BS: The 1960s was crap.

Subject: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 08:41 PM

I told GUEST on the 'spirituality' thread that I'd start this thread for him and those who want to talk about how misguided people from the 'sixties era' actually were. Here ya go, GUEST. It's all yours.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: greg stephens
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 08:44 PM

Bollocks. As far as I remember.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: michaelr
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 08:46 PM

I was 5 when they started and 15 when they ended. Too young to really take part. But I sure learned a lot.

Cheers,
Michael

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 08:47 PM

OK, it IS bollocks. I said he should start the thread. However, I noticed he hadn't, so I figured I'd save him the time.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 09:38 PM

the 60s was when I learned what real, traditional folk music was about. It was pretty good times if you weren't caught up in all the pop culture of the day. (Yeah, it was Vietnam, and all that, too...but...)

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Amos
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 09:40 PM

Decades don't be crap. Especially decades in which man gets sent to the moon, Kennedy gets elected and shot, and the Beatles get famous all in the same period. C'mon.


A

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 09:45 PM

It was an absolutely amazing time. I'm glad I was there to see it.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: freda underhill
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 09:48 PM

i agree. a fantastic time. people who werent there havent lived.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Bobert
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 09:48 PM

The 60's is what seperates us from a time when Bubba thought it was his Consitutional right to string up a nigga on Saturday night...

Fir God's sake, we needed the 60's and we're long overdue for another 60's...

Long live the 60's...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Rapparee
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 09:55 PM

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

Nothing was like we remember it, because we now view it in our tail lights.

And fer shame, brucie -- it should be "The 1960s WERE crap" since the subject ("1960s") is plural. And you an English teacher, too!

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:00 PM

Ah, but thinking quickly he says, Rapaire, the term 1960s is meant to imply an era; subsequently, was is correct.

Besides, I was THERE. I lost lotsa brain cells.

Hey, where's GUEST? This thread is for him, you cads.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:01 PM

Now, if we're talking crap, how about right now? Sure, there was a lot of self-indulgence in the 60's, but the advances in breaking down discrimination alone justifies some of the excesses. Most of the idealism was genuine, I think. Not a whole lot of idealism left any more.

I can't believe this is a thread with the word Crap in it that John didn't start...

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:05 PM

What is truly crap is RAP!!!!

And "New Country". And hiphop. And techno. And disco.

But especially (C)RAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Rapparee
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:07 PM

Like they say, "If you remember the '60s, you weren't there."

Jerry's right -- lots of excess, but some of that excess was excesses of tolerance, of caring for others, of breaking down barriers, of changes (yes, not always for the better).

Today we reap the harvest of some of the bad excesses as well: drugs of more and more potency, self-indulgence...you can name more.

"It was the best of times...."

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:08 PM

Disco. You have reminded me of DISCO. Who put you up to this? WHO? Disco. YMCA dah dah dah dah dah, YMCA. My head hurts. BADDDDDDDDD.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:08 PM

"60s" is a collective noun? nahhhhhhh...

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,jaze
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:11 PM

What Bobert said and pretty much everyone else. Sure there was good and bad, but the good and idealism far outweighed the bad and in many cases overcame the bad. There was a feeling that hasn't been here since. Of HOPE and change for the better.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:11 PM

I was there. I remember. Not all 60's folks did those various things to excess. Joan Baez didn't, and she remembers too. Young people had powerful ideals in the 60's and that was what made it such a special time. We believed we could make a better world. And to some extent, here and there, we did.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Biskit
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:18 PM

I think more was expected of the 60's then they were actually able to give. It was one of those things like communisim,..it looks really good on paper but in the end there is just to much money to be made from the "believers" and the leaders become more corrupt then the folks they're supposed to be against,...But The 70's Wow! Hippy Chicks, tapestry dresses, puchuli (sp) oil,outstanding concerts, did I mention Hippy Chicks?? A man with a guitar and a song in his heart could go far back then,...can't say I remember all of it, put the parts I do remember,...I remember vividly.
Peace! Through understanding.
~Biskit~

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:18 PM

Glad they came, glad they went. Been there, done that, played the music (so long and loud it buggered my ears), wore the t-shirt out, don't believe in trying to relive history, living in the 2000's now.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:22 PM

The reason the 70's were so great was basically this: the 60's lasted until around about '75.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Once Famous
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 11:00 PM

Was there for it.

