Revolution for the Hell of It
by Abbie Hoffman
Throw money at the Stock Exchange. Nominate a pig. Win.
For you if
you want to understand political theater as a legitimate form of resistance — from the man who made the Pentagon levitate
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Hoffman and the Yippies threw dollar bills onto the floor of the New York Stock Exchange and watched the traders scramble. They nominated a pig named Pigasus for president. They attempted to levitate the Pentagon through collective meditation. They understood something that most political movements miss: that a system which takes itself completely seriously can be disrupted most effectively by refusing to take it seriously at all — that absurdity is a weapon, that joy is a tactic, that making the revolution something people actually want to be part of is not a distraction from the politics but the politics itself. Published in 1968, the year everything was happening, written under the pseudonym Free. The most complete expression of Yippie politics and the most direct ancestor of everything in the Laugh & Resist arc — the argument that defiance should be fun, that the refusal to be grim in the face of power is itself an act of resistance. Rules for Radicals tells you how to build power seriously. Revolution for the Hell of It tells you why serious isn't always the right register.
Where This Book Lives
Same pattern, different era
Different time, different place. The same thing keeps happening.
A Young People’s History of the United States
Howard Zinn
Zinn, but sized for rebellion.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
I Am Malala
Malala Yousafzai
Bravery looks like a schoolgirl with a book.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
A Black Women’s History of the United States
Daina Ramey Berry & Kali Nicole Gross
America seen through eyes that built it.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
A People’s History of the United States
Howard Zinn
The underdogs get the mic.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
For the family bookshelf
Same idea, written for a younger reader. Good for reading together.
Sister Outsider
Audre Lorde
Poetry with teeth and a megaphone.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Freedom Dreams
Robin D. G. Kelley
Radical hope as resistance strategy.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Change Sings
Amanda Gorman
Kids, courage, and the sound of change.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Greta and the Giants
Zoë Tucker
A tiny voice takes on giants.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST