Have anti-war songs changed anything?

Subject: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 02:29 PM

Following on from the choice of best anti-war song thread, is it fair to ask if any of those beautifully written songs have changed anything. The songs mentioned in that thread cover every aspect of war. Eric Bogle's songs highlight the human cost and the futilitiy of war . "Universal Soldier" blaims the foot soldier, but " Masters of War" blaims politicians and big business. BUT, has any of this altered history? Prevented a war from starting? Ended a war? Or, are all those talented songwriters wasting their creative efforts on a lost cause?

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: mack/misophist
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 02:34 PM

They are as good a form of protest as any. They are a form of identification; it's important for us to recognize each other. Other than that, it's impossible to say for sure. Besides, a good song is it's own vindication.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 02:37 PM

Won't do to be too pessimistic, and say the songs have no power. When the powers that be decide these things, it is often a finely balanced decision. Politicians will balance the likely benefits to the world(or themselves) of going to war, against the undoubted miseries. Sometimes it goes one way, sometimes the other.
    And songs of peace undoubtedly reinforce our awareness of the horrors of war. So it is a fairly safe assumption, that whenever a group of people decide on a peaceful course of conduct, they will have done so partly because of the influence of song. So, what I mean is, don't dwell on the wars the songs failed to stop: think about the wars that didn't happen, that songs helped to stop. And keep singing.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 02:40 PM

A song ain't gonna change nothin'!

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 02:41 PM

(oops...)

But that doesn't mean one shouldn't try....

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 02:59 PM

Examples of songs that changed something is a fine old thread with some examples.

A song that altered history? 'Granola Vila Morena' perhaps, though it could be argued that any other song could just as well have triggered that revolution.

In the history (before '45) of the German armies there have always been forbidden songs. You could get punished for singing them. If the people deciding about censoring such songs thought these songs might have a possible detrimental effect on the military, we should seriously consider the possibility they were right.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Joybell
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 04:02 PM

That's a good old thread alright. I agree that even if songs don't appear to have much effect outside the group singing them, they are at least useful to cement relationships and work towards solidarity. My husband talks about the use of songs, within the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s when people feared for their lives.
I've never had my life threatened for my beliefs but I've lead singing in front of bulldozers a time or two. Once we stopped in the middle of "We Shall not be Moved" just at the point when a huge tree crashed to the ground from where it had been "standing by the waterside" for over 200 years. We WERE moved that time, just like the tree, but we influenced a few more people and we gained a few converts.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST, mikefule
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 04:12 PM

Yes, anti-war songs have changed something: they have become an important aspect of a stereotype of anti-war protestors, making it easier for the authorities to categorise all anti-war protestors as beardy-weirdy folk singing Guardian reading idealists. Thus, the anti-war song makes anti-war protestors feel good about themselves, whilst making them an easier target for satire.

But that's more to do with style than content.

So, take the powerful, "Last Night Another Soldier" by the Angelic Upstarts... well, that helped to stereotype anti-war (peace in Northern Ireland) proetestors as scruffy thick anarchist punks... an easy target for satire.

Songs don't change the world. They do, however, act as a bonding agent for groups of people who might change the world, but probably won't.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 04:15 PM

Well, I'm sorry, but anti-war protesters are beardy-weirdy folksinging Guardian readers, arent they? what's wrong withthat?

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 05:04 PM

It's hard to put a finger on the precise effect of a song, however powerful. Howsomever......


How could one say that Where Have All the Flowers Gone? and/or Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream had NO effect in the 60s?
Sure, you can't quantify the effect, but they were right out there with other influences on popular thought.   

Or, during the US Civil War, The Battle Hymn of the Republic?

A song with a strong message, coming at the right time, becomes part of the cultural influences moving in a direction.   That's making a difference, even if you can't hogtie it.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 05:05 PM

Okay, Okay, The Battle Hymn of the Republic is not an anti-war song, but the principle is still there.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,susanne (skw) abroad
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 05:10 PM

Greg, I'd know if I had a beard, even though I have been accused of weirdness now and again.

Just this once I find myself agreeing with Clinton Hammond. My question would be: If the answer to this thread title was 'No', would that mean we should stop writing and singing anti-war songs?