Had much of my life formed by it and remember enough of it.

I firmly believe that much of the conservative climate that exists today is backlash from it. There was good that came out of it as far as the civil rights movement and there was bad that came out of it such as drugs and the sexual freedom that led to AIDS and way too many out of wedlock children.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Greg F.
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 11:19 PM

Yup. The 60's caused AIDS.
At least its original bullshit for a change.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Metchosin
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 11:28 PM

And what are we going to blame syphilus on.....I know....the British Navy!

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Shanghaiceltic
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 11:41 PM

But who gave it to the British Navy in the first place?

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Metchosin
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:02 AM

Sheep?

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:07 AM

DON'T BLAME ME!

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Metchosin
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:07 AM

LOL

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: number 6
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:16 AM

Out of the 60's came some of the best (ever) of jazz, folk, and rock. Other than that, well it was better than the 50's and better than the 70's. Did a better world derive from the ideals of the 60's? Nope, not at all.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: harpgirl
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:34 AM

When I think of the 60's I keep wondering why we do not have an anti-war movement like the one in the sixties. Most of us feel the same way about Iraq that we did about Vietnam. It couldn't just be because of the draft....

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Art Thieme
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:43 AM

I was 20 years old in 1961. It was simply an incandescent time that envigorates me intelectually to this very day. I also agree with Bill D and his good insights. I agree with all threads that echo those posive observations. And I disagree with whatever was said in the other posts.

So there.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: number 6
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:47 AM

The 60's did produce an eclectic, outrageous band called the Fugs. We'll definately never see and hear a band like that again!

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:48 AM

Wet Dream Over You.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: number 6
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:52 AM

HeHe, they were good Brucie

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Metchosin
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:55 AM

"Did a better world derive from the ideals of the 60's?"

Ask that of someone who was forced to sit in the back of the bus because of the colour of his skin.

Ask that of someone who worked to get some birds back from the brink of extinction because of high concentrations of DDT in their eggs.

Ask that each time an area is set aside as a another park in order to protect habitat.

Ask the Vietnamese people if they preferred then to now.

I never believed in fairy tale endings but some things definitely changed for the better. However, you don't just blow your wad and then figure you've done your bit and sit back on your ass. Its a little too early to tell and as such, I'm not ready to write it off yet.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: LadyJean
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 12:58 AM

I miss the music. It was music not commercial rubbish. I miss the faith that we could make the world better. I miss the styles. Now I can finally afford a leather vest with lots of fringe I can't wear one. Oh, and how I miss my peasant dresses. I was a great one for peasant dresses.
When the 60s began all kinds of discrimination was OK, Blacks, Jews, Catholics, the disabled, the just plain odd, were victims of a society that said a good person was a good white Protestant, who could work for General Motors.
When the 70s began, that notion was well on the way out. Good riddance!

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 04:30 AM

Martin, there is no way anyone can blame the 60's for aids but it can be blamed for the so called "Permissive Society" that made for the rapid spread of aids.
HOWEVER> I most remember the 60's for "The Beatles".."The Rolling Stones" and the advent of many other Rock/Pop groups. The 60's heralded a revolution in many things..particularly types of music and the arrival of the larger concerts that are now part of the everyday scene.
The whole period was definitely not C... as suggested...It was a time of re-learning...a sort of renaissance of musical learning and Social learning which may not have been altogether good but was a great experience to live through.
I'm glad I was there!! But with the sentiments of Strollin' Johnnie....it is all a long time in the past...we have moved on and on and on and now we are in the 2000's..So lets LIVE them through...as long as we are able.
Best wishes, Mike.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 04:35 AM

Poignant memory

1971 sitting with friends in a pub in my college town of Grantham Lincolnshire - Margaret Thatchers hometown - founder member of the right wing backlashers.

Paul MacCartney's Another Day came on the juke box.

I remember saying , Oh shit! You didn't need to be a Beatle to write that. The party's really over now....

none of my friends believed me at the time. they do now.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,John O'Lennaine
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 05:26 AM

I think it's a little unfair to dismiss the '60s as crap (or anything else) simply because not everything worked out exactly as we envisioned it. Nothing good ever does. But a lot of things got started in the '60s which have yet to reach fruition. The Age of Aquarius for example.

