There was NOTHING TIRED about the 60's! BRING 'EM BACK!

[dxstone]

Another poster started a thread saying that tye-dye shirts should be BANNED from Camp Casey; they didn't want the ensuing MSM visuals and commentary to focus on the 'tired old '60's cliches'...
It's a raucous one, as you might guess, at
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4399632
The below was written in partial response to that poster, but it went its own way and I decided to post it as its own thread:

BRING BACK THE SIXTIES! BRING BACK THE MAGIC!

ANYONE alive then remember the tired old '60's?
The 1960's in America was a time of GREAT ENERGY and ENTHUSIASM and IMMENSE EFFORT on the part of millions of progressives (mostly young, but many old as well) who were TRULY COMMITTED to their cause...
It was a time of REACHING OUT and TAKING CHANCES, a time of COLOR and JOY and LAUGHTER and BRIGHT BEAMING HOPE and OPEN DISSENT AND DEFIANCE against an out-of-control 'leadership' waging a costly and unpopular and terribly ugly war that was sold as self-defense, though everyone could see that this argument was pretty implausible (sound familiar yet?)...
I think the existence of the draft back then was extremely important to the anti-war movement...
As I said, it was mostly the young; they had the energy, and they had the strongest personal interest...
Everyone who is too old to serve in a war shouldn't even have a real say, if you ask me... even if they were in some previous war; advise away, but no power of consent, how's that?... because all wars are different; there are (arguably, even though I hate the argument, it's just a bit too coldly pragmatic for me to embrace fully) good wars and evil wars, and this one is as evil a war as has EVER been started ANYWHERE on the face of the earth...
And neither should ANY leader or member of Congress or pundit who isn't sending their own sons or daughters, or going themselves, have ANY say whatsoever in the proceedings; they just shouldn't get to decide, they should shut the fuck up cuz it's not THEIR skin on the line..
BRING BACK THE SIXTIES. REMEMBER the past, not as the MSM presents it to you, but as it REALLY WAS.
It was a time of MUSIC and DANCING and SOCIAL EXPERIMENTATION of all sorts, a time of LIBERATION in the arts and science and the social sciences, and a lot of fierce questioning of so many common misconceptions and old out-dated concepts and constructs of our culture, some merely obsolete, some actually socially psychotic...
IMMENSE CIVIL RIGHTS GAINS occurred throughout America, and MANY questions of RACIAL AND GENDER INEQUALITY, SEXUAL FREEDOM AND SEXUAL DIVERSITY, WORKER RIGHTS and SAFETY, VOTING RIGHTS, PROGRESSIVE POLITICS and the TRUE COSTS AND WORTH OF WAR (to name a few), all of these at least began to be addressed much more broadly and publicly and rationally, many of them for the FIRST TIME in this country's history... and the people who made that all happen were INCREDIBLY DIVERSE... and they stood TOGETHER, not HIDING that diversity but PROUDLY DISPLAYING IT... they INSISTED on the right to CHAMPION diversity as the VIRTUE it IS... and they stood, all of these strangers connected only in spirit and purpose, shoulder to shoulder, for a time at least, and DEMANDED the rights the Constitution guarantees them, and SLOWED and STOPPED the jackals and the war-mongers in their tracks, and ROUTED the forces of racism and hatred and ignorance and tyranny for a time... and rendered through that collective effort some of the brightest jewels in the firmament of our positive cultural history...
It's too bad that our enemies (and yes, I DO mean Pappy Bush SPECIFICALLY) found a way to MURDER most of the great civil-rights leaders of the '60's, and then to subtly but surely DIVIDE us over the past several decades... the slow but steady deification of power and authority over talent and wisdom and true virtue brought to you daily by an utterly corrupt media, the Reagan Era 'virtues of Endless Competition over Cooperation, Infinite Greed over Easy Generosity of Spirit, Ultimate Truth as an elastic and malleable Plastic to be molded as our own elite may choose at their merest whim, and the greatest Virtue of all, ENDLESS COMFORT AND CONVENIENCE, sold in Happy Family Fun-Time size to an ever-more-exhausted populace... all of these contributed to the sad state that we as a culture now find ourselves in...
When people talk of the 'tired '60s', it pains me to realize that so many have lost the thread to a time that is, to my mind, a freakin' Golden Age...
I was just a kid then; and I'm old enough now to know that America's NEVER been perfect... but compared to right now, '60's America was a freakin' UTOPIA of wondrous possibilites...
"All we are saying is give Peace a chance!"
--John Lennon, former Beatle/goddamned dirty hippie
It was a time of rare passion and INCREDIBLE hopefulness and positive spirit and GOOD ORIGINAL MOVIES and Peter Max and The Beatles and J.R.R. Tolkien and Pink Floyd and and Joni Mitchell and we LANDED A MAN ON THE MOON, FOR CHRISSAKES!!!... it was a time of strong alliances and deep, meaningful friendships and GOOD DRUGS (if you knew when to show a little temperance) and lots and lots of SERIOUS FUCKING (or BEGATTING, if you don't personally like the word FUCK, and perhaps think it should be BANNED from the anti-war movement...)
I don't know though... that could dilute the message somewhat:

ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR! WE DON'T WANT YOUR NAUGHTY WAR!
FIVE, SIX, SEVEN, EIGHT! WOULD YOU PLEASE STOP? THAT WOULD BE GREAT!
Just a lil' to weak and tepid, I think...

The '60's should be the MODEL for what we are trying to accomplish today!
In my opinion, we need to REMEMBER and HONOR the remarkable achievement of those times, if we are EVER to see such bright days come around again.
d

[Kire]

1. I agree.

how come nobody occupies administration buildings anymore?

May 1968!!!!

[dxstone]

3. Yet CHIMPS occupy the White House!

Topsy-turvy Bizarro World these days, man!... and it wasn't that long ago that we were all on a good, firm path to a REAL future...

[TankLV]

117. A conscious decision to never have them located so prominently on campuses

When they trashed the then brand new Norton Student Union building (now the school of dentistry or something) at the SUNY Buffalo Main Street campus, Rockefeller and his goons vowed never to have another one like that again. Notice the LACK of anything like that in the new campus designs - or the every popular fashion of locating them in CORPORATE OFFICE BUSINESS PARKS miles from campus!

Thanks for asking. I'm an architect. It's my job.

We do lots and lots of casinos now.

[Old sixties guy]

118. Occupying buildings sets you up

For automatic busts and then having to divert your energies into legal defense instead of building a movement.
Study the Third World Strikes at SF STATE,UC Berk,Univ of Wisconsin,Duke U,etc.Tactics were militant and effective.Direct confrontations with police were avoided as much as possible.People moved en masse through campus and shut down business as usual.We called it"War of the Flea".When the dog scratches,the flea just moves to another part of the dog.They don't try to fight the dog.
This Fall be militant but creative.Violence is not necessary or even desirable.Yet vigils and peaceful rallies do not attract the alienated working class youth and youth of color.There is a middle ground that disrupts the Great Creeping Meatball but does not drag us into unwinnable battles with police that we are tactically unable to win.

[onecent]

2. The '60's were the BEST!! Life was simple, innocent...wanting

peace...love was abundant, disrespect was nonexistent.
No computers, no cell phones, no telemarketers, and a union was good.

Those WERE the good times.!

[yorkiemommie1]

5. full of optimism

back then i was full of optimism.

edited to say : i just volunteered to work for local Dems, better late than never.

[stlsaxman]

47. Check out "SHOTS: an American photographers journal 1967-1972"

By David Fenton



"Passion, promise, idealism, excitement and turbulance leap off the page and grab you by the heart!"- Arianna Huffington

All my heroes are there!

[jackster]

4. one, two, three WHAT ARE WE FIGHTING FOR....

anyone else watching Woodstock on VH1?

I'm aboard - revolution man!

[dxstone]

15. LUCKY!

I particularly enjoy the Fish Cheer...
Good ol' Country Joe...

Such times may come again, if we only remember, and choose once again to believe.

We are VOLUNTEERS OF AMERICA! VOLUNTEERS OF AMERICA!
--Grace Slick/Paul Kantner/Jefferson Airplane

[vickitulsa]

63. And how about TNT airing "Starship Troopers" repeatedly

over the last few days? I mean, Heinlein was a visionary in many respects, as most of us 60's crowd well know. He was concerned that some of his great science fiction might be seen by young people to glorify war -- although something like The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress or the well known Stranger In A Strange Land could hardly be seen that way, IMO. So he wrote Starship Troopers to get in the face of those same young readers, to open their eyes to the dirty tricks the government will use to get them to enlist and offer up their lives, their bodies and minds, for the causes of greed and power of the elite war-mongers.

I had read the book so long ago but didn't remember the details very well ... until I saw Starship Troopers from beginning to end for the first time last night on TNT. I mean ta tell ya, I know I heard some reviews when it was first released on the big screen that indicated the producers and directors had sorta pulled the sharpest teeth of the original Heinlein work -- but if they did, there was still plenty of meat in that movie as it aired! All the shady operations of a lying, thieving, war-mongering government on earth as it skillfully deceived the young into sacrificing themselves needlessly.

I've been noticing for some time now -- since the invasion of Iraq began and then the Occupation settled in for the long haul -- that I keep seeing 60's memorabilia appearing everywhere. The sayings are coming back, the anger is coming back, the SPIRIT is coming back -- I see it every day. And the desire to PROTEST A BLOODY WRONGFUL WAR of greed for oil and empire is coming back!! Even back then, and most people don't really think about this, but the Vietnam War was waged in part to protect such resources and such monetary interests for the Western world, too.

When the same sort of utter disrespect and contempt for the will and rights of the American people occurs now as occurred in the 60's, then it's time to resort to the same methods and tactics that worked to stop the war and end the nightmare of a government out of control then!

I could rant about this all day today, but I see plenty of you others including the thread originator are doing an EXCELLENT job of this as well, so I yield the rest of my time to the honorable posters of DU! :D

CARRY ON ANTI-WAR TROOPS! And from me you all get a sincere and snappy **SALUTE**! :patriot: :woohoo: :thumbsup:

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

6. I read the thread about tie dye

and then, later, visited the Crawford Iconoclast for the latest news. There were photos of Bush supporters-and one had on the biggest tie dye tee shirt I've ever seen!

So much for fearing we'd be stereotyped.

I lived through the 60s, the heartache and the joy. The energy back then was something else. The spirit of rightness in the cause that we had back then is still alive now in the anti-war movement. And we who many might distainfully call "hippies" will be protesting in solidarity on Sept. 24 at our county court house.

[Hissyspit]

8. Hippies or not, if you are right, you're right.

It's not the left's fault or "old hippies" fault that the right-wingers do not have the facts on their side.

[Hissyspit]

7. Certainly there was questioning of conventional wisdom

not fear of the unconventional, as has developed over the last decade or so, which has allowed for greater complacency and for greater manipulation of the truth by those not dedicated to truth.

[Warren DeMontague]

9. It's the fucking 80's cliches that are tired.

And frankly, I'm tired of people offering "advice" about how we should apologize for who we are.

