Where Everybody Knows You're Numb

Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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I feel compelled to use "In closing..." does anyone realize that the RNC's cash that was spent on SP's wardrobe is a non partisan economic boost? <BD

i think the problem with that kind of a display is the message it generates. sp has been on the stump talking about the common person and honestly i dont think the common person can relate to that kind of excess. its more of what weve seen these past 8 years. people lining their pockets at the expense of the general public whether its govt or corporations who then get bailed by govt.

think about what 150K could buy

3 er nurses for a year

500 dollars worth of energy assistance for 300 families

300 computers for schools

the budget for a food bank for one year, or a rape crisis center, or kevlar for the troops, or the wasilla police

the total income tax paid in 2007 for the joe common family and more than a few dozen just like him

6,000 text books

or we could outfit barbie and let her wear the dress for one day and let her kid drag around a designer purse to hold her crayons and later give it to "charity" in the event that someone is wanting a 2k valentino silk jacket for that special night at the shelter! it seems insensitive, yanno?

this administration has been spending to the point of ridiculousness and they have encouraged the population to do the same. people were discouraged from saving, from paying off their mortgages and car loans and encouraged to buy mcmansions and homes on wheels and now that house of cards has collapsed and it doenst seem to be the best message to be sending in the middle of economic chaos. id think restraint, cutting back etc would be what she would want to be saying here.

BoxDog wrote:

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Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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BoxDog wrote:

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Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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BoxDog wrote:

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Surreal though it seems, Chicago still needs the masses to protect themselves, they still have a Daly running the show. But the need for protection is from within. One dead school aged child every eight days. That's a murdered 8-18 year old, gunned down on the streets of Chicago every eight days. <BD


violence begets violence maybe, hey?
 




And Daly isn't so afraid of them as they were the yippies. Funny, but seems to me that comes down to really crappy community leadership. And yeah, 40 years ago? Where'd it go. I ask myself that often, of late.

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Excellent question. And where did that sort of commitment to anti-war activism go? <sideglancing to American's youth>

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Youth is relative. ;) Without responding toward specific age groups I would suggest that the peace agenda is the same as it ever was. <BD

Normally I'd agree, but I think it worth mention  that "youth" was an inherent part of the Chicago '68 event; Abby Hoffman et al. founded the Youth International Party (Yippies) and that's one of the principal groups present that summer in Chicago.   

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"real" Americans clean the restrooms, stock shelves and push the elevator buttons that help keep Neiman and Saks in business, don't they? <BD


Indeed they do. They'd have probably made their $20.00 before taxes whether Sarah had shown up for two hours or not, though. Oh, unless you mean either Saks or Neiman Marcus was in danger of going under without that extra $150K that day...

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There's no Saks in Wasilla, I doubt she's ever even ordered from a Talbots, let alone Saks. Tell me, what's your thought on a National SP Day?   <BD


Smashing idea! We can...
 
OK, I just erased what I wrote. I had an agenda for the day, but ... it wasn't nice. :)

But hey! Don't get me wrong! I'm head over heels for Sarah!
 
(Which makes me her exact opposite, I guess, since she is clearly "heels" over "head." )

                                

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Stimulus that isn't Chinese cash or emergently printed monopoly money deserves a , in my book.  ;) ;) lol.   <BD

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BoxDog wrote:

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Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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BoxDog wrote:

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Surreal though it seems, Chicago still needs the masses to protect themselves, they still have a Daly running the show. But the need for protection is from within. One dead school aged child every eight days. That's a murdered 8-18 year old, gunned down on the streets of Chicago every eight days. <BD


violence begets violence maybe, hey?
 




And Daly isn't so afraid of them as they were the yippies. Funny, but seems to me that comes down to really crappy community leadership. And yeah, 40 years ago? Where'd it go. I ask myself that often, of late.