What would life be like now if we had gone straight from the '50s to the '70s? Silly question. No point asking it. The 60's didn't change history, the '60 WAS history.
(I subscribe to the collective noun theory)

John

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: *daylia*
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 07:18 AM

I was 1 when the sixties started and 11 when they ended. I wouldn' t call the decade "crap". But there's plenty of things I remember about the 60's that I was grateful to see changed by the end of the 70's - most particularly the laws/norms surrounding women and children.

By the end of the 70's, kids could no longer be beaten by their parents/teachers (at least in public), women were finally recognized legally as "persons", and men could no longer rape an unattached (ie single and 'unowned') woman without sanction (as long as he claimed her skirt was "too short" or something similar).

My Grade 6 teacher, mother of three sons, was deserted by her husband in the early 60's. Though the church and community rallied to support the family, the poor woman could not remarry. She needed her husband's "permission" to file for divorce, and he'd just plain vanished. I watched her struggle miserably for years. How idiotic.

If it was the counter-culture of the 60's that helped to generate these changes - along with the changes re civil rights and awareness/concern for the environment that began in the 60's - then my heartfelt gratitude goes out to the hippies!

What's disconcerting is to observe that the girls of today seem to have no idea how fortunate they are. "Feminism" has become almost a dirty word, and the young women of the 21st Century take their hard-won freedoms, educational/occupational opportunities, "rights" and autonomy and legal status for granted.    :-O   This is amazing to me; it feels like I've been living in two completely different 'epochs' or 'worlds' during only one lifetime.

Now what I can't figure out is if I'm a "Baby Boomer" or a member of "Generation X". Generation X is supposed to refer to the children of the baby-boomers, born in the 60's and 70's (approx 1961-1981) Yet I see that sometimes, people born between 1958-1964 are included as "Baby Boomers" - and yesterday I found a reference to Alanis Morrisette, born in 1958 (the same year as me) as a premiere member of "Generation X"! IF that's the case, then I'm the same generation as my oldest son, born in 1977. How can that be? ARRGGHHHH I'm confused!!! Maybe I need a musical interlude ... Whooooo am I ... who who ... who who ... Whooooo am I .... tell me who the **** am I!   

;-) daylia

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: robomatic
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 07:33 AM

I am old enough to remember but was too young to participate in, much of the 60's. Those who do, invariably in my presence assure me that if "you can remember, you werent' there!" (yes, Rapaire said it first in this thread but it was the first thing went through my excuse for a mind)

Harpgirl, as to why there isn't the same level of protest now as then, there are three main reasons:
1) Elimination of the draft.
2) We look and feel more like winners now.
3) Modern technology, military and civilian.

I agree with Martin Gibson, that enlightened social attitudes, particularly civil rights independent of race and sex, got their momentum rolling (The roots of both of those revolutions emanate from the 40's and 50's however - check out Halberstam's book The Fifties ). The "Love" generation were very photogenic then (particularly in the rain); I recall too much toleration of drugs and a high level of self-righteousness that has tracked a lot of those folk.

The Sixties saw the end of the "big tail" fad of American cars, Bay Of Pigs, the Race To The Moon, the artificial heart, Cuban Missiles, Star Trek, Test Ban Treaty, Twilight Zone, Cleopatra, The Six Day War, Mister Machine, Perry Mason, Allen Sherman, How The West Was Won, King Kong versus Godzilla, Clay versus Liston, The British Invasion, To Kill A Mockingbird.

In the future lay: Gay Liberation, The Yom Kippur War, digital watches, Disco, Pet Rocks, Valley Of The Dolls, Watergate, Paul McCartney & Wings.

If the decade of the 60s were crap, then all the other decades are too!

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 08:26 AM

I remember the 60s as such an exciting time to live. I remember the hope. I remember the optimism. I remember the feeling of limitless possibilties for change for the better. I remember it as being an intellectual Christmas morning. Each package held a pandora's box of cool new ideas.