The folks who protested the war in the 60s were right. The civil rights people were right. The hippies, bless their souls and even their excesses, were right.

You left out Jimi Hendrix and the Dead, but overall, very good post. :hippie:

[dxstone]

14. Thanx!... yeah, I left out a LOTTA GREAT bands!

I think the 60's were an absolute renaissance in art of every kind in America, an influence that carried through the 70's...
The 80's, and Reagan, was where we hit a brick wall of sorts; good stuff is ALWAYS being created here, but it was actually being published and widely distributed less and less; the Reeps had gotten their Mighty Wurlitzer cranked up and their Mr. Microphones out and started drowning out all rational and creative thought and vision in an endless avalanche of Limbaugh-inspired lunacy, savagely raping reality in every little crevice or toe-hold they could find...
Like the other arts, music will always be vital in America, even if they start 3 more wars, they can't stop the music...
But when you look at what has become 'popular' today?... now that they've figured out how to make SHIT popular if they so desire?
When you look at these New American Idols and 'reality' talent shows and new designed&manufactured-by-corporate-committee boybands and girlbands... and somebody's gotta be buying that crap, right?
There's ALWAYS good music and art and writing to be found in any era... but the 60's were a special time; the 60's RULED!!!

:toast:
d

ps: Yep, FAR too many to list; but somewhere in heaven, Jim Morrison's just gonna keep kickin' out stained glass windows if I don't mention his name... there ya go, Jim!

[electropop]

57. The record companies are in trouble.

They claim it's downloading, but I think that's a tiny percentage of their loss (I've heard numbers to support this). The real problem is that very few people want to buy their pablum. :nopity:

[dxstone]

80. And btw, you make the perfect point...

"The folks who protested the war in the 60s were right. The civil rights people were right. The hippies, bless their souls and even their excesses, were right."

Damn straight; truth was on our side, just as it is today...
So it doesn't matter how we dress, or even THAT we dress...
In fact, I'd LOVE to see a sea of naked human beings surrounding the WH in every direction, with nothing on but sunscreen and some flowers in their hair, calling for an END to ALL these wars... especially the SECRET one that's been waged on our culture ever since the late 70's...

DEVO was totally right... but there's GOT to be a way to turn it all around... I've gotta keep trying--cuz if there's not, what's the point of living at all?
MORE people need to wake up; we have to find a way to wake them up and make them see that their tv is NOT their friend, that that is the face of The Man on the news show smiling and telling them everything is under control and jerking them around and talking around every important subject and issue, effectively censoring all rational thought in a tidal wave of nonsense and jabberwocky and cheap laughs and small-minded giggles and blatant misinformation...

"They've got the guns but we've got the numbers!"--Jim Morrison
Morrison could say that back then...
But we're finally getting there, slowly but surely...
I hope.
And that's STILL good enough for me, even after almost 30 years of Reaganomics and Reagan trash-culture and constant near-hopelessness.

Hell, our enemies wanna take us back a LOT further... they don't want just a second Great Depression; they want the Dark Ages back.
I say we GO BACK to the 60's!
I say we HEAD 'EM OFF AT THE PAST!

[vickitulsa]

108. "I say we HEAD 'EM OFF AT THE PAST!"

Oh man, now THAT is a beautiful line!

I hope you don't mind that I'm gonna be using it a lot in the upcoming days and nights as SOME folks think they're going to get away with mocking us ole hippies.

From the tie-dyed garments (and even curtains) to the retro style of some magnificent old cars, it would seem our culture has been recognizing the universal and powerful APPEAL of so many of our fads and fashions from "back when." And what's even MORE amazing, even the young repugs can't help being drawn into the scope of that appeal. I wonder if the spirit of the 60's never really died at all but has merely been hibernating? Awaiting the right time to awaken and inspire a whole new world in ways that can honestly SAVE that world!?

It does seem to have a power all its own, that spirit. Which came first, the actions or the spirit? Either way, the two feed on each other and the movement GROWS. Oh yeah! :D

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[HysteryDiagnosis]

10. Sometimes.... I fear that some of us spent more than 10 years in

the sixties.... heh heh heh..... I say bring 'em on, bring 'em back, just bring 'em. Those were the days.

[Iris]

110. I'd even take the 70s at this point,

when those who made it through the 60s entered gov't. and public life with passion. A lot of my teachers in the 70s had that sort of "we can do it" enthusiasm.

[zanne]

137. I'll take 1970 over 1870.

The RWers don't want to take us back to the 1950's--they want to take us back to the 1850's. And they'll start with reversing the outcome of the Civil War!

[Mythsaje]

11. I was born in 1966

And by 69 most of the adults I knew were hippies or the like. The musical soundtrack of my childhood was the Beattles, Stones, Steppenwolf, Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, the Moody Blues, and Crosby, Stills, and Nash.

The people I grew up around were gentle, loving, and peaceful, for the most part. I knew some biker wannabe types in my teens who were a bit toxic, but the "dirty hippy types" were truly some of the best human beings I've ever met.

Or, as I was taught to say growing up..."good people."

These days I'm an keyboard revolutionary...but if I ever get big as an author, I'll be standing tall wherever they'll have me.

[Lorien]

126. Born in 1965 here and had pretty much the same experiences;

my parents were "hippies "themselves, and the private school I went to was run by people like them (very unorthodox; no desks, flower power school bus, spent one semester in a forest, and another in a stable). Not only were the adults that I knew gentle and peaceful people, they were very well educated and up on their current events as well. The intelligen tand fascinating discussions that went on around me during childhood seem impossible to come by these days. I find that I'm longing for a return to that era more and more often as our media becomes increasingly inane and our people(for the most part) remain focused on consumerism. Yes, please; bring back the 60's!

[HysteryDiagnosis]

128. I lived on CSNY... burned out quite a few tapes... but then again,

I am older than dirt.

[hwmnbn]

12. Thank you!!!.......

It was a time of rare passion and INCREDIBLE hopefulness and positive spirit

That's what I remember, that's what I loved! That period is what shaped my philosophy and attitudes. I'm proud and grateful to have shared that experience.

Although my methods have evolved over the years, the principles have remained steady. You detailed some of the achievements in your post. At the same time we were having fun.

Maybe it was only our youth, but I don't think so. It was exhilarating to expand our consciousness, our potentials and our humanity. Love has always been the answer.

dxstone, thanks for the flashback.

[dxstone]

20. The pleasure is all mine...

And welcome to DU, hwmnbn!
I agree with everything you say, heartily!

:toast:

d

ps: Any nominations out there, anyone?... it's a good, happy, hopeful conversation for a change, I think; hope more will be able to see this one...

[Eloriel]

95. I've asked myself the same thing, a thousand times

Maybe it was only our youth, but I don't think so.

No, it wasn't JUST "the best time of our lives" because it was OUR youth. There was much, much more to it than that. Much more.

And yes, it was incredibly exhilarating. Hell, it's exhilarating just to remember it.

[jimshoes]

13. There is a certain feel right now

that is very similar to the 60's. There is a movement growing, a determination of spirit, of that there can be no doubt. The RW noise machine will not be able to keep up with it. It's the beginning of the end for them and their war based on lies.

[DavidDvorkin]

16. Best decade ever

I still miss those days.

And not just because I miss my youth. The hope, the joy, the enthusiasm . . .

[Gabi Hayes]

17. actually, the sixties started for real in 64, after the CIA, etal, killed

JFK.

the civil rights movement started in earnest in 64, as well as coordinated anti-war movements

sixties lasted til, 74, when public outrage culminated in even the pugs' inability to support the foul presence in the WH. after that, things started to suck again.

a brief oasis.....

[Bobbieo]

18. The 60's

Best decade ever and we are bringing them back.

[DavidDvorkin]

23. Culturally, decades tend to start in mid-decade

I think the clock was reset in 1945, when WWII ended.

[Clark2008]

19. Well, the music was better - not so regulated

and it didn't all sound the same. That's for sure.

[La Coliniere]

21. Thanks for the memories.

I want my groovy, freaky, love-in, "I can relate", joyful, sharing, caring, sixties back too, MAN!

[wli]

22. bring back the politics, not the fashion & stereotypes

The tie dye thing is what's tired, not the principles.

[Lorien]

24. I'll say it again: the fashion is back in Vogue

open up Vogue, Elle, or Women's wear weekly and you'll have a virtual '60's flashback. Tie-dye, fringe, tunics, peasant blouses, bell bottoms-you name it, it's back.

[wli]

26. weird, I don't see it happening around me

But then again, maybe I'm not the "mainstream."

[Eloriel]

96. ponchos and capes and knit and crochet and

pretty soon SOMEone is bound to remember macrame. :evilgrin:

[dxstone]

27. I think SUITS are what's tired and boring, and a sure sign of dishonesty!

I don't trust ANYONE wearing a suit; after ALL they've done, those people have NO credibility!
Who the hell dresses like that all day? WHY?
And what's with that "tie" thing? What the hell is that, a LEASH?
d
Dress codes, btw, were one of those old outdated mores the kids of the 60's REALLY found tired and tiring... and they rebelled against the whole idea of societally-sanctioned modes of dress and grooming along with all the other uncool rules they could readily identify...
I just don't see any reasonable argument against people wearing casual clothes...
Tie-dye is cool... it's bright and happy and energetic and fun and I just don't get that reasoning at all...

I STILL wear my hair as long as it will grow, I always will... this DOES hurt me economically, it always did; there are still many MANY assholes out there in positions of power who point fingers and throw feces and wish that the last vestiges of the 60's would fade away like a bad dream, and they could go back to being little dictator Massas on their own old-fashioned slave-labor cotton plantations...
But sometimes you've gotta draw the line, and HOLD it; you're sure not going to win people like THAT over, anyway.
NO ONE should be telling others how to dress and groom. That's 'WAY past TOO MUCH.

[mtnsnake]

52. Have you ever written any books about this? If not, you should!

If I saw a book with a title that read, "I Think SUITS Are What's Tired and Boring, and a Sure Sign of Dishonesty", followed by one of your above posts on the back of the jacket, I don't think I could leave the store without it!

You are colorful and right on. Thanks, and nominated!

[dxstone]

85. Thanx!

I may just do that!
I have enough material to publish many, many books... publishers, though, that's another problem entirely... I admit I've been a bit discouraged on this account for, oh, the last 20 years or so...
It doesn't stop me from writing, though, and speaking my mind...
Another reason I LOVE DU... a chance to be heard. If our culture was one-tenth as intellectually free as we applaud ourselves as being, we wouldn't have the lion's share of broadcast time or book publishing and marketing pre-reserved for some of the most imbecilic and boring and obnoxious people among us; people with no clue, troglodytes and evolutionary throwbacks of every sort, filling the airwaves and the print medium with same-old same-old happy happy joy joy conceptually devoid prepackaged denatured BULLSHIT...