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Excellent question. And where did that sort of commitment to anti-war activism go? <sideglancing to American's youth>

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Youth is relative. ;) Without responding toward specific age groups I would suggest that the peace agenda is the same as it ever was. Passed down from generation or not. The difference now, of course, is the amount of instant information, truth and lies, that a great deal of us are privileged (sic) the access of. Bearing in mind that the exact amount of truth and lies are not readily available to the extreme disadvantaged. Be they fianancially, educationally, linguistically or any other disadvantage. The bulk of those groups may well be at the mercy of their church, their bar mates, their street peeps. Their good hearted families that simply perpetuate a falsehood or misconception.  And we all know how twisted the game "telephone" can be by the time a statement or passage is filtered through several interpretations. So, really, those of us with bias, seemingly legitimate www news, and those with simple old, tid-bits, tales, and community whispers, are equally in the dark, or at least the mercy of, what's been passed on to us. And what we do with it? That's for us to decide. Unless there's a draft. But, really, at least round my parts it almost seems as if Iraq, Afghanistan and war in general has become a "non-issue", a backseat to the socialist banking system that was recently put into place and how much green SP spent at Saks and Niemans.

I feel compelled to use "In closing..." does anyone realize that the RNC's cash that was spent on SP's wardrobe is a non partisan economic boost? <BD


I do indeed, and that's a good point, although I question the non-partisan part.

And it's good to see those "real" Americans living in small-town America who own Neiman Marcus see some of that cash flow back to them.

BoxDog wrote:

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Surreal though it seems, Chicago still needs the masses to protect themselves, they still have a Daly running the show. But the need for protection is from within. One dead school aged child every eight days. That's a murdered 8-18 year old, gunned down on the streets of Chicago every eight days. <BD


violence begets violence maybe, hey?
 




And Daly isn't so afraid of them as they were the yippies. Funny, but seems to me that comes down to really crappy community leadership. And yeah, 40 years ago? Where'd it go. I ask myself that often, of late.

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Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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We knew well the difference between the "noon" bell and the "civil defense air raid" bell which was practiced with disconcerting repetition.

thats another thing that isnt done anymore. i remember those bells and whistles too. every saturday morning at 11am. 

I didn't know anyone who had their own bomb shelter. I now find that odd. For us, I know the place to go was the Armory (sp?) Building which was in the "downtown" area on property which has since been absorbed by ASU and torn down.

where would people go now do you suppose? we seemed to do a lot more to prepare people in those days even tho much of it was silly at least attempts were made. what if someone did set off a bomb in a city? there is no organized plan for the survivors.

I think Joe McCarthy et al. probably foreshadowed the international/political scene; and I think disgust with that whole paranoid, war mongering is what sparked the "hippie" movement politically -- "enough with the blacklisting, and the repression!" but I really do think just the year 1960, itself, ushered in a whole new era, and that was reinforced and reflected by going from Ike to JFK. It does seem odd, now that I think about it, that we are on the brink of now going from GWB to Obama almost 50 years later.

with  many similarities. i keep thinking that if he is elected both fashion and optimism will be big as they were in the early 60s with the kennedys.  michelle obama dresses well and apparently shops from the rack which is refreshing and she wears pants on occasion a break from the stiff haired china doll made up expressionless first ladies of the past (cept hill of course:)

-- Edited by Nightowlhoot3 at 09:59, 2008-10-19

 

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Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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i did my master thesis on this topic, thats how much it grabbed my attention.


I would LOVE to read it!!!

ill see if i can find it. i had one hardcopy which is still in my exs possession but i saved it all on a floppy and all of those old floppys are in a box somewhere in the storage room. i had a fine time writing it tho. archived research is something i really enjoy.  i compared the writing of the main atomic scientists pre and post bang for evidence of awakening of conscience. i did most of my research at u of chicago,los alamos, stanford and the imperial war museum and was given access to some amazing records.


I remember that time well too, and how it segued right into the Cuban Missile Crisis. I remember the palpable fear which exuded from my parents, as much as they tried to conceal it.

i remember this too.i remember my father and uncle watching it and seeming very upset. my uncle was a student at the time majoring in physics. he was clearly worried. and he wasnt one to worry. i remember when i heard that ct was ground zero because of he defense industries his words of encouragement: "dont worry if it happens youll be instantly vaporized. you wont feel a thing." lol how can you not be traumatized when thats the reassurance ya gets. oddly enough it did sort of work. i was able to sleep again.