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Bill D
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 05:47 PM

songs, by themselves, change nothing....but what they do inside some heads has always had some effect...even if it's just to paint a picture and make a point. And perhaps hearing a song has affected how a few people vote about those who start wars...You can't prove direct causality, but I have seen tears and resolve that I suspect DID affect behavior...and just maybe made a difference...

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 07:46 PM

Songs can let you know how other people think. No reason why they shouldn't do as much good -- or harm --as editorials or speeches or posters or any form of communication.

clint

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 08:06 PM

Iam sure that songs like Eric Bogles,"No Mans Land"can have a very slow effect on the way people percieve war and conflict...
In short ....They make people think..Always a good thing ..Ake

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,chicken man
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 08:32 PM

My question is [are all wars bad?] If the Americans had not rebeled in 1776 would we still be singing God save the Queen? The US Civil war would we still have slavery? WW2 Had Hitler not been stopped
Would Eastern europeans been killed,Poles, Russians, also Jews, Gays, Gypsies, Handicaped people???
Therefore is there ever a "Good" war. When is war ever justified??? or is it. Just something to think about.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 25 Nov 03 - 08:57 PM

War is bad. It may sometimes be a necessary evil, but it remains evil. How can it be good to end a single life? it may be the ultimate recourse to prevent the loss of further lives, but it still is not good. So every effort is to be made to avoid it, in the sense of trying to achieve the same end with peaceful means. As much as one can. And then a little bit more. But back to the thread...
If an anti-war song has ever stopped a single individual from taking up arms unnecessarily, then it has had an effect. It may not have changed the course of a war, or of mankind. But it clearly has changed at least one life - and maybe saved a few.
Ask yourself the value of a single vote - not that much different. It may not change the election result; not even the magnitude of an electoral win or loss. But would you be happy to lose the right to vote how you want?

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: alanabit
Date: 26 Nov 03 - 04:31 AM

Absolutely. The worst tyrannies arise not from the industry of the few but from the indifference of the many. Most of the worst evils of this world can be averted by a large number of people doing a small amount of good. That can mean many things. At election times it means picking the lesser of two evils - which is what most political choices come down to. Songs make up a very small part of that process, but I would not want to lose them. As the good songs last and doggerel like the "Horst Wessel Lied" (a Nazi rallying song) get shown up for the rubbbish they are, I would say time is on the side of the singers.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: mooman
Date: 26 Nov 03 - 04:37 AM

I believe a good anti-war song can help sensitise and motivate a good number of people. And people ultimately elect (in some countries) politicians.

Peace

moo

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Nov 03 - 06:18 AM

"If the Americans had not rebeled in 1776 would we still be singing God save the Queen?"

Probably about as frequently as Canadians and Australians sing it.

..........................

Songs can be important in building movements, and movements can achieve some kinds of victories. And songs can help people as individuals and groups to have the courage carry on in spite of everything.

In time the fall out from movements permeates how people generally tend to interpret the world. Sometimes quite a long time. But the kind of ideas that at one time seemed far out and extreme can become part of the way ordinary people see the world.

These days imperial wars have to be disguised in order to be acceptable to people, in a way that just wasn't seen as necessary a couple of generations ago. That is some kind of progress.

(Mind it can go the other way - torture appears to be seen as acceptable in a way that we might have fooled ourselves was no longer possible.)

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Peace
Date: 26 Nov 03 - 02:16 PM

Prob'ly not.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 26 Nov 03 - 02:32 PM

Now how about influence of pro-war songs?

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Margret RoadKnight
Date: 27 Nov 03 - 01:22 AM

Not exactly "anti-war", but great documentation of the effectiveness of songs in the anti-apartheid movement in the film AMANDLA (subtitled : A revolution in Four Part Harmony")

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,Frankham
Date: 27 Nov 03 - 01:17 PM

Every time we sing Last Night I Had The Strangest Dream, Down By the Riverside, Tommy Sand's The Music of Healing it strikes a responsive chord in the audience. Today's audiences are hungry to hear this
kind of song. No one really likes war even though some seem to promote it. But everyone wishes for peace in some form or other, even those that seem to be opposed to it.

Does an anti-war song change anything? It depends. In some cases small imperceptible changes in
people may occur.

