Re: the 60's

[Revfever <revfever@ubergadget.com>]

I love complete honesty (even if it's sometimes brutal, or otherwise)  
and speaking straight from the heart and with no BS. I do not agree  
with 100% all of the original post, but most of it I do, especially  
about the returning vets getting spit on. I was *very much* a very  
young protester against this very unjust war (which most wars are,  
regardless of the "official" reasons), but I did NOT condone anyone  
spitting on or abusing returning vets (a couple of them that were  
older, returning friends of mine, BTW) and also accusing them of  
crimes that 99.9% of them probably did NOT commit, along with also  
the fact that a LOT people got DRAFTED and a LOT of others had NO  
better economic opportunities and / or easily attained higher  
education opportunities choice left but TO sign up, or maybe turn to  
crime. (think about many of those in the Black ghettos and in the  
Latino barrios and poor Whites in Appalachia and all over elsewhere,  
and Native Americans stuck on hell holes known as the "reservations  
system"). This situation has been an economic reality in the USA   
(and likely elsewhere) for a few decades and that has remained ever  
since, and right on up to today. Sometimes makes me wonder if it is  
all "planned" this way and only for the profits of a select few. (but  
however, definitely for those profits of those select few, especially  
the war profiteers). A good chance that it is. Thanx for yer post  
here, Todd. It is another and different view that should be aired.  
And BTW, I also happily and with zero regrets, indulged in and  
reveled in the hedonistic joys and experiences of the (very late)  
60's as a young teen. And also, not everyone who did so, and also  
managed to get deferments, were from a wealthy privileged class. I  
know for a personally experienced fact that a lot of them weren't.  
Many of them just got lucky and never had their Draft numbers get  
drawn and / or also managed to hold onto whatever crappy, slave wage  
jobs they may have had. ( I had a few of those at the time) But, at  
least they even had those jobs, which a lot of people today can't  
seem to find and would sure want. (With a lot of "thanx" to all of  
those greedy, "patriotic" American companies that have sent millions  
of former good paying American jobs ELSEWHERE such as to China ,etc)  
But, I also never lost awareness of the sufferings and injustices etc  
that were foisted upon others, both here in the USA and elsewhere,  
and usually due to no faults of their own.  Never.  'Nam was another  
ugly chapter in American history and one that is being repeated today  
in Afghanistan.
The big difference now is that the streets are no longer filled with  
millions of people protesting that war in Afghanistan anymore.  
There's reasons for this....

Best,
Rev. Fever

> On 7/22/64 11:59 AM, Todd Howell wrote:
>> Rick,
>> I respect your take on things and all of your experiences. They  
>> must've been magic at the time. Wonder years indeed.
>> I remember very little of the era. I got a lot of memories second  
>> hand. I lived in fly-over country on a farm at the a** end of  
>> nowhere as a child. I remember watching my grandmother watching  
>> the casualty reports from Vietnam and fretting. Two neighbors on  
>> either side of us were there. One came back  in a bag and the  
>> other minus three out of four limbs. There were fourteen names on  
>> my own high schools Vietnam Memorial.
>> As with all cultural movements, there were I am sure the true  
>> believers and the opportunist free love and drug bunch along for  
>> the ride. I don't see the sixties as anything else other than  
>> another failed moment in the cultural eons. I had friends who I  
>> met through music, including one brilliant solo, Piedmont  
>> Bluesman, who also served in Vietnam. He told me stories of hippy  
>> girls spitting on him and calling him baby-killer. There were alot  
>> of those stories from my veteran friends. Sorry if I can't get on  
>> board with a bunch of rich, free love college kids who were  
>> fortunate enough to have parents who could buy them deferments  
>> while the poor white under-class and minorities got the dirty end  
>> of the cultural and economic stick and got p*ssed on for it. The  
>> zeitgeist was lovely. The execution terrible.
>> As a child of the SST and Sub-Pop eighties punk movements, I  
>> became formed into the cynical mold that I am now. I trust no one.  
>> Not Fox News. Not MSNBC. Neither left nor right. Neither Wall  
>> Street or the Hippy after birth of an era. I admit to being an  
>> equal opportunity paranoid who believes that the twenty four hour  
>> cable news cycle is essentially the Special Olympics of bull-sh*t  
>> with a gigantic black hole of truth and fact at its' center.
>> I admire and somehow envy your golden time and wish that I was a  
>> true believer in that way. I appreciate you sharing that and  
>> apologize to the list for a rant from a lurker.
>> Lost But Respectful,
>> Ransacker
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Rick Walker<looppool@cruzio.com>
>>> Sent: Dec 22, 2010 4:12 PM
>>> To: richard sales<richard@glasswing.com>
>>> Cc: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
>>> Subject: Re: Re: the 60's
>>>
>>> On 7/22/64 11:59 AM, richard sales wrote:
>>>> Well... the hippies also used hard core civil disobedience to  
>>>> express
>>>> our anger!  It was a thrilling time.
>>>> The free love and drugs was just a bonus for some of us.  For  
>>>> some it
>>>> was the core of the experience.  They're the ones who went on to  
>>>> Wall
>>>> Street and commerce. Truth is, they missed the most glorious  
>>>> boat of
>>>> the time.
>>> LOL,  There is a common joke that goes,  "If you remember the  
>>> 60's, then
>>> you weren't there."
>>> Sadly,  sometimes I think that if you weren't there you just  
>>> don't get it.
>>>
>>> It's like Dickens said,  "It was the best of times, it was the  
>>> worst of
>>> times".
>>>
>>> American children were probably the most dysfunctional in our  
>>> National
>>> history.  Many (and NOT the majority)
>>> were angry but they also wanted to buy out of the materialistic  
>>> culture
>>> that had emerged from all the wealth
>>> and conformity that characterized our culture at the end of World  
>>> War 2.
>>>
>>> I always think it is dangerous to put too much emphasis on a time in
>>> one's life when one is first learning about the world and trying  
>>> to come
>>> to terms with it's inequities (and it's delights) but there was  
>>> some kind
>>> of magic in that time, at least for me.
>>>
>>> The one thing that I do miss about it was the ,  of course,
>>> intrinsically naive, notion that we could
>>> somehow change the world........we could eschew the dominant
>>> paradigm..........we could make a culture
>>> that was less racist, less sexist, less ageist, less sizeist,  
>>> etc., etc.
>>>
>>> there was a feeling, artistically, that anything was possible and  
>>> that,
>>> I believe is what led to the explosion
>>> in creativity in music and fashion (as tacky as tie dye shirts  
>>> are to me
>>> personally.....lol).
>>>
>>> that part of it was wonderful where I lived (and at my tender age  
>>> (I was
>>> 14 in '67 but had a sister 4 years older
>>> who was taking me to concerts and parties and be-ins all the  
>>> time----she
>>> took my brother and I to
>>> the Monterey Pop Festival and to the Filmore Auditorium on my 16th
>>> birthday and turned me on, bless her heart)
>>>
>>> Youth seem far more cynical these days (and I teach them a lot so  
>>> I have
>>> some experience saying this).
>>> I suppose we can't blame them after they had to watch George Bush  
>>> stay
>>> in office for eight years and all it represents, psychically and
>>> politically.
>>>
>>> I always wish I could give them a little tiny bit of that naive  
>>> idealism
>>> we had at that time........
>>> .....that sense that anything is possible.
>>>
>>> It was a good think even though some of my memory about that time  
>>> is dim
>>> (lol).
>>>
>>> rick walker
>>>
>