 It cast an underlying pervasive constant of surreal terror upon all "normal" activity. Mine was second hand, really -- I was feeling what the adults were feeling, without fully understanding what it was about, but our vacant lot "forts" became "bomb shelters" almost overnight -- even in play, the possiblity loomed large. We knew well the difference between the "noon" bell and the "civil defense air raid" bell which was practiced with disconcerting repetition.

not so long ago i was reading somewhere something questioning where all of those shelters have gone? are there bomb shelters in phoenix? do you know where they are located? i am clueless where they are now but i remember the signs all over even into my teens




  We went seemingly overnight from Elvis to the Beatles, and everything seemed to sort of abruptly change. Fashion, civil rights -- all of it. The "boomers" were coming of age, and left their unique mark, I think. It's important to remember,

yes it does seem to have happened abruptly but i wonder if that is the case? there must have been some ripening in the country for all of this to happen but perhaps we were either not aware of it because of our age or information was not as readily available then as it is now so we didnt put all of the nationwide pieces together?

 
I remember so well the speech where JFK asserted that we would place a human being on the moon by the end of the decade. That seemed just ... incredible.

yep i remember having a conversation with a beach vendor in jamaica who didnt know that people had been to the moon. when we told him he was amazed. he thought we were pulling his leg and that was 20 years after the fact and it still seemed incredible.


 Avaition was completely turned on its head ... "jets" were a big deal, even. LOL. I oftentimes think how that world bears so little resemblance to the world of today, really. But then again, I guess the "Russians" are becoming "the bad guys" again, so maybe in some ways, we've come full circle.

lol but sarah has all that under control!

I think, Psych, my "interest" or lack thereof in specific world events is largely due to my age at given moments, but also the focus of my parents. I suspect it's a balanced combination of the two things, really. I know my family was, for instance, more focused on the Black civil rights movement than were others in my neighborhood, and that when MLK came to our town to speak, I was the only kid on my block who went to hear/see him. That was more about focus than age, really, although it's hard to separate the two.

yes if your family hadnt held those beliefs i doubt that you would have gone to see him.  you were exposed to ideas that most young people didnt have access to.  my mother was a science teacher and my dad an apologist for utc and the war machine. the conversations around the dinner table were far more to the right tho in his early days pops was a union organizer. i entertain the idea that all of that early exposure to science and technology and their many ways to kill people had a big impact on the skeptical view of both of those things that i now hold.

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-- Edited by Nightowlhoot3 at 11:34, 2008-10-18

 

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BoxDog wrote:

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Psych Lit wrote:

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im home sick today nursing a cold...another gift from my tour bus adventure:)...and the history channel is showing a documentary on the hippie movement. admittedly i was a young sprout during those years and more into the party aspect of the "movement" than in any political aspect of it but i the movement im watching on this documentary doesnt much resemble the years i lived through.

one comment for instance suggested that hippies were responsible for pushing those in the black community down by moving into what were once black neighborhoods, raising the rents and displacing former residents. also that the black community could not embrace the new residents because they were dirty and many were mentally ill. really? or that jerry rubin instigated the confrontation at the 68 convention and did so with the intent of focusing attention on confrontation politics by getting the mayor and police to cause harm.  the take on woodstock? "bad planning, bad acid, bad weather." well sure there was all of that but there was a whole lot more too. its kind of interesting to see wavy gravy and country joe mcdonald as old men. lol. where does the time go yanno? its also interesting to see how one singular event can lead to something of a tourist boom. one of those interviewed is speaking with the backdrop of yasgurs farm. i think its some sort of music venue today. i had a similar thought last week when i was in stockbridge. the stockbridge i remember was a very small town that was made famous by the arlo guthrie song alices restaurant. the town now is really a tshirt plastic object tourise trap which, had it not been for the brief moment of fame that came from a song, might still be that sleepy little berkshire town with odd characters and organic beans.
apparently too the hippies have also unleashed a "pandoras box of social problems" well thats one way of looking at it or perhaps as a movement they challenged a pandoras box of existing social problems.