Theory: This is why the UFO dudes don't visit more often anymore... they used to like us, they used to like our dumb-ass tv shows like I LOVE Lucy and The Beverly Hillbillies... but now they've seen The Sopranos and Ally McBeal and The Apprentice, and countless reruns of Cops, over and over... and they see the REAL Hillbillies living in the White House, and they're a lot warier than they used to be...
Now they stay at a safe distance, and watch reruns of Laugh-In, and Saturday Night Live, back when it was both HIP and funny, and Monty Python, they just can't get enough Python...
Reminds me of the old SNL news bit where we finally got a response from an alien life form from the SETI satellite transmissions and CD we sent out with all sorts of info about who we are and our history, and including music, from Beethoven to Chuck Berry...
And the aliens send a simple message, a single line:
Send more Chuck Berry.

[Eloriel]

97. I don't know if this will be of any interest to you -- but worth a look

Lulu.com Self-Publishing
http://www.lulu.com/themes/create/homepage.php

[vickitulsa]

65. "And what's with that "tie" thing?"

"What the hell is that, a LEASH?"

Uhh .. er ... YEAHH!! Actually a collar and leash in one, a lot like the cheapo length of plastic with a small loop at one end and a larger one at the other end -- the "disposable" LEASH used at veterinarians' offices and dog pounds everywhere.....

Women have been known to wear some mighty restrictive garments and particularly UNDERgarments, too -- but most of those were pushed on them by men. Men have no sense of what is good to wear but for one significant exception: SHOES!

Comfy, sturdy, sensible, and still often nice-looking. I have been wearing men's shoes for decades whenever I can find a pair that look okay on my female feet. And sometimes even if they DON'T look so sharp!

Shoes are important, that's how we get around. Women are STILL idiotic enough to go back after all these years and the medical knowledge contraindicating them to wearaing those tortuous pointy-toed high heels with spikes ... in which they could never run or walk a long way -- or MARCH on WASHINGTON.

I just don't understand that one....

So I suggest we all get out our old sturdy comfy shoes or boots or go buy a pair of new ones and get them broken in fast BECAUSE THE MARCHING DAYS HAVE RETURNED TO MIDDLE AMERICA!

~VV

P.S. Has anyone else noticed what Cindy does all day at Camp Casey or wherever she is? She walks around -- talking to people, just walking and smiling at friends and thanking them for support and revealing not only her nervous energy but her very strong will and determination to see this thing through to the end. She'll stop walking when the troops come home and not before! I feel precisely that way too, and when a lot more Americans do, that dirty "little" war in Iraq will come to a screeching halt. When Middle America, the Heartland, refuses to sacrifice its young people anymore, sons and daughters and grandsons and granddaughters, the elite warmongers in charge can do nothing but end the conflict and cut off the source of our misery and pain here at home.

:patriot:

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[Telly Savalas]

78. Martin Luther King, Jr. wore a suit.

Tommy Douglas, the father of universal healthcare in Canada, wore a suit.

Morris Dees, head of the Southern Poverty Law Center, wears a suit.

Dennis Kucinich wears a suit.

Malcolm X wore a suit.

Noam Chomsky frequently wears a suit while on the lecture circuit.

All of these guys have their flaws like all humans do, but you're totally full of shit if you think they have no credibility. Perhaps you should be more open minded and quit judging people by what they wear.

[dxstone]

91. Your response is really, really interesting.

But you might think about having some coffee and waking up a bit before posting... HEY, here's a refreshing idea: Maybe you should go jump in the lake!
I'VE worn a suit, ya doofus! EVERYONE HAS at one time or another!
For you to completely miss my point and to instead come at me like an angry Mr. Spock ("You, sir, are an ILLogical asshole; here is a complete list of good people who have worn suits down thru history," he said with calm and measured diction) is just silly.
You're calling me silly... but you, sir, are a VERY silly person indeed.
Entertainingly so.

[tx_dem41]

92. WOW....what pointless hostility aimed at a post that illustrated a

very good point.

[dxstone]

99. I believe his exact words were "totally full of shit"...

Thus my hostility...
It's NOT a good point. It's just another point in an endless sea of points. I can certainly understand how SOME may wish to wear a suit in order to get their voice heard... and I would not in any SERIOUS way try to dissuade them in this PERSONAL CHOICE... but I expect the same respect in return.

It doesn't matter what you wear
It's not important how you comb your hair
It doesn't matter if your car looks like junk
It doesn't even matter if you smell like a skunk
It doesn't matter if you're rich or poor
Or gay or divorced or a veteran of war
I don't CARE where I fall on their demograph chart--
ALL that matters is what's in your heart.

And I don't think we need to keep pretending to be THEM in order to 'win their hearts'; most of our enemies simply don't have one, and most of those we CAN win know that clothes are just clothes; ANYONE can wear a suit (Kissinger, Hitler, Bill Kristol, Charles Manson... ANYONE!)
It doesn't automatically make your intentions noble... but it definitely give ME the feeling that that's the IMPRESSION you're trying hard, perhaps much TOO hard, to make.

[tx_dem41]

102. In your first post...you said a suit was a "sure sign of dishonesty"

A SURE sign. Although, I didn't like his/her use of "full of shit" either, I can surely understand them being upset at your implication (either purposeful or nonpurposeful) that MLK and others were dishonest.

[Telly Savalas]

106. And your exact words were:

"I don't trust ANYONE wearing a suit; after ALL they've done, those people have NO credibility!"

To which I respond that you're totally full of shit if you think the individuals I listed have no credibilty. My statement is only hostile if you really do think those folks have no credibility. You surely don't really believe those people deserve our disdain do you?

[dxstone]

111. No, I don't... again, that line is meant to be taken tongue-in-cheek.

Even when I'm trying my hardest to be very serious, I usually end up jokin' around a bit... I AM primarily an angry clown, after all...
And I said it to make a serious point.
Because that's just the sort of crap THEY say all the time. "Those HIPPIES are dirty and ignorant and undisciplined and high on loopy locoweed and spoiled goddamn commie faggot weirdos who never worked a day in their lives." THAT'S what I'm lampooning, that very sort of heavy-handed, irrational, blanket-coverage prejudice based upon something as ridiculously elastic and utterly meaningless as a person's wardrobe.

The people you listed all have GREAT credibility... but it was not they alone who ended the war in Vietnam or advanced civil rights, though for many, their contribution could have been no greater personally...
It was in fact the COLLECTIVE effort of all those dissidents of the 60's and early 70's that won the day; it's ALWAYS a collective effort, ANY great and marvelous thing that people have ever achieved...
But it's ALWAYS the nature of so-called 'conservatives' to claim for themselves the lion's share of the credit and the profit from ANY collective endeavor, and in so doing to completely ignore and disenfranchise the larger segment of actual workers and doers and supporters and thinkers and dreamers from that achievement, of whatever common endeavor we might speak of.
A major difference in philosophy there: "All people are equal", as opposed to "some people are MORE equal than others", or "well-dressed people (HOWEVER you may define that) are somehow more credible or important or wise and all-knowning than others."
Again, I don't give the proverbial RAT'S ASS about fashion; give me someone who knows how to wear a sincere, open SMILE on their face without it looking, as it does with so many of our own current 'well-dressed' power elite, like it was GRAFTED ON surgically.
d
ps: The Sixties were the LAST TIME Americans pushed back hard against the status quo, and thus refused, both literally and symbolically, to don the 'uniform' of the cultural majority.
The LAST TIME BEFORE THAT?... I guess that would be the American Revolution, when we upset the British in their game by preferring to fight with guerrilla tactics rather than following the proscribed 'rules of war'... and EVEN refused to wear the expected uniform of war.
So maybe it IS all about the clothes after all.

[TankLV]

120. Self deleted

[TankLV]

119. True - but that was then - this is NOW.

Enron execs wear suits.

Worldcom execs wear suits.

Gorgonzola Sleazy Lice wears suits.

Asscrap wears suits.

THESE are the "posterboys" for suit wearers nowadays.

What worked in the past, doesn't necessarily always work in the present.

[Telly Savalas]

129. I didn't realize Morris Dees, Dennis Kucinich, and Noam Chomsky were dead.

Enron execs drink water.

Worldcom execs drink water.

Condoleeza Rice drinks water.

George Walker Bush drinks water.

Doesn't mean that everyone who drinks water is evil, does it?

[mtnsnake]

146. C'mon, you don't have to take it so literally word for word.

If you do, then that's a good way to deflect what the original purpose of the post was.

Sorry, but I love the analogy with the "suits" thing, and I'm sure Martin Luther King, Jr, if he were still alive, would not be offended...or anyone else who's wearing a suit and has likewise good intentions.

[Warren DeMontague]

100. You choose your wardrobe

I'll choose mine, TYVM.

[spanone]

25. I agree. The movement from the youth of America was overwhelming

in the sixties. They MADE people hear their side.

[Swamp Rat]

28. I'm taking the 'movement' to my university campus.

:hi:

[vickitulsa]

67. Good for you, Swamp Rat!

And a hearty THANK YOU for the gorgeous Peace symbol graphic. I have collected quite a few of these, artistically done, around the Internet over the last eight years, but yours if by far the most beautiful one I've seen.

And your artwork is so outstanding I'm just certain some of it will be taken up by the students at your campus who feel as we do about this rotten, stinkin', lie-based war in Iraq. I've noticed several of your graphics displayed at Camp Casey, by the way, and they look GREAT on TV!

I know you will keep up the artist push from your end, as those of us with other talents will do in our own way, my friend. I say GOODONYAMATE, and carry on!

Which reminds me of another song, one I had as a recording by Joan Baez who was my favorite of all the protest singers during the Vietnam War era. It's called simply "Carry It On" and it's about the need to keep up the fight -- the fight AGAINST warmongering and powergrabbing that sacrifices young lives for the gain in wealth it brings to the upper crust who never send their OWN children to fight in their evil wars.

Here are some of those lyrics.

There's a man by my side walking
There's a voice within me talking
There's a word that needs a'saying
Carry it on
Carry it on
Carry it on
Carry it on

They will tell their lyin' stories
Send their dogs to bite our bodies
They will lock us in their prisons
Carry it on
Carry it on
Carry it on
Carry it on

When you can't go on any longer
Take the hand held by your brother
Every victory gonna bring another
Carry it on
Carry it on
Carry it on
Carry it on

I can't recall who wrote it, Joan or someone else, but I suspect we'd recognize the name if we heard it. --Just looked it up at Lyrics007.com, and they had the words but didn't note the artist who penned them. That means it's either Joan Baez, because it was in the category of "her" songs, or else they just weren't listing the composer and lyric-writer for every song.

Here is a link to the lyrics at that Website of another of my top favorite Joan Baez war protest songs, Heaven Help Us All.

http://www.lyrics007.com/Joan%20Baez%20Lyrics/Heaven%20Help%20Us%20All%20Lyrics.html

And don't forget Where Have All The Flowers Gone?~!

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Raksha]

29. Great post!

Re >>The '60's should be the MODEL for what we are trying to accomplish today!<<

THEY ARE, especially for those of us old enough to remember.