It may be that songs by themselves may not change history but
added to movements that fuel constructive energy, they may have a potent affect.

They are so worthwhile and important to sing that we have to
operate on a faith that they have some power to influence people.

Any song can be satirized. I think that the funniest are those
that poke fun at pro-war songs.

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Nov 03 - 01:20 PM

I agree. Change is the wrong word to describe the impact songs have. Influence or affect are better word choices. Many songs have influenced people, but I can't say I know anyone who was changed by a song. Maybe in a very superficial way, but not anything meaningful or lasting, as the thread title suggests.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Jacqk
Date: 28 Nov 03 - 12:25 AM

I don't think songs change things of themselves; but as part of a greater movement they lend energy.

I'm no historian, so this is only a guess, but one song that might have changed something so large as a war was the song Strange Fruit, by Billie Holiday. It didn't address war, but another equally ingrained aspect of our country, lynching.

Billie's song was part of a much larger movement, which got people thinking, and so it found an audience ready to think about what was being sung. A recipe for anti-war change?

Jack

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Dave Masterson
Date: 28 Nov 03 - 06:37 AM

Have anti-war songs changed anything? In all honesty, on the wider stage probably not, but as individuals you have to stand up and be counted for your beliefs.
"All it takes for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing." Anon.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,guitaropsimath
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 12:34 AM

The anti-war songs of the 60s that I heard, thought about, believed and sang have made a difference in how I perceive the world. Maybe over the last 40 years of encouraging folks I talk with and sing to to think about alternative solutions to our various social ills some other folks are seeing things a little differently. Like Arlo sez, "Never before in history have things been so bad that so little can make so much difference." So thanks, Buffy, I think Universal Soldier has made a difference.

Doug

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Mo the caller
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 03:31 AM

I sometimes wonder if the 'protest' song has been put in to balance the programme. With a jolly song to follow.

And I think, 'So what am I supposed to do about that?'

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Rog Peek
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 07:36 PM

Desmond Tutu once said If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.

If you do not wish to take a stance of neutrality, then protest is essential, and as mack/misophist said Songs "are as good a form of protest as any".

Besides, I'm sure they can at least make some people in high places feel uncomfortable. I'm damn sure Phil Ochs was a thorn in the side of J. Edgar Hoover, and probably a few others. Enough anyway to have provoked an FBI file over 400 pages long. I can imagine J Edgar Hoover went apoplectic when he heard lines like "....pledge allegiance against the flag." or "......even treason might be worth a try" or "We'll assassinate the President."

So keep on writing, keep on singing!!!

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Teribus
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 08:33 PM

No, not one iota, nor will they ever change anything, they are all retrospective - If you believe that old hackneyed saying that "Those who forget the past are condemned to relive it" - well the same goes for the songs. Victors very rarely write songs, they are normally the preserve of the defeated.

TMOPOTS

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Gulliver
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 10:24 PM

"Victors very rarely write songs, they are normally the preserve of the defeated."

Huh?!?

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Dan Schatz
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 10:42 PM

If songs can change people, then people can change things. It happens very slowly, over great time, and not alone, but songs can make a difference.

Wendell Berry wrote eloquently about protest:

"Much protest is naive; it expects quick, visible improvement and despairs and gives up when such improvement does not come. Protesters who hold out longer have perhaps understood that success is not the proper goal. If protest depended on success, there would be little protest of any durability or significance. History simply affords too little evidence that anyone's individual protest is of any use. Protest that endures, I think, is moved by a hope far more modest than that of public success: namely, the hope of preserving qualities in one's own heart and spirit that would be destroyed by acquiescence."

Dan Schatz

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Bert
Date: 17 Aug 07 - 02:07 AM

has any of this altered history?

I think that it is quite likely that the CND movement in the Fifties and Sixties, songs and all, kept the big powers talking for long enough for them to start thinking a little.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Aug 07 - 03:20 AM

They may not change the the minds of "the good and the great" but they do help to establish the fact that we are not alone in objecting to the crap they throw at us.
I'll never forget the affinity I felt with all the other anti-Vietnam protesters in Grosvenor Square when we were telling the occupants of the US embassy what we thought of Napalm and Agent Orange.
They also put on record that the blood of the Vietnamese, Chileans, Nicaraguans, Greeks, Kurds, Haitians, Iraqis - whoever, was on their hands and not ours.
"Disc of sun in the belching smoke,
Blazing huts were the children choke,
Burning flesh and blackened blood,
Charred and blistered like smouldering wood.
Oh brother, did you weep,
Oh brother, can you sleep.

