in 1921 as a "bathing beauty revue", the contest is now judged on competitors' talent performances and interviews. As ...
in Atlantic City. The demonstrations were held to speak out against the consumer driven oppression of women, and to say that the Miss America Pageant perpetuated false stereotypes about the capabilities of women. In 1969, as a member and leading feminist of the SDS, Jaffe traveled with a group of people to
Hanoi Hanoi or Ha Noi ( or ; vi, Hà Nội ) is the capital and second-largest city of Vietnam. It covers an area of . It consists of 12 urban districts, one district-leveled town and 17 rural districts. Located within the Red River Delta, Hanoi is ...
to talk to
Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
ese students and others about the US antiwar movement.


Weathermen

In 1969, the SDS was heading in a more radical direction and Jaffe became one of the founding members of the Weatherman Organization, yet never became a leader. Jaffe joined the Weather Underground because the group believed in the self-determination of
African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
people; that they should have a
revolution In political science, a revolution (Latin: ''revolutio'', "a turn around") is a fundamental and relatively sudden change in political power and political organization which occurs when the population revolts against the government, typically due ...
of their own without the total involvement of white
middle class The middle class refers to a class of people in the middle of a social hierarchy, often defined by occupation, income, education, or social status. The term has historically been associated with modernity, capitalism and political debate. Commo ...
people. She also joined because the group was radically anti-racist and anti-imperialist. As quoted by historian Dan Berger, Jaffe says the Weather Underground was "the most vital show in town." The organization was also aligned with her Marxist ideals. To join she had to set aside her
feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
convictions, yet she always believed that the WUO should have focused more on women's liberation. In September 1969, she participated in "jailbreaks", actions in which high school students were encouraged to leave class and run through the halls as though they were being freed from the prison that was their school. This action was to gain support for the "
Days of Rage The Days of Rage were a series of protests during three days in October 1969 in Chicago, organized by the emerging Weatherman faction of Students for a Democratic Society. The group planned the October 8–11 event as a "National Action" ...
" also called the National Action. She and 25 other Weatherwomen, including
Cathy Wilkerson Cathlyn Platt Wilkerson (born January 14, 1945), known as Cathy Wilkerson, is an American far-left radical who was a member of the 1970s radical group called the Weather Underground Organization (WUO). She came to the attention of the police when ...
, were arrested in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
, for that act. From October 8–11, 1969 Jaffe participated in the "Days of Rage" in
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...
where members of the WUO, after having taken control of the SDS, ran through the streets smashing windows and causing chaos, she was arrested on October 11 for battery and resisting arrest. In 1970, Jaffe was indicted in
Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...
,
Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...
, for her participation in the 1969 War Council held in Flint, Michigan, the final public meeting of the Weatherman-controlled SDS before the dissolution of the SDS in January 1970. 13 people were indicted on charges of conspiracy to commit bombings and murders, however, these charges were dropped in 1973.


Underground

After the
Greenwich Village townhouse explosion The Greenwich Village townhouse explosion occurred on March 6, 1970, in New York, New York, United States. Members of the Weather Underground (Weathermen), an American leftist militant group, were making bombs in the basement of 18 West 11th ...
in March, 1970, Jaffe went underground. She found it necessary to cut her beloved long hair which she had been growing since childhood; she also cut ties with her tight-knit family because it was what she needed to do to become a revolutionary (or, simply, to elude capture by the FBI)."Weather Underground" documentary Although her whereabouts from 1970 to 1978 are mostly unknown, in 1971 the
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...
lifted her fingerprints from an abandoned apartment in San Francisco, California. Summaries of surveillance files indicate that the apartment had been rented by Weathermen from 1970 to 1971 and contained
bomb A bomb is an explosive weapon that uses the Exothermic process, exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations inflict damage principally through ground- and atmosphere-t ...
making material; the FBI called the apartment a bomb factory. While underground Jaffe helped to design and publish Weather's short-lived publication, '' Osawatomie''. Around 1975, while living on the East Coast, Jaffe expressed concerns about the direction the group was taking: because of her feminist background she most likely wanted them to refocus on women's issues, and this led to her becoming estranged from the group. She was living on her own and not in a
collective A collective is a group of entities that share or are motivated by at least one common issue or interest, or work together to achieve a common objective. Collectives can differ from cooperatives in that they are not necessarily focused upon an ...
, so when she showed up to a planned meeting and no one else showed, she realized she was out. Jaffe resurfaced in 1978. In an unpublished critique of ''Prairie Fire'', written soon after Weather split up, Jaffe wrote harshly about the problems with the Weather Underground's lack of focus on feminist issues.


Recent history

After she resurfaced, Jaffe spent a great deal of time reassessing her priorities as an activist. In the last 20 years, she has focused much of her attention on feminism,
lesbian A lesbian is a Homosexuality, homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate n ...
issues, and
anti-racism Anti-racism encompasses a range of ideas and political actions which are meant to counter racial prejudice, systemic racism, and the oppression of specific racial groups. Anti-racism is usually structured around conscious efforts and deliberate a ...
in New York State. Today Jaffe is a mother of one son and lives in
Albany, New York Albany ( ) is the capital of the U.S. state of New York, also the seat and largest city of Albany County. Albany is on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River, and about north of New York City ...
, with her life partner. Having continued a life of activism, Jaffe has worked on a local Free Mumia Committee and she is also the former Executive Director of the organization Holding Our Own, an anti-racist women's funding foundation. Jaffe was also prominently featured in the 2002 documentary film ''
The Weather Underground The Weather Underground was a far-left militant organization first active in 1969, founded on the Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan. Originally known as the Weathermen, the group was organized as a faction of Students for a Democr ...
''.


References


Footnotes


Sources

* * * * * * * *"The Weather Underground", documentary produced by Carrie Lozano, directed by Bill Siegel and Sam Green, New Video Group, 2003, DVD {{DEFAULTSORT:Jaffe, Naomi 1943 births Living people American anti–Vietnam War activists American communists American feminists 20th-century American Jews Brandeis University alumni Jewish feminists Jewish socialists Members of Students for a Democratic Society Members of the Weather Underground Radical feminists Marxist feminists 21st-century American Jews