[Karenina]

30. Those were the days, my friend

We thought they'd never end
We'd sing and dance forever and a day
We lived the life we'd choose
We'd fight and never lose
For we were young, and sure to have our way...

[dxstone]

112. I LOVE that song!

Ahh, such bitter-sweet nostalgia from so many of these yet-hopeful responses...
To ALL of you, old hippies and new, I raise my glass in toast:

May we live ON as we DREAMED of living, to the highest standard of that dream; and too, may we die as we lived, FREE SPIRITS ALL!
:toast:

[Wizard777]

31. The only people that can remember the 60's weren't there

So for God sakes somebody get some video and takes some notes this time around.
Waaaaaaa Hoooooooo!

Born to be wild.

[Seabiscuit]

42. I remember the 60's and I *was* there.

[Piperay]

132. I remember them and

they weren't that great. :-(

[DanCa]

32. Actually the s ixties were cool

but I like the seventies too.

[Carla in Ca]

33. I made it through the 60's

And all the happier for it. When I get into a generational discussion with someone younger all I have to say is "Ah, I had the 60's, you didn't". I get a smile and they confess the music can't be beat.

Since we are on the subject of tye-dye, here is a picture I took at the Vigil. Couldn't resist sharing it.








M A K E L O V E , N O T W A R ! ! !

[DistressedAmerican]

34. I Am Trying! No Free Love going On Yet Though!

Sweet post. More from me in the AM. Very tired. Sacking out...

[ngGale]

35. If you're going to San Francisco....

Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair
If you're going to San Francisco
You're gonna meet some gentle people there

For those who come to San Francisco
Summertime will be a love-in there
In the streets of San Francisco
Gentle people with flowers in their hair

All across the nation such a strange vibration
People in motion
There's a whole generation with a new explanation
People in motion people in motion

For those who come to San Francisco
Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair
If you come to San Francisco
Summertime will be a love-in there

If you come to San Francisco
Summertime will be a love-in there

San Francisco
~by Scott McKenzie

:hippie: :loveya:

[eowyn_of_rohan]

55. Hearing "oldies classics" when they were new sounds...

That song aired in spring, 1967 I remember, and it was like an anthem--a call or calling to our generation. How many took off for SF that summer because of that song? I was too young, but my parents took us to Expo 67 in Montreal that year, so I felt like I was doing SOMETHING ;)

I discovered Top 40 radio that year, and kept track of where my favorite songs were on the chart from week to week. It is hard to convey to "kids" now how powerful the music was back then, and how it felt to hear these now "classic" songs coming over the airwaves for the first time! Every sound was virtually NEW -- which was enthralling and electrifying!

For some reason it sticks in my mind, the first time I heard those first few bars of "Honky Tonk Women" on the car radio, and it was Holy __ What is THIS!

Such an amazing time to have been young and alive, FILLED, as so many here have said, with creative energy, idealism and optimism. But it was definitely not all good, or happy or joyful, and it was difficult time to come of age, with all the social (and moral) upheaval, trying to decide between what your parents had taught you, or to "go with the flow" of your own generation...

[TankLV]

121. WKBW! Best station EVER!

KB radio!

Hounddog, Sandy Beach, Joey Reynolds.

Boy do I miss that one!

http://wkbwradio.com/

[vickitulsa]

66. Ahhh ... the MUSIC!

And what many people know, even non-musicians or perhaps especially non-musicians, is that the music can actually lead the way.

Rebellion and revolution are often accompanied not by a drummer boy but by a guitar-toting, lies-quoting songwriter and singer -- or a whole sh*tload of them!

Here's one of mine, written at the piano but most often sung to a guitar accompaniment. The story behind it is very real. I was visiting a Namvet friend of mine, a family man who was wounded at Khe Sanh after many days there under seige during the TET Offensive. He "caught a mortar round in his hip pocket," as he puts it. By the way, this sweet veteran of that nightmare war died at age 41 of congestive heart failure ... which the VA would not treat because they claimed it was NOT "service-related"!

Anyway, during this visit to Nick and his family, which included two daughters age 17 and 8 and a son age 12, we all watched a TV movie I'd taped when it aired where I lived. It was the story of Jan Scruggs' efforts to get the Vietnam Memorial (better known to most as "the Wall") placed on The Mall in Washington, DC. Nick had not seen it, and in fact like so many Namvets he seldom read or viewed anything about Vietnam because it upset him so much.

But he actually WANTED to see this one after I described to him what it was about. So we sat in their den in the evening and in the dark, gathered around the ole TV set in true American family form. Because I'd already seen the movie, I mostly watched my friend and his family as THEY watched it this time.

I noticed that Nikki, the 17-year-old daughter, kept sneaking peeks at her dad as he was so obviously engrossed in the story. Nick was an artist, too -- painting and sculpting mostly, and his subject matter was almost exclusively the war and his feelings about it and the men who sent our troops to fight and die in it. He was uneasy allowing his feelings to show in other ways, but the Wall story really got to him ... and he couldn't stop the tears from flowing down his cheeks.

Nikki was clearly stunned. Her dad had spoken so little about the war over her short lifetime that she really had no idea how it affected him to remember it. She'd seen his artwork, but being a teenager she hadn't really tried hard to understand what it meant to her father.

Seeing him weep openly definitely got her attention, though! She didn't say anything, but I could tell she was very moved as she became thoughtful about all this emotion in her dad that was so new to her awareness.

So when I got home from my trip to visit this family, I wrote the following song -- and on my next visit I shared it with Nick and Nikki and the rest of his family, explaining that I had penned it from Nikki's point of view, as I saw it.

ON THE EVENING NEWS

We are the children
Of the Vietnam War
We don't know why our daddies died
What was all the death for?

We are the children
We've been paying our own special dues
We can't relate to a jungle war
On the evening news

Well, my own daddy didn't die
But sometimes he almost wishes he had
He's been living in a torment
That I think must be just as bad

And I can see it in his eyes
The old newsreels make him cry
And I know what he's crying for
It's the Vietnam War

So many people in the USA
Are now wishing for something they could say
To make it up to the young men
Now grown old, too soon
We cast them from the fold

They were the sacrifice
On the altar of politics and greed
They didn't think that we would ask them
If there was no need

We are the children
Of the Vietnam War
We don't know why our daddies died
What was all the death for?

We are the children
We've been paying our own special dues
We can't relate to a jungle war
On the evening news

May there never be another jungle war
May there never be another desert war
May there never be another jungle war
On the evening news...

~*~*~*~*~*~

I've been feeling the old songwriting juices stirring again, and am working on the lyrics for a song protesting the war in Iraq right now.

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Eloriel]

86. Beatuiful story, beautiful song

Thanks for sharing it with us.

As for the music of the 60s: the music ALONE made that THE best era ever. :bounce:

[vickitulsa]

105. Why thank you, Eloriel.

I'm very pleased to be able to sing it again. Haven't very much since Nick died, but I think the message is once again soo relevant!

I always know when serious matters are moving me in a place really deep inside, where the creativity originates, because I begin to write songs and sing them every chance I get to anyone who will listen. Often I just play and sing in the background, and hope a little bit of the message gets through.

I hate the spotlight, 'cause it can, as Larry Gatlin put it, "kill a man outright." ;) But I sure want to share with others the urgent messages that sometimes find an outlet in my music.

Before my house burned down in '93, I had a small recording studio in the extra bedroom and a major record company asking me to send them tapes of my original songs. They never bought any but their A&R man kept his secretary calling me -- not writing but calling -- asking me to send more of them, two at a time, for the staff to hear.

The fire ended my career-to-be, in a way, but of course if I'd been moved powerfully enough to pursue it again, I would have found a way. Mostly I just sing for friends and very small audiences around town.

But I share my song lyrics across the Net freely, and if anyone is touched by them I am happy. :bounce:

You are so right, too, about the 60's music making that decade the BEST ever! And the early 70's run it a close second.

My brother who is also a musician and is 59, three years older than I, has a truly massive CD collection; and I'll bet at least 80 percent of the music is from those two decades. Me, I am finding I can locate all the bestest oldies out there on the Web somewhere and sometimes even download them for free; and it's also terrific that now a person can find the lyrics to the good ol' songs -- even the obscure ones, usually! -- when it's drivin' ya crazy tryin' ta remember some of them! B-) :hippie: :toast: :crazy: :thumbsup:

~VV

(And oh yeah, how much less thrilling would all of that groovy "Vitamin A" have been without the MUSIC to listen to while tripping! Hohoho)

(BTW, I love your screen name, Eloriel. Sounds very Elvish! Which means I picture you as looking a lot like Liv Tyler or Cate Blanchett.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Desertrose]

124. I second that....very touching (and true) lyrics!

I can't believe we didn't learn any more than we have from those times. How could we have gone down the same road again. (oh,yeah, bush happened...sigh)

Thinking of the 60's really pulls me a lot of different ways...the good times and the sad times.....there is no way to explain coming of age in the sixties...you really did have to be there....

Thanks for sharing :hug:
DR

PS Keep writing those lyrics!!!!!

[struggle4progress]

114. " ... We haven't had that spirit here since 1969, and still those voices

are calling from far away ..." -- Hotel California (The Eagles)

[struggle4progress]

116. He's five foot-two, and he's six feet-four,

He fights with missiles and with spears.
He's all of thirty-one, and he's only seventeen,
He's been a soldier for a thousand years.

He'a a Catholic, a Hindu, an Atheist, a Jain,
A Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew.
And he knows he shouldn't kill,
And he knows he always will,
Kill you for me my friend and me for you.

And he's fighting for Canada,
He's fighting for France,
He's fighting for the USA,
And he's fighting for the Russians,
And he's fighting for Japan,
And he thinks we'll put an end to war this way.

And he's fighting for Democracy,
He's fighting for the Reds,
He says it's for the peace of all.
He's the one who must decide,
Who's to live and who's to die,
And he never sees the writing on the wall.

But without him,
How would Hitler have condemned him at Labau?
Without him Caesar would have stood alone,
He's the one who gives his body
As a weapon of the war,
And without him all this killing can't go on.

He's the Universal Soldier and he really is to blame,
His orders come from far away no more,
They come from here and there and you and me,
And brothers can't you see,
This is not the way we put an end to war.

-- Universal Soldier (Donovan)

[DanCa]

36. self delete

[Greyhound]

37. Totally! But what about the young? They/you were the engine

that drove those great times of change. Though there certainly are many young progressives, there are not nearly enough, IMO. Mostly they seem pretty sold on the corporate dream. :hippie:

[dxstone]

94. Slow, measured mass hypnosis...

Interestingly, I just watched Jonathan Demme's remake of the old Frankenheimer film "The Manchurian Candidate"... pretty damn good (much better than the original, imho), and the allusions to this subject are many...
What's happening right now, as I see it, is that The American Dream became the American Corporate Dream... and that dream has now become a NIGHTMARE for so many of us, and many more coming every day...
Which is something to be thankful for, in the long run.
How can they sustain this Nation of Dreamers with nothing but nightmares?
They can't.