Wall-eyed moon in the wounded night
Touching poisoned fields with blight,
Showing a ditch where a dead girl lies
Courted by ants and hungry flies.

Scream of pain on the morning breeze,
Thunder of bombs in a grove of trees,
Hymn of rubble and powdered stone,
Mangled flesh and twisted bone.

Programmed war, efficiency teams,
Punch-cards fed to thinking machines.
Computered death and the murder plan,
Total destruction of Vietnam.
Oh Brother have you got no shame,
Oh Jesus, they're killing in my name".   

I wish I'd said that - in fact I did, many times.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: sing4peace
Date: 12 Sep 09 - 09:59 PM

I'm a newbie here at Mudcat, came across this thread and had to add a story about my friend, Joe Labriola. Joe was a Marine in Vietnam, did two tours, came out with a body full of shrapnel and a chest full of medals and started working as a recruiter. One day he was riding to work when he heard Phil Ochs on the radio singing: I've Got Something To Say, Sir (and I'm gonna say it now). He told me it was as if a hammer had hit him on the head, split it open and let the light come shining in. He got to the office and asked the other recruiters whether any of them had questions about the war they had fought. He was told that with thinking like that he was no use to them anymore and he was fired on the spot. Phil's song had everything to do with Joe's 180 degree turnaround on the war. (To find out more about what happened to Joe please check out: www.freejoelab.com).

If songs weren't so powerful, Clear Channel communications would not have issued their infamous banned songs list in the aftermath of September 11, 2001. Remember how ridiculous it was to have "Imagine" considered subversive?

A few years ago, I was privileged to be part of a recording with many of the original people who sang together as "the Freedom Singers". Their singing was featured often in the public television documentary series "Eyes on the Prize". The Freedom Singers were a totally cooking vocal ensemble. They were absolutely essential to the civil rights struggle - some of them were Freedom Riders - all of them had been part of various civil disobedience campaigns as they fought Jim Crow laws.

Chuck Neblitt (choral director) told me that to them, the most important song of the movement was "Hold On" - (keep your eyes on the prize and hold on). That was the song that they would sing to and with each other as they were set upon by dogs, had their heads bashed in and as they sat in police wagons and holding cells all bloody and weary. "Hold On" was the song they credited as the backbone of the movement - more so than "We Shall Overcome". Similar stories are told of songs in the anti-apartheid movement as well.

I like to remind people that a singing movement makes tyrants tremble. As it says in the song: Paul and Silas began to shout, their chains fell off and they walked right out - keep your eyes on the prize and hold on..."

Still good advice I think.

I think it is also important to not just talk the talk (or sing it) but to walk the walk as well. It takes more than songs to stop a war, but the songs can sustain us along the way.

JK

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Beer
Date: 12 Sep 09 - 10:21 PM

I like you already "sing 4 peace", and I welcome you to Mudcat. I have a feeling if you stick around you will be a great contributor. Your message was great and the Vietnam era brought back many memories. Some great, some more difficult.
No I never served but was still part of the time.
Beer (adrien)

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,blueuke
Date: 13 Sep 09 - 03:29 PM

Sing4peace:
I just heard a fascinating story about the "Clear-Channel Censorship List" on Crap from the Past, explaining exactly where the list came from and why Imagine & other songs like What a Wonderful World were on the list. Check it out--search for Crap From The Past's most recent show 9/11/09.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Lox
Date: 13 Sep 09 - 03:40 PM

Songs don't change things directly, but they do inspire people to care and think about issues that they might otherwise ignore.

In this way they can increase the numbers and the motivation of people to seek ways of stopping wars.

There are certain simple truths that music is somehow better at conveying than words and the tragedy and futility of war is one of them.

Just as love songs are often responsible for sex!