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I think the only thing I want to say as far as this goes is that, in turn, "block busting" was happening. In that, groups, with cash, of mostly black working folks were going in droves to traditionally known "white" neighborhoods and driving DOWN the value of the housing. That was deemed illegal and "stopped" . It never did. Once a block was broken up and the minority established themselves within that territory they were aggressively pushing the whites out, leaving not only a lack of communal and integrated cohabitation, but also simply turning middle class neighborhoods into ghettos. But, the homes were then reasonable enough. Unless, of course, you happen to be 96 year old Fanny whats her face from Akron that points a gun to her stomach and gets her debts forgiven.

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Progression, when it comes to civil rights is always going to have some "less than good" things involved -- affirmative action, for instance, is, yeah, going to "unfairly" hurt some deserving Anglo males, and that's unfortunate, it truly is -- almost as unfortunate as guilty criminals being released on the dismissive phrase "a technicality."

I think in times, instances such as this, it's important to keep one's eye on the greater good, and larger picture, and to remember that the presumed injustice due to the change in social mores which is striving towards a more equal and just plateau, could have just as easily be reflected on the other side of the coin, if the movement were not in place. We can't really expect the process to be completely devoid of uncomfortable times, and unsettling incidents, but I think are well advised to shift our vision to the desired end product. Segregation was a tough nut to crack (oops ... there's another cliche) but it had to be done.

BoxDog wrote:

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Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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BoxDog wrote:

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May 4, 1970. Four of those such "hippies". Dead. For planting flowers in the barrels of rifles on the campus of an American college campus. Just one of hundreds of college campuses in distress and under duress from a war in a jungle halfway around the globe. Of all people, Nixon, had one of the most eloquent and disturbed reactions to the events of that tragic day. Anyway, so much for summer lovin'. 

A few photos of the murdered students:

May 4, 1970 in photos

 

Special to The New York Times

By John Kifner



Kent, Ohio, May 4 -- Four students at Kent State University, two of them women, were shot to death this afternoon by a volley of National Guard gunfire. At least 8 other students were wounded.

The burst of gunfire came about 20 minutes after the guardsmen broke up a noon rally on the Commons, a grassy campus gathering spot, by lobbing tear gas at a crowd of about 1,000 young people.

http://dept.kent.edu/sociology/lewis/lewihen.htm -Contribution by Kent State

-- Edited by BoxDog at 22:47, 2008-10-17

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Ya know, 1965-1970 were just such tumultuous times ... such a time of upheaval -- Watts in '65, all the riots the summer of '68... I remember so well Kent State. This country was different then, than it is now -- significantly. Back then... they were hard times...

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You think it was more difficult then? Or is your perception of the following decades a different one? <BD

Not "more" difficult, just difficult in a different way. 
The country was really divided ... warring with herself, really, moreso than now, I think. And it was coming at us so fast, and with such unrelenting ferocity. Watts burned for six days ... from riots. Bobby Kennedy and ML King were killed ... Chicago in 68 ... the division over Viet Nam was severe... people weren't as much viewed as individuals, as they were members of "camps" which were either "you" or "the enemy."  The Civil Rights Act of 64 was still young, and in the process of implementation, not unlike the way it had been with Brown V. Bd of Ed, "with all due speed" wasn't fast enough for many.

It was just .... "busy."

Imagine the Rodney King incident,  the OJ Trial (the first one), and The Columbine High tragedy, all happening the same week. Then imagine the next week, Mathew Sheppard's murder... and then maybe three weeks later, the tragedy of 9-11, and those weeks lasting months, and the months turning into years. That's sort of how it felt to me. There was so much, and that damned draft, and all those guys being shipped off against their will, and coming home in boxes. And then there was the Watergate burglarly, and the impeachement trial, which, regardless of how you wanted it to turn out, was a "damaging" thing for our country's heart. Good, perhaps for the country, but so terribly terribly sad, really. Ithad only been a few years before that our president had been murdered, and I don't know how well we were "over" that, really, and here we were losing a second president...  And the barrage would ebb and flow .... the little girls killed in Birmingham ... MLK's mother shot dead while playing the organ one Sunday morning in church ....  that was the one which finally knocked me to my knees, I think... driving home from working the phones at a democratic telethon, and hearing that on the car radio.... I had to pull over -- I couldn't even drive the rest of the way home. It was finally just too much.