I also remember some bad stuff, but I don't dwell on it.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 09:08 AM

No question in my mind that the most unfortunate aspect of the 60's was the diversion of young people's energy into drug use...using drugs to entertain themselves. I was not touched in any way by that, as I chose not to use drugs. I will never forget Joan Baez's brilliant comment on the whole thing...

"It's silly to make marijuana illegal. Of course...it's silly to smoke it too."

That got both the establishment AND the hippies mad at her, but she was absolutely right on both counts.

A secondary unfortunate aspect was the promotion of sexual promiscuity ("free love"), which is simply not a very good idea. I wasn't much affected by that either.

When you line up all the good ideals that inspired people in the 60's next to that, the 60's still comes out looking pretty good to me.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,George H
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 09:13 AM

My sweet Lord! Between this thread and that other one, I do hope you snarly old folkies recycle all that vitriol!

Here - put this in your pipes and smoke it. Might mellow you out a little.


THE LIGHT THAT HAS LIGHTED THE WORLD

I've heard how some people, have said
that I've changed
That I'm not what I was
How it really is a shame
The thoughts in their heads,
Manifest on their brow
Like bad scars from ill feelings
they themselves arouse
So hateful of anyone that is happy
or 'free'
They live all their lives,
without looking to see
The light that has lighted the world

It's funny how people, just won't
accept change
As if nature itself - they'd prefer
re-arranged
So hard to move on
When you're down in a hole
Where there's so little chance,
to experience soul

I'm greatful to anyone,
that is happy or 'free'
for giving me hope
while I'm looking to see

The light that has lighted the world


Peace.

George

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Rapparee
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 09:27 AM

SWEET SURVIVOR
Peter Yarrow -Barry Mann -Cynthia Weil- Silver Dawn - ASCAP

You have asked me why the days fly by so quickly
And why each one feels no different from the last
And you say that you are fearful for the future
And you have grown suspicious of the past
And you wonder if the dreams we shared together
Have abandoned us or we abandoned them
And you cast about and try to find new meaning
So that you can feel that closeness once again.

Carry on my sweet survivor, carry on my lonely friend
Don't give up on the dream, and don't you let it end.
Carry on my sweet survivor,
Though you know that something's gone
For everything that matters carry on.

You remember when you felt each person mattered
When we all had to care or all was lost
But now you see believers turn to cynics
And you wonder was the struggle worth the cost
Then you see someone too young to know the difference
And a veil of isolation in their eyes
And inside you know you've got to leave them something
Or the hope for something better slowly dies.

Carry on my sweet survivor, carry on my lonely friend
Don't give up on the dream, and don't you let it end.
Carry on my sweet survivor, you've carried it so long
So it may come again, carry on
Carry on, carry on.

DON'T STOP TO REST
(Song for Phil Ochs)
Steve Romanoff

Relax, relax in photographs of places where you've been,
Where nothing new can worry you, you've earned a rest, my friend,
The riot tears and rebel years have vanished with the din,
Of young bureaucrats and slapping backs and prizes they can win,

You've seen them all at city hall, you've seen them in the street,
You've seen them masquerading where the better people meet,
Convinced at last those days are past when they should give a damn
About the anguish in the world, about the future in their hands.

        You've heard the promise of the evil men
        Don't stop to rest or we'll come back again,
        If you remember then you ought to know,
        Don't stop to rest 'cause we've got far to go.

Come all you young-eyed citizens, a story I will tell,
Of how a Great Society was going all to hell,
But children who resembled you were brought up on a war,
Had had their fill of overkill and said they'd fight no more,

It cost them miles of marching and it cost them years of pain,
Before their fathers realized their kids were not insane,
But now we're all executives too busy to recall
The days of righting what was wrong, the words of writing on the wall.

        Chorus

Now don't misunderstand me 'cause I mean just what I say,
Old pledges made in passion still should mean something today,
You've done your bit, don't go and sit behind your groaning board,
And let the scrivener set down, you've given all you could afford.

        Chorus

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Oracle
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 09:56 AM

Daylia, don't let the dates confuse you. Just go check your dainties drawer. If it's overflowing with a tangle of steel-reinforced waist-cinching girdles, garters, nylons and/or padded, pointed Playtex Cross-Your-Heart brassieres, you're a definitely a Baby Boomer. On the other hand, if you find mostly polyester low-cut bikini panties, textured pantyhose and/or the tell-tale absence of brassieres of any genre, then you're most likely Generation X.