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: topical tom
Date: 13 Sep 09 - 03:46 PM

I believe that this has probably all been said before but here goes.Anti-war songs have obviously not stopped war but it is my belief that they have sensitized many people to the horror and madness of a race killing it's own fellow-beings.They have helped promote anti-war movements which, in turn, have given pause to blind indifference to war and it's effects on people the world round.Anti-war songs can change outlooks, opinions, and perceptions of war. They may not stop war but, by God, they scream out to be written and sung!May they never disappear from this troubled Earth.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Azizi
Date: 13 Sep 09 - 03:50 PM

sing 4 peace, here's the link to the website you mentioned in your post:


http://www.freejoelab.com/index.html

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 13 Sep 09 - 06:57 PM

Alistair Hulett uses a quote from the time in "Red Clydside"

"A bayonet that's a weapon with a working man at either end"

It's a very powerful image, tho I don't if it changes anything in the wide world.

sanra

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,iancarterb
Date: 14 Sep 09 - 02:52 AM

At least one person will feel better DURING the singing of the song. Nobody ever felt better until AFTER a war.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: Stringsinger
Date: 14 Sep 09 - 08:35 AM

The songs have brought the issue into the consciousness of those who may not like them.

This is a good thing. They've awoken people from the slumber. This is the function
of any good topical song.

Will they change human behavior? That remains to be seen.

The songs helped end the Vietnam War. Maybe new ones will get us out
of Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Remember "Give Peace a Chance"? and "Hey,hey, LBJ, how many kids have you killed today?"

Yes, I think a good protest song helps to bring these issues into focus.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: billhudson
Date: 14 Sep 09 - 12:08 PM

Who knows at the end of the day? But, if we can get people to stop and think we are half way there. It's always one to one if you change anything but its a link.
Pete Seeger and I were talking about this very same point and he always tells me of a young seminary with a sign against the war. Someone told him, "You are not going to change the world" And the young man said,"I'm trying to not let the world change me",or something like that. The point is if you believe what you are singing then keep going, no matter how out numbered you might think you are.
But to answer the question, yes I do think it has changed a few minds.
Still Pickin
Bill Hudson

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: TonyA
Date: 14 Sep 09 - 12:30 PM

A dilemma facing the effectiveness of anti-war songs is that so very few people are actually pro-war. Most have been led to believe that war has been thrust upon them by an implacable aggressor, leaving them no choice. So in singing an anti-war song you're essentially preaching to the choir, except that owing to illness some choir members may not be in church today. You appear to be blaming them for being ill, which just makes you seem crazy.

Still, as others have said, it's important to sing the songs anyway, if only to avoid seeming crazy to yourself.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: sing4peace
Date: 14 Sep 09 - 01:14 PM

"The only tyrant I accept in this world is the still small voice within me. And even though I have to face the prospect of being a minority of one, I humbly believe I have the courage to be in such a hopeless minority." Mahatma Gandhi

I've been labeled as a "protest singer" ever since I was a 15 year old banging out a very passionate, if somewhat out of tune version of "The Times They Are A Changin'" at the Pawtucket Elks Club back in the autumn of 1968. That song and so many others remain in my repertoire because they are powerful tools.

I know songs change people, I've been changed by songs my whole life. That's why I sing and that's why I listen to music. It's like food - molecularly altering. I have a box full of letters I have received from people who tell me how this or that song I sang made them question their own choices and beliefs.

Today, I think I do my best singing at an open mike/public speakout I have hosted in Memorial Square in Providence, Rhode Island (USA) every Saturday, rain or shine, for over five years (since May of 2004). It is called the "No Time To Be Silent Vigil". We started the vigil in the aftermath of Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib to speak (and sing) out against torture. We gather where we do in hopes of convincing Judge Williams (our former Supreme Court Chief Justice) to resign from the military commissions at Guantanamo Bay and we brave the elements -not to mention the so-called slings and arrows of public opinion - to address the brutal reality of "the never ending war".

Many musicians have joined me there along with poets, painters and a dancer now and then. Some will sing, some read poetry and it's quite moving when we are visited by a local jazz trumpeteer who brings us all to tears with "Taps". We practice radical listening and advocate persistant and creative non-violence. We've had thousands of conversations with people over the years - weaving community one person at a time.

Consider yourselves invited. We'll be there for the foreseeable future - every Saturday - rain or shine from noon until one in front of the monument to "the war to end all wars" - that is, as Hank Williams used to say, "God willing and if the creek don't rise".