I think the AIDS assault which came after that time was a horrible period too, but it was "diffferent" somehow. 

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Psych Lit wrote:

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Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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Psych Lit wrote:

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BoxDog wrote:

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This was the event that politicized me.

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Wow.
And we still had four years to go of Nixon (who was probably drawing up the plans for the break in of Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office at the time ...)


hey, i was a freshman in high school that year. the mind was still in development:) the picture of the runaway girl in the kent state parking lot did it for me. after that i was a radical.

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I simply CAN'T miss this opportunity. It's just so Obama/Ayers though....For Kent State? I was eight. But, still, a mature one, I was trying to get something going with Miss Miller.

Nightowlhoot3 wrote:

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BoxDog wrote:

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May 4, 1970. Four of those such "hippies". Dead. For planting flowers in the barrels of rifles on the campus of an American college campus. Just one of hundreds of college campuses in distress and under duress from a war in a jungle halfway around the globe. Of all people, Nixon, had one of the most eloquent and disturbed reactions to the events of that tragic day. Anyway, so much for summer lovin'. 

A few photos of the murdered students:

May 4, 1970 in photos

 

Special to The New York Times

By John Kifner



Kent, Ohio, May 4 -- Four students at Kent State University, two of them women, were shot to death this afternoon by a volley of National Guard gunfire. At least 8 other students were wounded.

The burst of gunfire came about 20 minutes after the guardsmen broke up a noon rally on the Commons, a grassy campus gathering spot, by lobbing tear gas at a crowd of about 1,000 young people.

http://dept.kent.edu/sociology/lewis/lewihen.htm -Contribution by Kent State

-- Edited by BoxDog at 22:47, 2008-10-17

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Ya know, 1965-1970 were just such tumultuous times ... such a time of upheaval -- Watts in '65, all the riots the summer of '68... I remember so well Kent State. This country was different then, than it is now -- significantly. Back then... they were hard times...

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Psych Lit wrote:

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BoxDog wrote:

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May 4, 1970. Four of those such "hippies". Dead. For planting flowers in the barrels of rifles on the campus of an American college campus. Just one of hundreds of college campuses in distress and under duress from a war in a jungle halfway around the globe. Of all people, Nixon, had one of the most eloquent and disturbed reactions to the events of that tragic day. Anyway, so much for summer lovin'.

A few photos of the murdered students:

May 4, 1970 in photos

This was the event that politicized me.

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BoxDog wrote:

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May 4, 1970. Four of those such "hippies". Dead. For planting flowers in the barrels of rifles on the campus of an American college campus. Just one of hundreds of college campuses in distress and under duress from a war in a jungle halfway around the globe. Of all people, Nixon, had one of the most eloquent and disturbed reactions to the events of that tragic day. Anyway, so much for summer lovin'.

A few photos of the murdered students:

May 4, 1970 in photos

This was the event that politicized me. i didnt understand why this happened.  there is a marker in the parking lot where this occured i remember going to see it when i lived in the near midwest. seeing it in the context of a peaceful campus with students nonchalantly walking by is really a startling thing.

Special to The New York Times

By John Kifner



Kent, Ohio, May 4 -- Four students at Kent State University, two of them women, were shot to death this afternoon by a volley of National Guard gunfire. At least 8 other students were wounded.

The burst of gunfire came about 20 minutes after the guardsmen broke up a noon rally on the Commons, a grassy campus gathering spot, by lobbing tear gas at a crowd of about 1,000 young people.

http://dept.kent.edu/sociology/lewis/lewihen.htm -Contribution by Kent State

-- Edited by BoxDog at 22:47, 2008-10-17

 

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milo wrote:

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like it or not you are getting my opinion

well good:)
i lived close to the haight ashbury district in SF during this time frame. i would venture to say over 80% of the "love children" were in it for the sex drugs and rock n roll. one of my main hang outs was the mediterranean coffee house in bizarrekly, me as a republican was more aware of the political climate than most of the people i saw over there. all the "hippies" knew the words to the protest songs but had no idea what they meant, they were way to high on drugs to "get it".