[vickitulsa]

101. Man, I agree with you there.

When it comes to our daily economic lives and the cloud of hardship and fear we live under inside our own borders, the way our lives have changed since GWB and Gang took office (illegally), I just do NOT see how any of what must be *their* wet dreams can be sustained for much longer.

And the whole nightmare aspect to the current wars in Iraq AND Afghanistan (which is heating up again now in some parts of that country) can be taken quite literally as well, IMO. The heart of PTSD, what keeps it beating a drum of horrific sounds and flashing dire scenes full of terror for a high percentage of veterans are the nightmares which haunt them at a time when they can't fight back, can't wake themselves UP, can't get away.

No matter what a vet says or does during his waking hours or how well he (or she) is able to suppress the intrusive thoughts of war experiences, there is just no remedy for what attacks them in their sleep. Being a PTSD sufferer myself from childhood experiences not all that far removed from combat, I relate to what veterans endure when PTSD symptoms come calling. I've talked with many of them about it, and we all agree. The sheer HELPLESSNESS we experience when dreaming things we don't WANT to dream is maddening.

And what makes this whole situation worse is that new events revive old terrors. Every time there is a major incident that makes news, something which causes death and destruction and most of all FEAR among those who are involved, people with PTSD have to do battle all over again with their own private fear and dread and the sights and sounds that go with them.

As an example, and I may have told this here before, so forgive me, but exactly seven days after the terrorist attacks of September Eleventh, I had the mother of all nightmares -- and this after a lifetime of living with bad dreams. Since I got some good therapy as I reached my late forties, I'd been doing a lot better and slowly having far fewer sleep disturbances including nightmares; but the magnitude of the horrors of 9/11 threw me right back into nightmare mode, bigtime.

I won't describe the dream itself except to say that it involved scenes of such fear and dread, explosions and gore, that it topped anything I'd ever dreamed before by a long shot. I'd been so immersed in angst about the war in Vietnam and read and talked about it so much when it was happening that I even had combat nightmares back then and afterward. But nothing I'd ever experienced came close to that nightmare a week after 9/11. In the dream *I* was going through something much like the victims of the attacks, and I awakened so shaken I was literally trembling and was having trouble even breathing.

I had come awake, up out of the dream all at once, possibly because I'd had some success before in learning to WAKE MYSELF UP when the bad ones reached an extreme place. Trying to remind myself that "it was only a dream" was pointless then, because it doesn't matter that your waking mind KNOWS it was a dream. You BODY is reacting just as if the things experienced in the dream were actually occurring -- this has been shown in countless studies. My heart was pounding so hard I thought it would jump out of my chest, and the tears flowed so fast I couldn't begin to control them or keep up with wiping them.

The only thing I could think to do was call my neighbor, a lady about my age whom I'd become close to recently, even though it was just before dawn and still dark outside and I knew she'd be asleep. I asked if I could come over -- her apartment was just a few doors down from mine -- and she said yes because she could tell from how I sounded that I really needed help. I remember telling her, literally and for the first time in my life actually *BLUBBERING*, that I was "rattled" and needed to talk to her.

I didn't even get dressed, just staggered over to her place and she was waiting at the door, ready with a big hug and broad shoulder to cry on, to help her friend through what was clearly a terribly rough time. She gave me one of her Valiums and sat and listened to me relate the full horrors of the dream and get the whole thing out of my system as the sedative kicked in, and finally three hours later I was able to go home and ease back into "normal" life.

You can tell I haven't forgotten it, however.

I tell all this to illustrate in case anyone doubts it how devastating "just a dream" can be, and to reinforce what you said about the nightmare so many of us are enduring these days and for the last five years or so. Our whole country is in the grip of a horrendous dream from which many of us want to wake up very badly -- but we can't.

At least we haven't been able to until NOW ... now that things are finally looking like they might turn around.

However, the nightmares won't fade away completely for some time, even if we rid ourselves of the burden of an administration that is causing the disasters, one after the other. There will be a huge amount of healing that will be necessary, and therapy is in order.

I just hope we're well on our way to seeing an end to the catastrophes that we've witnessed and lived through in recent years, including the war and all that means for those troops who have had to fight it and their families.

Even if we could impeach GWB today and see his entire club of thugs sent to prison for all their crimes, people like Cindy Sheehan would find it cold comfort because she would still face the rest of her life without her beloved son, and knowing he died for a lie. But if we fail her, if we fail to speak out loudly and clearly enough and be persistent enough to not only end this insane war but oust the criminals who launched it from their comfortable offices where they wield their power to do harm in the world, then IMO we should have to face her just as W should face her and tell her WHY.......

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Peace Patriot]

133. Vickitulsa, how blessed you are to be able to describe your experience

so well! Thank you, thank you, thank you! Vietnam was a nightmare not only for those in it, and those returning from it, but also for those us at home--a terrible ripping off of the mask of what we thought was a good country, to see the horrendous acts that our government was doing in our name, and the horror that other young people, in those days only young men, were being forced to endure and to be part of. At least a million people slaughtered and their country laid waste. And the body bags coming back--oh, God!--and the crippled soldiers, and the drugged out soldiers who could only find comfort from their nightmares in heroine and alcohol--and, even worse, society's abandonment of them. Vets on the street! Vets uncared for!

I have my own, inner, personal theory about Iraq, that evil men like Cheney and Rumsfeld and Perl and Feith, and their rightwing billionaire "think tank" funders--INTENDED to wipe out the lessons of Vietnam, and especially to wipe out the SENSIBILITY of sorrow and compassion and ethical responsibility that drove the 1960s antiwar movement, and to create CALLOUSNESS and UGLINESS in Americans, to make Americans INSENSITIVE to the suffering of others--with deliberate policies of TORTURE, and obliviousness to casualties, and disregard for soldiers, treating them, literally, like cannon fodder, and creating a whole new class of hated sub-humans ("ragheads" to replace the "gooks" of Vietnam, whom they could readily exploit because nobody cares about them, and their deaths aren't even counted--tens of thousands of them Iraqis killed by our bombs, and thousands of Iraqis, Afghanis and others still imprisoned and being driven mad and tortured, even now. They set about DELIBERATELY to break the spirit of the Sixties, to destroy "love, love, love" forevermore. That has been their MAIN purpose, and it is so evil, it's hard even to speak of it.

Some speak of the war profiteering and the greed, and, of course, the oil--and also the sleazy desire for "empire." But I sense more than this--I sense seething hatred of the consciousness, wisdom and even holiness of the Sixties peace movement. That movement created a vision--a new projection of human goodness, generosity, kindness, and spiritual and ethical values--that they HAD TO smash and obliterate, and have done everything in their power toward that end--from spitting on and degrading the Uniform Code of Military Justice and international law, to polluting Christianity with messages of hatred, repression and murderousness.

Truly a recurring nightmare--for those of us who lived through the Sixties, and especially those who were young in those days, as I was. To see it all happen again--and this time, with venomous malevolence against the forces of goodness and justice. To wipe peace off the face of the earth. To deliberately try to kill that hope and that dream in human hearts. An icy shudder runs through me at what I see in these terrible men.

But through it all, I have never, ever lost faith in the American people. Because you know what? We DID learn the lessons of Vietnam. We have not forgotten. Not only did FIFTY-EIGHT PERCENT of the American people oppose the Iraq war BEFORE the invasion--I'll never forget that stat, Feb. '03, across the board in all polls, BEFORE all the lies where exposed, before the full horror and costs were known, 58%--but also ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FIVE CONGRESS PEOPLE VOTED AGAINST THE IRAQ WAR. You know how many Congresspeople voted against the Vietnam War? TWO!*

And that more recent war vote--on Iraq--came amidst the most fearsome intimidation that has ever been exerted on Congress. It took very great courage to vote against the Bush Cartel fascists. We should re-publish that list of 125.

Your nightmare of 9/11, Vickitulsa, and the nightmares of Vietnam vets and now returning Iraq vets, have not been suffered in vain. They are the nightmares that visit people of conscience, good people, people with love in their hearts, people for whom the horror of war is extremely shocking and their psyches rebel against it and fill their spirit with alarm. The ability to HAVE nightmares is a GOOD SIGN. And the ability to FEEL and REMEMBER the nightmare of Vietnam is going to be the salvation of this country--and perhaps of the planet itself and the whole human enterprise--NOW. Vietnam is re-visiting us NOW because these bastards wanted us NOT to have nightmares about the suffering that we can inflict on others and on our own. They wanted us to FORGET. They wanted to destroy that love and that tenderness and that wisdom that we had gained, as a people, from the horror of Vietnam.

But it is not destroyed!

-----

*(Senators Wayne Morse of Oregon and Ernest Gruening of Alaska. August 7, 1964. I don't know if the House also voted on that resolution. But if it was just the Senate, still, it was 2 Senators in 1964, and 25 in 2003.)

[vickitulsa]

145. Oh man, I almost missed this post, Peace Pat, and I'm glad I didn't

because then I wouldn't have heard your theory! It's a stunning one, to say the least, and certainly worth pondering awhile.

What's most disturbing is that it might well be TRUE. It certainly fits with all the sub-threads of this war that are occurring. And after all, how could those mega-rich oil magnates (the American versions) and the think-tank mouthpieces who come up with "science" to support the evil they want to do in the world, how could they have gotten to where they are without developing a callousness themselves?

Maybe this is one thing that they figure, if it's good for them, it's good for "the little people," too. There's a word for it in psychdom, it's called "de-sensitization," and it's just what it says. The example given in a textbook I had in college has stayed with me. I think the kid's name was "Little Hans," and he was very young, no more than five or six at most. Little Hans was afraid of big dogs and scary furry animals. I can't recall if one had harmed him or what, but in an effort to free him from this fear which to some degree caused a problem in his life, these experimenting shrinks back in the '50's or maybe the '40's started getting Little Hans used to non-living, small and clearly harmless furry objects. When he was okay with those, they slowly increased the size of the furry things and made the experiences with them pleasant for the boy.

After a time they were able to start with very small LIVING furry things, bringing them around Little Hans but making sure he was in no danger of being touched by them until he WANTED to be. In due time, he was perfectly comfortable with cats and small dogs and then big dogs.

Very simple principle, actually. And the process has been employed in literally thousands of applications ever since then.

One has to wonder, looking back on it, HOW on earth we ever accepted for even one month, let alone a year or EIGHT YEARS the deaths of our young men in Vietnam! We are outraged when 50 soldiers are killed in one week in Iraq, but during Vietnam 50 could easily die in a few HOURS. During its peak, FIVE HUNDRED dead in a WEEK was not unusual. There were so many funerals going on, so many gold stars going up in the windows of military families' homes, it was like a constant, crazy -- NIGHTMARE -- complete with dirges playing like background music.

And though 58,000 died, there were hundreds of thousands of other casualties among American (and allied) troops. It's been estimated, too, that as many as TWO MILLION Vietnamese died during that war.