Simple.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Once Famous
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 09:57 AM

Georgiansilver, you said it better than I. The 60's "permissive society" led to the AIDS epidemic. But the "permissive society" came out of 1960s style rationale and rebellion.

When I say that the backlash is being felt now, believe it. The permissive society that led to the tolerance of the gay and lesbian lifestyles and it's effects on the deterioration family values were voiced loud and clear in our last election.

Some feathers riled by this?

Too fucking bad.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,HOO HAH!
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 10:45 AM

Who cares, the more gays, the more women for me, and the more lesbians the less ugly women in the running - ROLL ON HOMOSEXUAL RIGHTS

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Once Famous
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 10:49 AM

Thank you from the all lesbians are ugly crowd.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 30 Dec 04 - 11:19 AM

The War cast its shadow over most of the decade. The atmosphere of limitless possibility created by the Civil Rights Movement, and visionaries like King and Kennedy, was poisoned by assassination. The personal liberation that came with the sexual revolution, the music, and the psychedelic experience, was tempered by the knowledge that you could be drafted, uniformed, and killed at the will of the government. Life had a sweeter, sharper edge.
And it didn't hurt that I was nineteen.

Life is change
How it differs from the rocks
I've seen their ways
Too often for my liking
New Worlds to gain!
My Life is to survive
and be Alive for you
Jefferson Airplane

Here's to all of the survivors

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 12:46 AM

About anything you say about the 60's is true. Full of idealists, nuts, trendies, damfools and original thinkers. And people like Tim Leary who was all of the above.

It was the time of my life when I felt most at home in the world.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 12:51 AM

I wish to clarify something for people who did not read the initial post: here is the initial post again.

Subject: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: brucie - PM
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 08:41 PM

I told GUEST on the 'spirituality' thread that I'd start this thread for him and those who want to talk about how misguided people from the 'sixties era' actually were. Here ya go, GUEST. It's all yours.

LOL--so far, he ain't showed up. Guess he just wanted to slag people on the spirituality thread. However, I am happy to see y'all are havin' fun here.

Peace on you all.

Brucie

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 02:57 AM

Capitalist puppetmasters learned a valuable lesson from the sixties: the best way to quell an impending revolution is to market it. Take its peace symbols and love beads and loud music with its antagonistic lyrics and flower power slogans and bell bottomed, tie-dyed fashions and mass produce them for mass consumption. It takes the wind right out of their revolutionary sails, and fills the air with the ka-ching sound of corporate sales. "Let the cash registers ring."

And it still works today, too. Anytime one of the hippie idealogies from that era is ressurrected from the grave and looks to make some sort of comeback, someone is there - often a reformed hippie - to proffer a way to make a buck off it.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Dewey
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 04:26 AM

Civil Rights For All Americans was certainly not CRAP. Neither was the MORAL abolition of the Vietnam War (which was far too long and bloody)


This country is more free-thinking, politically active, socially caring now, because of the 60's.

The idealism was bad,
The consciousness excellent.


Things always have to get a little worse before they get better whether today or yesterday. So too was it in the 60's, but in the end truth wins out even when it is partially misguided.

Glad to see in retrospect the drugs and sexual promiscuity rejected by the boomers. Don't worry, your kids will forgive you.

But a special thanks for the GOOD THINGS And the good times that evolved.


All minorities especially thank you. Where I live today young people, don't even dream about color differences! they just see people (Martin Luther King's dream fulfilled)

And I do remember the early 70's when the "n" word was used, and not in a very inclusive way.

Anyway, Lincoln would be proud.

So I guess we can just forget the rest of it, ESPECIALLY the Vietnam War.


Dewey

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 04:53 AM

It must have a great time for professional folksingers. In England there were folk clubs in every town.

Acoustic artists were in the charts like Dylan and Donovan and even the Ian campbell folk group. It was a huge popular movement with people feeling that they had discovered another byway of democracy - another means of expression.