I think what you say was true for some, those who were too young to be drafted, for instance, or for those who didnt get into politics. i know i was a very young almost teen when the left coast became the place to be. i remember sitting in my neighbor karens living room and watching a news show about haight ashbury and were were all oh lets ride out bikes to the train station and go. i think we were 9 or 10 or something but it certainly looked like fun. i didnt get the politics of it till i was in my late teens, early 20s but marched and sang along with everyone else long before that awareness set in so in that respect i think what youre saying is accurate. but for a lot of people these were world changing  times. if you were a young male there was a good chance that youd be drafted. if you had a brother or a friend of that age it was a reality that you would lose them too, tho i dont think it was all about the war. i think a lot of it was about social taboos, about race, about sexual orientation and sexual equality, about people in power vs power to the people taking from those who were using others as chess pawns in their quest for that power.
i think about the readiness of a culture to accept leaps to the next epoch and surely the events of those years might have been foreshadowed by the growing unrest of those for whom the benevolent 50s made mockery of the pleasantvile lifestyle.
if you were female, if you were black, if you were gay or lesbian all was not wonderful. what sprung first from the civil rights movement spread to the "hippie movement" which perhaps questioned a life where so many people were cut off from the mainstream. could stonewall, for instance, have happened if those turbulent civil rights and anti war marches didnt happen? could rev wright have  happened:)?

 i still get emotional when i hear "blowing in the wind". hippies would fight ya over being shorted on a drug deal, but didn't want to go to viet nam.

the pbs stations have all been showing a retrospective peter paul and mary concert series lately. i dont know if you get pbs but its on frequently and blowing in the wind is one of the songs done. and the drug issue i see as a dividing issue. when hard drugs were involved mindsets changed. peace and love aint happening when you are an addict. i remember doing weed and some of the hallucinogens when i was in my early to mid teens and was rather horrified when so many of my friends went deeper into harder drugs and didnt return. i remember being at a party in the 7th grade and one of my older friends died from an od. 2 days later two more friends died from the same combo of drugs and another went off the deep end after ingesting lsd for too many days in a row. that was the end of my drug experience. losing friends is not fun and at 15 i was all about the fun. but the drug use continued on for many people i knew then many of whom are still addicts today.

 they all blamed johnson for the war, Ike got us involved in, then kennedy escalated. johnson just didn't know how to stop it with honor, poor guy, he just wanted to leave with honor. just like no one will get us out of iraq with honor, no way to clean this crap up just like nam. what ever is done and who does it, they will leave with dirt on them.

the problem with these kinds of wars is that they are conceived or ill conceived by people in washington but fought by people from the heartland and there doesnt seem to be a lot of care about those who actually lay body down for the fight. i am a pacifist for the most part. there are a few things tho i think worth fighting for but oil and the commie threat arent on that list. if we think about all of the lives lost in that war and how it eventually turned out all i can do is shake my head and wonder what they were thinking just as i shake my head and wonder what bush was thinking back in 01.

 sure i believe in equality, i think we should all have the equal chance to make it or drown, i just won't swim for ya. teach a man to fish, then if he sits on the river bank and starves because he is lazy, so be it. i do not think it is my place to carry the heavy end of the log then reward the person on the light end for being a sorry ass.

and this is fine as long as you havent tied up your fellow fishermen in knots or built a dam downsteam so the fish dont flow. i think what you describe is probably what most people think is right, only problem with it is that we are not taught to see the places where some have an unfair advantage over others.

america is a wonderful country, it has room for improvement, i admit, but still even today it is a grand place to live. all those people who say they hate it here don't have to stay or risk life and limb to get here. if ya wanna stay, love america and try to do the best for her. that was my message to the hippies of yesteryear and it is still my message. vote even for damned dog catcher, boot out the rotten apples and start at home on the local levels.

amening you on that. we have the government that we apparently want. the only thing id add to it for people to educate themselves  on the issues. wed never be in this bloodsucking war right now if anyone had actually thought about it. 