One of my Namvet pals once told me that the most important lesson he had to learn was that the minute he stepped off the plane onto the soil of Vietnam, the value of life dropped to ZERO. He said the Vietnamese themselves accepted this, that in their culture, the death of one individual was not significant. Apparently, at least in his opinion, that's why they would rig grenades to toddlers and send them over to a group of U.S. soldiers.

But DID Cheney and Rumsfeld, Perl and Feith, deliberately set out to de-sensitize a nation to abuses like torture and mass murder of Iraqi civilians? I certainly wouldn't put it PAST them -- and that's a positively frightening thought. Wipe out the lessons of Vietnam, so that they are then free to put their conscience-free talents to work bigtime in the world -- perhaps even going for the big banana, the whole enchilada (forgive the food metaphors), by reaching for true "Empire"!

Maybe they figure, if the rest of the world thinks the U.S. is seeking to become a world empire, then let's just go ahead and DO that, huh? I mean, is THAT what's in their heads? If so, I think they've all really gone MAD.

I went to a Website last week from a link posted in the sig line of a DUer that shows how many IRAQIS are estimated to have been killed since the U.S. invasion was launched. You are so right that we rarely ever hear that number mentioned by American media -- let alone by the president or any other politicians. I think about it all the time! But those heartless bastards want US to be as heartless as they are, I guess, so they don't even apprise us of how many Iraqi civilians are "wasted." Sometimes we hear about their police officers or maybe their military units that suffer casualties, but no one wants to tell us about the regular Iraqi people who are cut down in the violence that never ends in their land.

Well, I could go on about this for awhile, and I apologize to all for having been so verbose, particularly on this thread; but ya know, finding all you likeminded people here at DU recently has really changed my life and given me a place where I CAN talk about these things, and I guess that has sorta opened up a floodgate.

I hope you all know how much I appreciate ya's! :hi: :thumbsup:

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[ClayZ]

38. And remember how much fun these are.....

:kick:

[Ptah]

62. How about The Whole Earth Catalog

The one with the story of Urge:
Divine Right's adventures in The Last Whole Earth Catalog

:hippie:



Edited to add pic

[OnionPatch]

70. OMG......Urge!!

I just remembered that we named our van "Urge" after that story. That was an awesome read. I've been wanting to re-read that story ever since then. Is the Whole Earth Catalog available anywhere these days?

THE SIXTIES ROCKED!!!

Every young generation since then has been milque-toast.

[Ptah]

130. Amazon has a 30th ann. edition.

I miss the geodesic dome geometry.
If I remember correctly, there was a printout
of the dimension to the accuracy of nine digits

Something like 27.82619832764 inches for a strut.

Wood burning stoves was another catagory I spent
untold hours reading and re-reading.

An, the good old days.
:applause: :hippie: :bounce:

[Telly Savalas]

79. Not very environmentally friendly though, eh?

[ClayZ]

88. Sure were easy to fix! n/t

[bobbieinok]

39. Horowitz and others claim they were ruined by the 60s

they add to the message we've been fed since Reagan (and earlier) that the 60s were drugs, booze, sex, and loud music ...... and responsible for everything wrong about US today.......everyone was just so rude and rebellious and didn't listen to 'god given' authority....

this means, of course, that civil rights and women's rights won in the 60s are the cause of all the bad today........well, of course, if you're longing for the great days of the robber barons when only the 'anointed rulers', white males, had any voice

it really drives so many crazy to think that women and blacks and Hispanics and others no longer feel they have to stay in the kitchen and at the back of the bus while 'the adults' (barf!!!!) are in charge........no, we all know we have a right to come right in and pull up a chair and enter into the dialogue

[Seabiscuit]

41. Horowitz didn't have anything worth ruining.

[Skidmore]

46. Does Horowitz go outside and look around...

there are plenty of drugs, booze, sex, and loud music these days too, in spite of all the phoney religiosity. Some of it actually participated in by preacher.

Horowitz is just a hate filled racist masquerading as an intellectual. I hope these people end up being Walmart greeters when the revolution is over.

[Seabiscuit]

40. I was a young anti-war protester during the 60's and I'd gladly bring back

that energy, but by now I'm 60 and according to you I shouldn't have a say in the matter ("Everyone who is too old to serve in a war shouldn't even have a real say, if you ask me...") so fuggheddaboutit.

[acmejack]

48. Hold on a second here

"Everyone who is too old to serve in a war shouldn't even have a real say, if you ask me... even if they were in some previous war; advise away, but no power of consent, how's that?"

In a word, IDIOTIC! How does everyone have such wonderful memories of this time but no problem with that statement? Am I just confused or am I experiencing a time warp here?

[eowyn_of_rohan]

60. It was an absurd statement

What does he mean "advise away, but no power of consent"? D-U-M-B statement...

[TankLV]

123. It is actually very simple, not dumb in the least.

It means that those who sit in the comfort of knowing that they PERSONALLY will not have to SACRIFICE ANYTING, let alone THEIR VERY LIVES for their decisions, should butt out and let those WHO WILL HAVE THEIR VERY OWN ASSES ON THE LINE FOR ANY DECISION THEY THEMSELVES WILL MAKE, be allowed to make such decisions.

I think it is brilliant and necessary.

If you don't understand it, I suggest you do so in a hurry, because the CHICKENHAWK AWOL COWARDS are perfectly willing to SACRIFICE YOUR LIFE to make THEIR sorry asses more comfortable!

[Seabiscuit]

142. So how are you going to bring back the 60's spirit without the people who

had the 60's spirit in the 60's? You won't have a clue about what you're doing.

The position you're espousing is idiotic: "Let's restart a 60's revolution without any 60's revolutionaries because they're just too damned old to be required to put their lives on the line in a war."

That's like saying "let's form a classical music orchestra without anyone with any experience playing classical music."

[dxstone]

147. See TankLV's response immediately above, and my own further down (#98)

You're reading what I said a bit too literally...

[Seabiscuit]

148. I did read TankLV's post, which is the one I was responding to.

I'm reading it and the original post exactly as they're written. If you think that's "reading what I said a bit too literally" perhaps you should have either meant what you said or said something else.

[rman]

43. "Elites were terrified by the 60's..."

"Elites were terrified by the 60's; this outburst of popular participation and democracy and so on. And there was this huge counter-campaign to drive it back."
-- Noam Chomsky, "Life and times of Noam Chomsky", Democracy Now
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/11/26/1936241&mode=thread&tid=25

[kliljedahl]

44. This old hippie

Gives it a kick & a nod

[mopaul]

45. don't forget the orange sunshine, purple microdot, & windowpane

[dxstone]

76. "But stay away from the brown acid!"

Butch got the brown acid... went on a reeeeal bad trip, and never came back...

Before:




After:

[TankLV]

125. I believe bunerboy there did as well.

Makes more sense of all the shit he's done TO us!

[vickitulsa]

149. Hey mopaul, I wonder why no one responded to THIS

:hi: :hippie: :party: :bounce: :toast:

I'll confess I certainly remember purple microdot and windowpane, though I set out on my "consciousness-expanding journey" a little too late for the orange sunshine. :D

But the shrooms, man, fresh, real shrooms, those were outta sight!

And my boyfriend in Austin tried some peyote buttons when a young man hitchhiking through from Mexico northward dropped by our camp at Lake Travis one hot summer in the late 70's, selling the peyote he'd picked fresh from the ground down there to get enough $$ to get home. Gary puked for about an hour after ingesting those things, then had one of the coolest adventures of his life -- or so he said. I wasn't inside his head, of course, so I could only tell that he seemed to be enjoying himself.

Our dog Travis was a bit standoffish while Gary did his thing on the peyote, though. I have always believed that dog could TELL something was veeerrry different about our staid ol' Gary for awhile....

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[lynettebro440]

49. Hell yes

Stoner, bring them back. My kids talk about how cool the 60's sounds when they disect each decade apart. There was never better music, design, free spirit and love then back then and I was only an late adolecent. We need that passion back. I always wondered if I would have been older would I have gone back and fought for the chance. Never in my wildest dream did I think I would get that chance to ask that question again. The answer is hell yes.

Bring it all back, because it's the last time any generation had any character. Hell most of the clothes and the bell bottoms and tie dyed are already back, the marketing people already decided to bring it back. The one thing that I have watched on here is the generation of original hippies giving us almost hippies advise. Bring them back Stoner, and let's all really get it right this time and learn how to be a real hippy and peace out and love one another. They had the right idea, but this butt wipe administration has gotten in the way since Nixon. Right On. Fucking bring it on!!! Love you Stoner.

Kicked and Nominated.

[meganmonkey]

50. And some of us young 'ens are carrying the tie-dye torch

don't worry! Posts like the 'ban tie-dye' ones make me laugh - but posts like yours make me even more excited about going to DC next month ( :woohoo: )

In my mind, actions are much more powerful than the color of your t-shirt. The late 60s showed that all types of people could band together and force a change in government policy. I pray that we have that ability today.

We can't write people off for being hippier than us, nor can we write them off for not being hippie enough. We have to get it together! It's the only way to get it, get it? :P

POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!

:woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:

[unhappycamper]

51. I never got into tie dyes, and doubt I will now.

I did have a brief flirtation with polyester & platform shoes, but fortunately came to my senses in a VERY short period of time.

The Veterans for Peace, the Iraq Veterans against the War, the Vietnam Veterans against the War, Military Families Speak Out, Code Pink, Gold Star Mothers for Peace, Raging Grannies, United for Peace and Justice, and all the local grass roots organizations for peace might unleash the creativity of that time.

IMHO, the magic is back and it's being driven by digital revolution. This picture I took on Boston Common (3.20.2005) sums up my thoughts:


Good post - :kick:ed and nominated.

[dxstone]

140. GREAT PIC!

Suprised I haven't seen it before now!
Wear what you will, m'friend! We are all allies; whatever the outer garb, it's what's in your heart that counts!

[tx_dem41]

53. Why can't we be original and create our own decade?

Everything in our "modern" culture is recycled, be it movies, TV shows, and consumer products. Why make our most personal political beliefs/movements recycled? Aren't we proud of them enough to create their own new culture? A culture that is inclusive of those generations that knew nothing of the 60s? For instance, we can incorporate so much modern political, anti-establishment music that has been written in the last few years. We can attract people that are plugged into that scene and could, quite frankly, care less about the 60s.

[lynettebro440]

54. Well

the 60's generation having been waiting around for someone to step up to the plate. Since we were the generation that was able to take down the last crooked administration we had in the white house, by all means, please kick start whatever movement will get this generation off their asses from watching MTV and reality TV shows and playing video games and start making a voice and some sort of creativity and motivation that they can muster up. The problem with every generation after the sixties was it was all bullshit corporate mayham.

I keep telling my kids, get your Enimem dude talking, there hasn't been anyone since the peace activists since the 60's. When has there been a JFK, Bobby K, Martin Luther, and etc...Those were all in the sixties. It's not about being a hippie it's about a movement. If you can wake up the later generations, get with it. Us sixties (hippies) generation remember how to do it.