Then all the traddies came and broke up the party and insisted , actually folk music is a glum business of 20 minute unaccompanied ballads in unintelligibe accents,people in fishermans smocks playing 25 minute slip jigs and laments on the tin whistle they bought last week.

that buggered everything.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 08:07 AM

weelittledrummer,

I am very curious about your claim.

If the traddies were playing the glum boring unintelligible stuff and the folksingers were playing the popular democratic expressive stuff, how come the traddies won?

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Joe_F
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 09:25 AM

The Silly '60s were a relief from the Stuffy '50s, which were a relief from the Bloody '40s, which were a relief from the Dreary '30s,....

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 10:34 AM

The Traddies didn't win. The singer-songwriters won. The traddies merely managed to keep on keepin' on, regardless...as did the singer-songwriters, led by Dylan. There will always be people who look down their noses at anyone else's favourite style of music. That's the ego asserting itself.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 12:29 PM

in many cases they won by sheer nastiness, breathtaking rudeness to visiting American visitors and genuinely working class people and the support of the Arts council.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 12:32 PM

Ps they won in the way that middle class rudeness and intolerance always does win in this bloody country.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 12:33 PM

What in the world are you on about now?

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Peace
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 12:47 PM

"What in the world are you on about now?"

Dang, you TOO. I have found myself with these British expressions that are starting to come easily to the tongue/finger tips: 'Wotcha, mate' is one of them. They are getting you also, LH.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: frogprince
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 01:25 PM

Thanks, Repaire, for throwing in "Sweet Survivor", and "Don't Stop to Rest" (I hadn't heard that one before, and started to read it as BY Ochs; it's a worthy tribute.) Here's one more that nailed me to the wall when I first heard it.

                   LIVING LEGEND
Was it bitter then, with our backs against the wall?
Were we better men, then we'd ever been before?
Say, if she came again today, would you still answer to the call?
Tell the truth my friend; don't it matter anymore?

We were simple men, by her side when she was born.
                                 (Talking about the dream)
It was simple then, like the freedom when you fall.
And we were smaller then, you see, but soon we gathered like a storm.
They don't understand what that thunder meant at all.

Was he crucified? Was he done in by the law?
Are you satisfied that he'll never ride again?
Some people say he got away, they say he never died at all.
If that story's true, does it bother you my friend?

Was it bitter then, with our backs against the wall?
                                 (Say, 2000 years ago.)
Were we better men, then we'd ever been before?
                                 (200 years ago.)
Say if she came again today, would you still answer to the call?
                                 (Or tomorrow.)
Tell the truth my friend, don't it matter anymore?

Written by Kris Kristofferson.
(© Resaca Publishing Company.)
From "Highwaymen 2", © 1990, Columbia Records.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Sidewinder
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 01:34 PM

Does not one single person have any memories or anecdotes relating to any other decade other than the 60s. I, like the rest of you, am fascinated by the Swinging 60s but come on! were the 70s 80s 90s really all that bad? I am beginning to feel stuck in a timewarp where images of "skipping reels of ryhme" and "cellophane flowers of yellow and green" "run laughing through your fingers" that's it! I'm off to listen to London Calling by The Clash and U2s Unforgettable Fire, and I may even dig out Springsteens "The River".I can feel a resolution coming on.

Happy New Year Y'all.

Sidewinder.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Bill D
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 01:57 PM

well, shucks...I remember a bit of the 40s!...I remember the Andrews sisters version of "Goodnight Irene" being played over PA system at my pool...yuuuch!

I remember FDR's death...I remember funny-looking cars being produced after WWII.....etc....

but that should be another thread...

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 03:20 PM

Hey, Sidewinder, I just started a thread about the great things in the '80's.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: ard mhacha
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 05:05 PM

I spent all of the 60s in London and it was fantastic.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Bert
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 05:12 PM

Really the Permissive Society began in WWII. Where premarital sex was accepted and even condoned (in hushed tones maybe) if a soldier was leaving for war.

There was some return to puritan values in the Fifties but these were offset by the rising pre-hippy "Bohemian" culture.

If I remember rightly the CND got started in the fifties as well.

The revival of folk music started in the Forties with songs such as Goodnight Irene and The Old Sow song becoming popular.