 

everyone i know is all hot about this election but they do nothing the rest of the time. we want change, then we have to make change, even between elections. the staff of kay bailey hutchinson and ralph hall know my name. i sign my name "lobbyist donate money, we the people vote to keep you in office, don't forget who we are".

and its not only about voting. its about going out and making a difference in the world. tutor, clean up a vacant lot, read to kids, visit the elderly (or take a tour bus ride with them lol)
lunch is over  but im not done with this and since save is not an option...

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the hippies turned into republicans, because they didn't know what they were "protesting", us sorry assed republicans got out of the party, and still work towards positive change, in the land we still love. hell i am still willing to protest, if the cause is clear, just have your little duckies in line if you want my support.

those damned flower children with their nasty assed dogs taking a crap on public streets, stealing anything that wasn't nailed down or red hot, did little to advance the cause of humanity. they were just sorry excuses for human kind, screwing in public parks, that had once been places for children to play. from my view they raped SF and berserkley. oh yes, i do think that some of the "hippies" were on what they felt was a good path, but their followers were the dregs of society.

sometime i hate telling where i have been and what i have done, but, since this is kind of private, i will venture that direction.

I knew some of the activist back in those days, yeah me the hot headed right wing azzhole. i suppose one of the best conversations i ever had at a party was with Angela Davis, we agreed on nothing and everything. the conversation with her taught my young mind a lot. taught me most humans want the same things from life, we just see from different paths.

i dated an activist "hippy" and I know they were far removed from the love child hippy of woodstock,,,,,,,,, yeah, when you watch the history channel and get a different view than what you always thought, they are telling it like it really was. ten protestors with ten thousand tag-a-longs (<< texas embelishment) did get the media attention. i was there, and i know most of the "hippies" had no damned idea what they were protesting, they just knew there was excitement, drugs, rock n roll and sex.

 

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Psych Lit wrote:

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im home sick today nursing a cold...another gift from my tour bus adventure:)...and the history channel is showing a documentary on the hippie movement. admittedly i was a young sprout during those years and more into the party aspect of the "movement" than in any political aspect of it but i the movement im watching on this documentary doesnt much resemble the years i lived through.

one comment for instance suggested that hippies were responsible for pushing those in the black community down by moving into what were once black neighborhoods, raising the rents and displacing former residents.



The documentary needs to distinguish between Hippies and Yuppies. "Hippies" didn't do this.


also that the black community could not embrace the new residents because they were dirty and many were mentally ill. really?

Nope. Of course many of our homeless are, and have long been mentally ill -- and? And sure, I suppose someone tripping on acid could be viewed that way, but I think this generalized assertion to be without foundation.

or that jerry rubin instigated the confrontation at the 68 convention and did so with the intent of focusing attention on confrontation politics by getting the mayor and police to cause harm. 

This is "the history channel" and not "FOX?" You're sure??



the take on woodstock? "bad planning, bad acid, bad weather." well sure there was all of that but there was a whole lot more too.

I was all set to go, with my friends, to Woodstock, and my Mom wouldn't let me. I've never really forgiven her.



its kind of interesting to see wavy gravy and country joe mcdonald as old men. lol. where does the time go yanno? its also interesting to see how one singular event can lead to something of a tourist boom. one of those interviewed is speaking with the backdrop of yasgurs farm. i think its some sort of music venue today. i had a similar thought last week when i was in stockbridge. the stockbridge i remember was a very small town that was made famous by the arlo guthrie song alices restaurant. the town now is really a tshirt plastic object tourise trap which, had it not been for the brief moment of fame that came from a song, might still be that sleepy little berkshire town with odd characters and organic beans.
apparently too the hippies have also unleashed a "pandoras box of social problems" well thats one way of looking at it or perhaps as a movement they challenged a pandoras box of existing social problems.

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