[eowyn_of_rohan]

59. Of course our generation caught the system off guard

They think they are ready for us now, with their tasers and rubber bullets and their control over the media...

[tx_dem41]

61. I think its going to take more than just admonishment from the 60's..

crowd quite frankly. The 60's counter-culture crowd seems just as uninterested in the counter-culture of the 90s and 00s than the conservative crowd. Both sides need to reach out to each other, and since the 60s crowd actually has the experience, I believe they should make the first move.

[ewagner]

90. BINGO

If the younger generation was out in full-force trying to stop this war...us old, grey warriors would probably sit this one out...but they're nowhere to be found (at least in large numbers)...

You see, the kids of college age and early twenties today have had it beaten into them that they have to achieve, achieve achieve to make it to the top in this world and that's all they've focused on. We worked hard to get our kids into the best colleges and the best careers but maybe failed to warn them that some day they would have to step up to the plate and defend democracy.....

Now........

If somebody or something disrupts their career paths.....(can you say draft?)

there will more than likely be hell to pay

[Telly Savalas]

73. No doubt. VW Microbuses are no more fuel efficient than SUV's

We need to create our own decade and we need to make it one that leaves a more permanent mark. If the 60's revolutionized things so much, then how was it that only a decade later Reagan took the helm?

Certainly there were big advances by the civil rights movement in the 60's, but the biggest gains were made in the early part of the decade before the advent of hippiedom.

And while the feminist movement arose in this decade, why do we only romanticize those who burned bras then and downplay the equally important work of women a decade or two later who made inroads into traditionally male spheres. (e.g. when my wife entered the engineering profession, it was still very male dominated. Hell, it still is to a degree. When I taught engineering calculus a few years back there were many more male than female students.) 35 years later there's still huge problems with pay inequaltiy.

Also with regards to feminism, wasn't it the case that a lot of women were disillusioned with groups like the SDS because despite the lovebeads and tiedyes the males were being sexist pricks to the same degree as their counterparts in suits and ties?

Accuse me of setting the bar a bit high, but I think we should aim for more that what was done in the 60's. I got my 3 year old a tie dye shirt last week and like the Grateful Dead as much as the next guy, but excessive romanticizing of any time period is unhealthy. Let's not turn the social justice movement into a leftwing counterpart to Civil War recreation societies.

[tx_dem41]

74. Great last paragraph.

Thanks for responding.

[Telly Savalas]

81. Thanks for being the first voice of dissent in this thread.

Many of us, like me, are too damn lazy to cut against the grain unless someone else starts.

[tx_dem41]

82. As I told you the other day....

Who loves ya', baby? Bet you're tired of hearing that. :)

I appreciate you backing me up in more than a few threads lately.

[tx_dem41]

75. Self-delete

Danged double post.

[Gemini Cat]

113. You nailed it.

On all points.

:yourock:

[TankLV]

127. I for one would LOVE it if the newest generations would "step up to the

plate" and give us old farts a chance to relax.

But I don't see it happening.

Almost all of the democratic party meetings I've been too, I'M considered the "young guy" - and I'm 52!

There are only a handful of anybody younger than 40 or 30 at these things!

Please, by all means, STEP UP TO THE PLATE!

So, far, I haven't seen much of it.

Only protests I see are when they try to charge for downloading music instead of stealing it for free from the internet. Or movies. Or cable.

Sure there are the exceptions, but those are the EXCEPTIONS.

When I was in my teens and twenties, WE were the ones doing most of the "work"!

It certainly is not that today! Hasn't been since ronnie raygun.

[Rich Hunt]

56. uhhhh

Please don't bring back the fashions.

Indoor plumbing and soap are among mankind's proudest achievements.

How about we bring back the thirties instead.

[mopinko]

58. proud to be an aging hippie

tie-dye, birkinstocks, stevie wonder, and fuck you if you don't like it.

[hiley]

64. 60's should be honored!

Thanks dxstone!
I am with you, bring back the 60's and the magic!
hiley:applause:

[lynettebro440]

68. This needs a good

swift kick to keep it on top. Go Stoner.

:kick:

[snot]

69. I LOVED the 60's, and think we shd honor them, AND yet

nothing is never exactly the same, nor should it be.

The new generations have grown up in a very different world than we did. They will re-invent the peace movement; and that's probably for the best--it will have more relevance.

The job of us oldsters is to try to make sure we lovingly teach and pass on those principles and lessons we think most important.

[tx_dem41]

71. Exactly. n/t

[Burried News]

72. This thread has gone totally Gonzo - and it's great.

The history of the 60's needs to be written with some loving eyes because alot of it was written by the Turd Blossoms of that day.

[laureloak]

77. WAR...what then is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!

Peace, brother.

[On the Road]

83. The 60s Were Absolutely Great

I am happy that the freaks stormed the halls of power over the Vietnam war. I've been to anti-Iraq-War marches with hippies and black-bloc anarchists and loved it. It's entirely appropriate for that kind of event.

But....there is the question of symbolism. What will make Cindy's protest most effective?

It seems to me the reason Cindy's protest is effective is because she is a middle-class mom. Is it better to depict her surrounded by tie-dyed shirts or by other people like herself? It would seem wise to sustain the image that's been working so well.

[Dervill Crow]

84. Excuse me?!

"Everyone who is too old to serve in a war shouldn't even have a real say, if you ask me... even if they were in some previous war; advise away, but no power of consent, how's that?... because all wars are different; there are (arguably, even though I hate the argument, it's just a bit too coldly pragmatic for me to embrace fully) good wars and evil wars, and this one is as evil a war as has EVER been started ANYWHERE on the face of the earth..."

As a United States citizen and as a parent, I definitely should have a say in whether "we" go to war.

I was born in 1954, so my peers just missed the draft for Vietnam, but my kids' generation is being used up in this war. Thank gods my own kids are not in the military, but nobody's kids should be used and abused in this immoral war.

[tx_dem41]

87. Wow...this proves hardly anyone actually READ what was posted...

....since the phrase that you referenced would preclude many, many, many DUers (in fact all "aging hippies") from protesting THIS war.

Does anyone actually read anymore? :eyes:

[dxstone]

98. Actually, it would preclude no such thing...

I specifically said, "Advise, but no consent"--and I also said (in the previous or next paragraph) something about not having a say if you have no personal stake, no loved one going over there...
It was a conceptual statement, not a legal document of policy; I said it to get people thinking about the differences between Vietnam and Iraq, how the draft made more people involved whether they liked it or not...
If you wanna nit-pick, all I can say is yea, you got me... I didn't mean that part so much literally as figuratively; the people who should have the MOST say SHOULD be the soldiers, cuz they're the ones volunteering to put their asses on the line IF NEED BE... not if need be manufactured, but if REAL need TRULY exists...
It did seem to make a difference in the 60's...
But I'm not calling for a reinstatement of the draft. I'm calling for an end to the war and an end to this insane war-mongering administration and an end to old-money interests deceiving our soldiers into going and giving their lives for the long-term enrichment of already-rich share-holders of some faceless corporation full of evil, twisted, vile RICH people who don't give a DAMN about anyone's kids but their own.
Hey, I'M old enough to be outside of all this; I'm in my mid-forties, I'm not going to war; HELL NO, I WON'T GO! THEY DON'T WANT ME ANYWAY!... I'd be much too nice, to enemies and friends alike, and therefore bad for the morale of all involved.
I was just making a point, the old one about how our soldiers TRUST US to use their offered sacrifice wisely, and NOT send them to die for NO GOOD REASON.
But really, isn't all that sorta obvious?
If not, I apologize to all who misread me. Some of what I write is to be taken literally, other parts I'm exaggerating, musing, joking a bit, waxing poetic as I can manage, in order to communicate some of my own on-going analyses, questions or unaddressed concerns as to how to make this system better.
I don't claim to have all the answers... but I DO have a LOT of ideas.

[Dervill Crow]

103. Mea culpa and my bad.

My post was in response to another post in response to the original post . . . you're right, I DIDN'T thoroughly read it. I'm at work, and doing my job is interfering with my DU perusing.

:hide:

[Eloriel]

89. It was a magical time -- and I yearn for it sometimes

You've done a fairly decent job of describing it, I think -- and that's saying a lot because its essence is ineffable, really. Believe me, I've thought a lot about that very thing: how difficult it is to actually capture the zeitgeist because, well, for a lot of reasons.

It was a time of great sorrow and despair, with the assassinations, with our brothers and lovers and sons and spouses dying in Vietnam, but it was also a time of great hope and promise. For some reason we felt not only indestructible and invincible, but like we could do ANYthing, go anywhere, achieve anything. All of life was completely open to us.

It was an AMAZING time to be alive. Just amazing. I miss it so much -- that hope and idealism, that sense of endless promise, that cynical innocence.

[vickitulsa]

131. What a perfect way to describe those times...

"... that cynical innocence." I love it!

Thank you for this summing up, Eloriel. :hug: :pals: :yourock:

~VV

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Lisa0825]

93. BRAVO!!!

I missed it the first time; I was born too late. But many of the people I respect the most were proud hippies back in the day. And when they tell me stories about the things they saw and did, it really inspires me.

[flamin lib]

104. There's a movie titled 1969 that's great if you can find it.

It was a very interesting time to be alive and even more interesting to be drafted and stationed near Washington DC.

[vickitulsa]

143. Man, I'll bet THAT's right!

Stationed near Washington, DC in the '60's ... I'm trying to imagine it.

I think that in spite of the disagreements and misunderstandings, this thread has proved just how significant the '60's were, and why we should at least consider what went down then in the light of what's going on NOW.

And after all, you can seldom have a conversation about those times without a LOT of emotions coming to the surface! In fact, there are still families that cannot have discussions about the '60's between the older and younger generations because of the hard feelings that have remained for so many long years.

I can't help but think of Dickens and A Tale of Two Cities, the very first sentence: "They were the best of times, they were the worst of times."

Someone speculated above that after the JFK assassination and then the civil rights murders, it was kinda like something just "split wide open" and all kinds of things tumbled out in a rush (my paraphrasing). I think that's quite true. We who were young adults in the '60's had been brought up in the '50's, when a fairly rigid rearing of children was the norm. So when the Vietnam War heated up and somehow thousands of our young men (mostly men) were coming home in body bags, those who hadn't yet broken loose from the training of their youth finally just HAD to DO something.

I believe we can pull together NOW to help end the nightmare we're all suffering NOW. It might be a bit rough and rocky at first, but let's face it -- it's NECESSARY. We NEED EACH OTHER. And we all need COURAGE. We ought to stand by each other, take the hand of our brother like the song says, and learn to leave the nitpicking for another day.

I may be a bit of a Pollyanna about it -- or would that be Polyanna? ;) -- but I honestly believe we can do it. We have more in common than we have to disagree about. I'm hoping no one is raising a dissenting voice just to be dissenting, and that our GOALS are the same: to end the presidency of the moran who's ruining so much that was good about our country, to end the wars that are causing so much suffering and accomplishing nothing good.