"Hope is the thing with feathers
that perches in the soul
and sings the tune
without the words
and never stops at all."
Emily Dickinson

------
Your sister in Hope and Song,
Joyce Katzberg

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: SuperKrone
Date: 14 Sep 09 - 09:08 PM

1967, 1968, 1969 Fifth Avenue Peace Parader here. The songs helped end the draft, but so did the realization that those who could not figure out how to evade the draft were not the ideal participnts in technologically sophisticated warfare. I do remember with deep shame that we walkers (we didn't MARCH by any military standard) cheered ourselves for keeping on through a rain shower, to the tune of Handel's Water Music that happened to be playing on someone's portable radio, very high tech for the time. Shame because at the same time draftees and volunteers in 'Nam were crawling through the muck on their bellies. And the shame of the XX exemption: female, so not draftable. Over the last few days I've cobbled together a set of lyrics about war as it is now in the US.

"Jennie's Gone for a Soldier

There's a yellow ribbon painted
On the back of my old van.
And it is for my daughter
Who is serving in Iran
Bringing ammunition convoys
Through a frightened, angry land.
Jennie's gone for a soldier.

Our Jennie's made lieutenant,
Boys and girls in her command
They place their lives and honor
In her strong and dirty hand
Leading ammunition convoys
Over mine-torn bloodied sand.
Jennie's gone for a soldier.

Hush, my grandchild,
Hush, my love.
The hawk of war
And the mourning dove
Tell the earth below
And the sky above
Your Mother's gone for a soldier.

And when she rotates back again
Its never quite the same
She answers to "Sargeant" now,
And not to her born name,
And civilians can't be easy
With the vigilance and flame
War leaves in the eyes of a soldier.

I almost, ALMOST, wish I could
Put flowers on a stone,
Not watch the child I sang asleep
Stand in the dark alone
Flinching from the fireworks
Lit by those who've never know
What rockets can mean to a soldier.

Weep, my grandchild,
Softly, love,
With the hawk of war
And the mourning dove
Tell the earth below
And the sky above
Your Mother's gone for a soldier.

Spoken:

She comes back with her eyes,
With her arms and her legs,
But not the same woman.
Always my daughter,
Always your Mother,
But not the same woman.
Not quite."

Similar things, of course, happen to sons and Fathers.
It isn't that I think that warfare should be closed to women.
It isn't even that I think we can manage without warriors,
not for a while yet, anyway.
But I do think that Obsidian the officer,
and Dove her mother,
and Hunter her son,
are worth a song.

If anyone is inspired to sing it, the tunes are out there.
Just give a mention to Obsidian, Dove, and Hunter,
And SuperKone, who remembers the 1960's.

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: iancarterb
Date: 14 Sep 09 - 10:13 PM

"the realization that those who could not figure out how to evade the draft were not the ideal participnts in technologically sophisticated warfare." I always hoped that were not just true but difficult to fight, but it's not impossible to lower the threshold of skills needed or remove the control from the consequences- cf the gamers who fly remote control drones over Afghanistan from a Nevada airforce base. Not much PTSD from that. We'll need the songs and the marches ongoing, I fear, and I likewise fear that obligatory national service with the military being one option is the only way to get away from the all-volunteer forces who have more at stake in their decision than draftees. The draft enabled but also eventually helped to provoke the end of the Viet Nam lunacy. I know from experience that the only real military offense is Non Belief, and the senior petty officers and mid level officers can ALWAYS tell at 20 paces, and you're in trouble from first day to your last. It is, at least, socially important trouble.
Carter

Subject: RE: Have anti-war songs changed anything?
From: GUEST,Mr Red
Date: 15 Sep 09 - 07:52 AM

As my old mammy said - "Constant dripping, wears away a stone" - any drip knows that.

My feeling is that until everyone can speak the same language, pray to the same god, and generally suffer the same drought/flood, wars are inevitable, songs can only be a paliative. And once English (of whatever patois) becomes the lingua Franca (contentious in itself) it will be the source of irritation because of that. Take the rise and rise of the Welsh language as an example.

Our only hope is that the spectre of global warming might just be a meeting point for all humanity, if only there wasn't quite so much of it.