These kids were no danger to anyone but themselves, and no doubt their later lives ranged across a broad political spectrum and varied occupations. Assuming they didn't die in the drug experimentation of the era. To put it in context: the war in Viet Nam was still raging, and despite their privilege, boys were terrified of getting caught up in it, and were trying to understand what the violence there was like. And the photos show the curious mix of time so long ago: a little boy's fascination with playing at war, the very real fears, and recreation drugs. What strikes me most now is the absence at the time of school shootings and other mass murders so prevalent today. The carrying of toy weapons of mass destruction has shifted in meaning a great deal, and most liberal kids simply wouldn't be seen with even a toy gun.
I love this. People forget how the liberal militants were the Bundys of the 1960s and 70s. The Black Panthers were all armed and demanding the right to be so, based on their constitutional rights! It was Reagan who passed California's first real gun control act, directly in response to the the armed Panthers. Black people with guns - scary! And the Panthers were mild compared to the Weather Underground. Such good times!
If the fop at the top wins re-election, we might see all that again! Stock up on ammo, fellow leftist revolutionaries! Viva la revolución!
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If they choose to teach the class today, they will have to update the curriculum to feature cyber and drone attacks, with a bioweapon extra credit.
And now, it seems, we have come full circle as extremists of the new counter culture (conservatism) pool their knowledge of guerrilla warfare techniques in a bid to smash the new status quo (’60s liberalism in mainstream media and academia).
E.g., https://www.npr.org/2019/09/23/763544037/kansas-soldier-charged-with-teaching-bomb-making-to-far-right-extremists
All of which makes me more committed than ever to preserving the equatorial values of liberal democracy—because there is no democracy in a one party state. From my perspective, the crux of the matter today is no longer Left vs. Right, but the equator vs. the poles.
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It was the summer of '69....
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They were called "Bourgeois Romantic Revolutionaries."
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It would be interesting to read a where are they now on these revolutionaries.
I wouldn’t be surprised to find more than a few loyal Fox News watchers.
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And now, it seems, we have come full circle as extremists of the new counter culture (conservatism) pool their knowledge of guerrilla warfare techniques in a bid to smash the new status quo (’60s liberalism in mainstream media and academia).
To take just one example, an army specialist in Kansas was recently taken into custody for sharing, online, his knowledge of Afghan style, cell phone triggered IED’s with other far right extremists.
All of which makes me more committed than ever to preserving the equatorial values of liberal democracy—because there is no democracy in a one party state. From my perspective, the crux of the matter today is no longer Left vs. Right, but the equator vs. the poles.
I grew up in Scarsdale in the 90s (and lived across from Butler Woods) and they taught us how to join the Wall Street establishment to keep the peasants under control. Guess I was born too late!
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'69 was the height of academic experimentation as school administrators and teachers fell to catering to young people, so many young people. A booming generation was straining education institutions at the seams. My high school offered English credits for a class on witchcraft. I opted for Shakespeare, but still, it was the era of underwater basket weaving and other questionable curriculum. I never heard about this guerilla war class, but I'm betting it drew attention and looked really cool. Such was the motivation back then.
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The demonstrators of that era believe, to this day, that it was their actions that brought the Vietnam war to an end. It wasn't. We simply lost the war; it was a military disaster. Their masses played no role in obtaining that conclusion.
Now they march to demand action on climate change. It will be similarly ineffective. With or without their protests: It will end. Unfortunately, the loser this time will be all mankind. Unlike the Vietnam action, we can't just walk away from it and declare it over.
Rather, we are over. It's won.
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@Austin The Vietnam war ended because kids would no longer fight the war, it was tearing the country apart.
Our continued movement toward disastrous global warming, disastrous for those of us not in the later stage of our lives, will end when young people say it must end.
The demonstrations and the organizing made the difference a half century ago, and they will make the difference now. We are still a democracy.
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I was as far left basically as it was possible to be at that time. Very active anti-war activist for years, carried a red book, was on my way to a volunteer tour of Cuba.
However never in my wildest dreams did I consider violence as part of my polticial life or activities.
My experience on the periphery of those espousing violence was that those considering violence were either already from very violent socio-political environments (ala black panthers or petty criminals already) or they were from priveleged backgrounds and had zero perspective on what violence was really like and what the consequences of violence would ultimately be.
That was my experience being very active in the left and anti-war movement from about 66 through 75.
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As someone who was a high school freshman in NYC in the fall of 1969 I take issue with the use of the word "epidemic" in this article. Now my Staten Island high school was full of working class and middle class students, so I don't have much of an idea of what going on in the tony suburbs, but there was no talk of guerrilla warfare.
I can tell you that the one thing of major concern that year (outside of being eligible for the draft in four years): the first Earth Day that occurred later my freshman year. My generation failed to delivered on that issue. My hope from this week's news is that my generation with support and join those young people at the UN Climate Action Summit 2019.
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