I've always been a peacemaker -- in part it comes from an abusive childhood, when I tried to stop the fights by appeasing everyone. But this is a bigger thing, this is such an important thing we just can't afford to splinter and lose our effectiveness. I've shared some very personal things here because I AM trying to reach out to the young folks, and to everyone who needs a little boost to be drawn out. Drawn out and then drawn IN ... into a Movement, as some have said.

Yes, it will be different from the '60's -- of COURSE! These are different times. It's just that a lot of us older folk do remember how much was accomplished by vigorous and persistent PROTEST of a government out of control and a war without end.

And you know what? In spite of the dissenting voices on this thread, I still FEEL THE LOVE HERE. THAT is what made things happen 40 years ago, and that same sort of love can work its magic NOW. I'm not sure whether to WAIT on the younger crowd to get something going or to try to lead or guide them just a bit. Certainly I want to ENCOURAGE them!

Oh my, I think I'm gonna greak out in a chorus of Cumbaya! Joan would be proud! :blush:

Hmm ... come to think of it, I reckon Joan IS proud of us, all of us, since she is joining hands with those who want to see peace break out all over.

Which reminds me (seems like everything is reminding me of something tonight), how about that saying that was popular "back then": "What if they gave a war and nobody came?"

And don't forget Baba Ram Dass -- "BE HERE NOW!"

THESE are the days, my friends! Let the WAR end, but for the sake of all human beings and other living things, let this SPIRIT last and last.......

~Sincerely,
VV

P.S. And oh yeah, I was gonna mention, I think I saw that movie called simply "1969" not long ago. I'm trying to remember it but I think I'm gonna need some prompting so here I go searching the Web....

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[dxstone]

150. Thank you so much, vicki!...

For your responses on this thread, ALL of which are worthy of comment... this is the biggest thread I've ever started, and I couldn't keep up with it all in a timely fashion; but I really enjoyed your input a lot, and would particularly thank you too for the original song you posted further up in this thread... GREAT stuff!; I too am a songwriter...
You write really good commentary; you and I apparently see eye to eye on a lotta this stuff...
A big warm welcome to DU, hon! I hope I will continue to see lots of you around here; you have so much of value to contribute!

:toast:

d

[Hubert Flottz]

107. The livin' was easy...

Things were cool man.

[lynettebro440]

109. This needs

another kick to keep it up there.

:kick:

[Dr Fate]

115. Bring back the Munsters & Jack Kirby while you are at it.

And mono Zombies records too.

[dxstone]

122. Whaddaya mean?

The Munsters did their part; I don't know how we coulda gotten there without them...

[Dr Fate]

141. Al "Grandpa" Lewis is an active Green Party member & candidate.

So he probably did oppose the Vietnam war.

[Peace Patriot]

134. 1963: restrictive bras and girdles; nylon stockings with seams down the

back of the leg that had to be kept straight; four inch spike heels; white gloves; no birth control; what proper young ladies did and didn't do; a mask of lipstick, eye liner, mascara and pancake makeup, and a "bubble" hairdo that needed daily spraying and stiffening with toxics (in order to look like Sandra Dee); the words "orgasm," "homosexual," "clitoris," "penis," "child abuse," "spousal abuse," "alcoholism," and a few others DID. NOT. EXIST. (Never spoken!)

1964: All that vanished overnight--that restricted view of self, however it manifested in individual lives. And a new consciousness was born.

Maybe JFK's assassination unhinged us--since he was a strong symbol of youth and the future. Shot dead at the end of 1963. It was unthinkable! Perhaps it ripped open the national psyche--and all manner of interesting things flew out: that there were no rules; that all manner of disguise must be discarded; that the old were unable to hold the world together so the youth must find our own way; that real love was possible, and not all this fakery; that nukes promised only a nightmare, not peace, and must be gotten rid of; that people could speak freely, we had RIGHTS; that black people were not "other," they were US; that women needn't wear restrictive clothing, and needn't be restricted by marriage, but could be free, in every way; that material possessions were not nearly as valuable as love and friendship, not even close; that society should help the poor and the sick, and that there was plenty for everybody; that Christianity meant sharing bread and celebrating together, not acting all mournful in church while some fancy, dressed up male performed voodoo at the altar with his back turned to all; that religions have more in common than not, and shouldn't be fighting with each other; that the human story is to progress and improve, to learn, to expand, and to enjoy people and life.

Quite a year, 1964! And THEN came the Beatles. ("I Want To Hold Your Hand!") (Un. Frigging. Believable. Music. Joy! Love! Exuberance! Release! Freedom! Piercing harmony. Guys having a ball. Not killing. Not oppressing. Not exploiting. Singing!)

Also, however, three civil rights workers were slain in Mississippi--almost as shocking as the JFK assassination (nothing could really compare to that). But something new happened in response: students from all over the country started mobilizing and traveling south to help out with the civil rights movement, literally to broaden the target; nuns, priests and ministers marched with Martin Luther King!; and Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

And, late in 1964, unnoticed by most us, the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution--that authorized massive military expenditures in a place called Vietnam, that almost no one had heard of, but which the eager minds of the 1960s soon were avidly reading about--and discovering that our government was WRONG. Peaceful people. Just wanted their freedom. Duly elected government--U.N. monitored election. But the people there CHOSE communism--so they had to be killed? No way. Why do that? It's WRONG. Love and friendship and music is a far better thing to be doing.

Where did that consciousness come from, that exploded upon the world in the transition months from 1963 to 1964? That's when it happened. That's when...the thing happened that resulted, for instance, in a protected young white girl from California who hadn't even heard of Watts, let alone where it was, and who barely knew that Negroes existed, somehow found herself in Alabama--having never traveled anywhere before in her life--volunteering for Martin Luther King's voter registration campaign. How can you account for that?

All of society's ideas were being turned upside down and inside out. That's when the bumper sticker "Question Authority" first made its appearance. What a concept! QUESTION authority! That was BEFORE we really understood what was going on in Vietnam. We were already thinking: the "authorities" don't know dick. Their stupid rules--like segregating people with "white" drinking fountains and "colored" drinking fountains--were inhuman and WRONG. How can "authorities" be trusted who would permit such an outrage?

And it spread over the nation, like a supernova explosion--"Question Authority!," there are no rules that can go unquestioned, or be unthinkingly obeyed, no walls, no prisons anymore around the mind, and no limit to the possibilities for change and improvement--just as the Vietnam War was beginning to produce many dead.

And thence to 1965.

I have often puzzled about that era. It was rife with bloodshed (more to come, the Texas Tower Sniper, Martin Luther King, Robert Kennedy, and thousands, and finally, at least a million, in Vietnam; and then Kent State--one national trauma after another), and yet, at the same time, there was so much light! So much creativity! So much fun! So much real "love-love-love!" I know an anthropologist who said ironically, "Why don't we just reinstitute ritual sacrifice, and slay just a few selected human offerings on an altar, and stop killing millions of people in war?" He had a point! --however startling--that humans NEED bloodshed, so why not make it more constructive, more creative, more purposeful? (Har-har. Funny guy.)

But the vision was born at that time, that the world could truly one day be at peace, that men could really and truly stop killing each other, that there was plenty for everybody, if no one was greedy (the Diggers, the Hippies), that equality and justice were POSSIBLE for all, and that "make love not war" was a REAL option, a choice that we could make.

Buddhists would probably say that the Darkness and the Light go together. And if they are right--and I strongly suspect that they are--we are in for one hell of fantastic peace movement and major new leap of consciousness.

----

Don't bring back the Sixties! No! Let's do something better than that. Because the Sixties failed to deal with the military and corporate profiteers who have led us again into unjust war. We stopped that war (way too late!), but we failed to unseat the forces that produced it. And that's what we must do now--and it's going to take far more courage and creativity than was even imaginable in the 1960s. It's going to take, as JFK said in his inauguration speech in 1961, "a new generation of leadership" with an even greater vision than went before.

[dxstone]

138. WONDERFUL ESSAY! BRAVO!

I see we are on the very same page here...
Including your summation at end; I know we can't go living in the past, no matter how much I'd like to... but we HAVE to bring that spirit back to inform us in this new struggle...
That's how I see it, anyway...
Thanks for sharing this with us all!
d

[vickitulsa]

139. WOW, Peace Pat, I always enjoy your posts, but this time

you really sound like a Leader -- capital L!

Would you mind if I copy this post of yours into a document to share with some of my cyberfriends, who will no doubt pass it along to an even broader audience? I mean it, I really love the way you pulled so many different aspects of those times together and then wrapped up your thoughts with that suggestion in your final paragraph that we do something even BETTER than the 60's.

That "new generation of leadership" just maybe should include YOU....

But if not, if you'd rather not run for office or become a public speaker/motivator, then at least I'd like to share with others the wonderfully encouraging words you've written here. I'll send them the link to this entire thread, but I want to pull out your post for a document of its own. I know some of my friends might not want to read a thread in an online discussion group, but they would certainly give serious attention to a document I recommend to them and attach to an email.

Okay?

You really got a groovy thing goin' there, brother! Some folks might ask ya whatcha been smokin', but I say, "ROCK ON!"

**SALUTE~!** :applause: :woohoo: :applause: :woohoo: :applause:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[ngGale]

135. Kicking for the movement ...

Both Sides Now
Judy Collins lyrics



Bows and flows of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I've looked at clouds that way
But now they only block the sun
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my way

I've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down and still somehow
It's clouds illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all

Moons and Junes and ferris wheels
The dizzy dancing way you feel
When every fairy tale comes real
I've looked at love that way
But now it's just another show
You leave 'em laughin' when you go
And if you care
Don't let them know
Don't give yourself away

I've looked at love from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's love's illusions I recall
I really don't know love at all

Tears and fears and feeling proud
To say, I love you, right out loud
Dreams and schemes and circus crowds
I've looked at life that way
But now old friends are acting strange
They shake their heads
They say I've changed
But something's lost
But something's gained
In living every day

I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all

:kick:

[dxstone]

136. Great song!

And I don't mean to be persnickety, but those lyrics were written by my very favorite female poet of all time, Joni Mitchell!
She wrote a LOT of songs that others popularized, such as Woodstock by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young... Judy Collins had the hit on this one Clouds, but it's one of her earliest works...

She also wrote:

And so once again
My dear Johnny, my dear friend
And so once again
You are fighting us all
And when we ask you why
You raise your sticks and cry
And we follow, my friend
How did you come
To trade the fiddle for the drum?

You say we have turned
Like the enemies you've earned
But we can remember
All the good thing you are
And so we ask you please
Can we help you find the peace and the star
Oh my friend, what time is this
To trade the handshake for the fist?

And so once again
America, my friend
And so once again
You are fighting us all
And when we ask you why
You raise your sticks and cry
And we follow, my friend
How did you come
To trade the fiddle for the drum?

You say we have turned
Like the enemies you've earned
But we can remember
All the good thing you are
And so we ask you please
Can we help you find the peace and the star
Oh my friend, we have all come
To fear the beating of your drum

[Independent_Liberal]

144. Keeping this kicked!