The graying of anti-war activism

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 3/21/6 | C.W. Nevius

[SmithL]

My teenage daughter and I attended an anti-war rally last weekend in Walnut Creek, but you couldn't really say we made a point of it. It was more like we were going by, saw the crowd and stopped in to hear the music.

There was an old-fashioned folksinger there, complete with an acoustic guitar and a Bob Dylan-style harmonica holder around his neck. His look may have been retro, but he certainly wasn't. We estimated his age at 20.

And that was the funny thing. He was one of the few young people there. There were a lot more people my age than my daughter's age in the crowd.

...throughout the Bay Area, if not beyond, last weekend at the many rallies marking the third anniversary of the Iraq war. The crowds were small, but, beyond that, they were more Woodstock than MTV.

Where did all the student activists go?

"I really don't know why there isn't a large number of young people,'' said Linda Spatz of Berkeley, a member of Grandmothers Against the War. "My own children are in their late 20s and they are not politically active.''

If you really want to talk about the vanishing student activist, step onto the Cal campus where the Berkeley radical is, according to Daily Californian editor Adeel Iqbal, "more concerned about getting a 4.0 grade point and getting that I-banking (investment banking) job.''

What happened? Well, says Country Joe McDonald, whose "Fixin' to Die Rag'' was the theme song for the anti-war protests of the Vietnam era, maybe nothing. Maybe students were never that active -- even in the 1960s.

"I was there in the '60s and '70s, and there was a lot of bull thrown around about the 'revolution' and a lot of drug taking and sex happening,

[SmithL]

and a lot of drug taking and sex happening,

And the same people are going back for the same reasons.

[JennysCool]

These people's nostalgia for their "good old days" is getting people killed.

[cvq3842]

Agreed!

I am disgusted beyond words at the efforts made to cripple our war effort and make sure it is a failure. That's what the enemy's banking on, and the left and the MSM are only too happy to oblige.

[A Balrog of Morgoth]

"I really don't know why there isn't a large number of young people,'' said Linda Spatz of Berkeley, a member of Grandmothers Against the War. "My own children are in their late 20s and they are not politically active.''

She just answered her own question. How many children emulate their parents when their parents are nutty activists?

I think this would be similar to the child of an alcoholic who doesn't touch the bottle.

[FlipWilson]

Activism, to me, implies an inclination to gravitate away from what is seen as the status quo. On college campuses across the country the status quo is leftist faculty forcing, yes forcing, their views on students. Thus, perhaps today's student activism is a gravitation away from what was seen as the "movement" in the 60's.

[trad_anglican]

We estimated his age at 20

His age means less than nothing.

[Jim Verdolini]

I have counter protested a LOT of anti war rallys and have always been struck at the crowd attending....gray haried, pony tailed, pot bellied hairy legged activists, and those are the women!

Sad old ex-hippies who never got the word the revolution was over.

sad

[b9]

I think the (lack of) the draft is definitely a key,'' says Spatz. "Today they are not impacted.''

So glad they pointed out that our dedicated military is all VOLUNTARY.

[dead]

"I really don't know why there isn't a large number of young people,'' said Linda Spatz of Berkeley

Because today’s kids know that you old hippies stink like shit and tell boring stories about sitting in the mud forty freaking years ago like it was the equivalent of storming a Nazi machine gun nest.

[Semper]

Good point. These people should ask themselves: Are my actions contributing to a successful conclusion of this effort or are they complicating and prolonging it with the serious consequence of more casualties on all sides?

[elcid1970]

Around 1973 (when the draft ended and the so-called Movement died in a fizzle) I heard someone sum up the entire antiwar and counterculture Sixties thus:

"You know, a lot of guys joined the revolution just to get laid."

[oldleft]

I think what is telling in this article is just how much all of this "protesting" is just a bunch of middle age hippies trying to relive their youth, and that there's nothing wrong with the youth of today.

I just hope when I'm 50 I and my friend don't try to start a new rave scene or tool around in '89 Mustangs listening to Guns N' Roses. OK, that last one will probably happen, but I won't wonder why 18 year olds aren't down with it.

[steve-b]

"I think the (lack of) the draft is definitely a key,'' says Spatz.

[reformedliberal]

The Movement was very small, back in the 60s and 70s.

Try this, today: ask aging boomers if they were political, meaning activist, or "just hippies". The ones I put this question to almost all grin in a goofy manner and say:"Hippie".

We had the activist instructors back then, too. They were also young and looking to make a rep for themselves. They did, at least at the schools I attended: a rep for getting the pretty girls in bed and being easy graders while their classes were egoistic performances, not education.

I agree that the activism today is against the leftist indoctrination. The students I know mostly keep their head down, lie thru their teeth on the disposition exams and in their papers, are getting their degrees and voting GOP. "Hippie" is not a term of endearment among these young people.

[edcoil]

"Where did all the student activists go? "

They grew up and figured out how wrong they were - but more importantly what are you doing just driving around burning gas with nowhere to go or nothing to do? Y

ou just burning gas or reliving the old song "Riding along in my automobile... with no peticular place to go...."

[Adiemus]

I am disgusted beyond words at the efforts made to cripple our war effort and make sure it is a failure. That's what the enemy's banking on, and the left and the MSM are only too happy to oblige.

The White House or DoD need to commission a study on the negative effects of the LSM on the war. I bet they have extended it by at least two years already. Our GI's blood is on their America hating hands.

[cvq3842]

Yes, it makes their job much more difficult.

[KarlInOhio]

"You know, a lot of guys joined the revolution just to get laid."

That matches my theory that if Bill Clinton believed right wingers were getting more tail than the hippies in the 1960s he would be a Republican to this day.

[Emmett McCarthy]

Absoloutely KEEEERECT! Easy broads and, as often as not, free drugs.