RAP really started with Billy Cotton in the late Forties as well

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Metchosin
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 05:13 PM

Did you ever go to the Galtymore(sp)?

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,Frank
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 06:04 PM

If anyone remembers the "sixties' they probably weren't there.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Big Mick
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 06:07 PM

OK .... I need some help here. How did the permissive '60's spawn the AIDS virus? I know the answer must be obvious, but I am having a helluva time seeing it. Nice to see the same ignorant, racist, idiots still rearing their heads.

Born in 1951, turned 13 in 1964 just in time for the Beatles, JFK's assassination, and became draft age in 1969. I remember the Cuban missile crisis, and standing outside of a Boy Scout meeting with a bunch of other kids all looking at the sky. I remember being very scared that night. I remember the day they shot JFK. I remember the day that they shot Martin Luther King, and I just stood there among my friends with tears running down my face. He represented such hope that we could finally get beyond the ignorance of racism, so they murdered him. I remember Bobby's Presidential run, and how he made me feel like we could recover some of the optimism for the future. Then came that day in Los Angeles. All this, and then came Vietnam.

They were turbulent times, but as I look back on the times 40 years on, it is the music I remember the most. I don't know that we will ever again experience the kind of musical renaissance that we did then. The attitude seemed to be that all that was old was new, and experimentation was the name of the game. The Beatles, heavily influenced by rockabilly and 50's groundbreakers, took us from "I Want To Hold Your Hand" all the way through Sgt. Pepper's. So many bands played with so many styles. The Sixties saw trad music revive, and it saw traditionally trained musicians take the roots music and help it to influence other styles. I think of The Byrd's, Buffalo Springfield, and so many others. But it wasn't limited to just folk. We saw group's like The Left Banke who took baroque music and incorporated it into rock with wonderful results. We saw acid rock bands like Iron Butterfly take very old music and infuse it with a beat and a bass line. We saw "It's A Beautiful Day" take pianoforte's, guitar's, and great harmonies to create songs like "White Bird" and "Girl With No Eyes. We saw John Mayall, Paul Butterfield, and other Bluesmen, electrify the blues and spawn folks like Clapton and Raitt. Frank Zappa, Jimi Hendrix, The Hollies, Richie Havens, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Carole King, James Taylor, Mama's and Papa's, and on and on. Rhythm and Blues, and Soul Music probably enjoyed the greatest growth of any musical medium in the bunch. We started out the sixties with white guys like Elvis covering black groups songs. By the end of the decade Motown had come to prominence and we had groups like The Supremes, The Four Tops, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, and The Temptations. Black performers who had enjoyed some success in The Fifties, became icons and mainstream in The Sixties. I am thinking of folks like BB King, Ray Charles, and Blind Blake.I have only scratched the surface, but it is safe to say that, from a musical perspective, we may never see another decade like this again.

The Sixties, oh what a time! Was it Confucius that said, "May you live in interesting times"? Much of The Sixties, was good. Much of it was bad. In between there was a ton of gray. But it was a helluva time to grow up.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Bobert
Date: 31 Dec 04 - 06:16 PM

Or re-grow up, Mick.....

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: ard mhacha
Date: 01 Jan 05 - 03:43 PM

Metchosin, I was at every Irish dance hall in London, the Garryowen, Gresham,Charlie Macs at Wesminister, the Hiberian at Fulham,etc.
I had a great 10 years, it was a time of great fun, I was lucky to be part of it.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Metchosin
Date: 01 Jan 05 - 04:12 PM

I can believe it. Being a visiting colonial who loved to dance, I was gobsmacked. It was certainly a memory that I'll cherish forever.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: annamill
Date: 01 Jan 05 - 04:17 PM

..I don't remember...

Bring you all back to today

I'm a Security officer today

..oh, shit..my husband just put Rick on..sorry...damn..

I work as a security officer these days and we get quite a few skateboarders which I have to scare off. Well, I'm not a mean person and usually make friends with these young people trying to have fun.

Each and everyone of them has put up a 'V' with thier fingers and hollor "PEACE" as they drive off. Always makes me smile.

The sixties were exciting to me because I lived in New York Greenwich Village. Saw a lot and met a lot of cool people. Other than the obvious well known people, I often wonder what happened to my friends back then.

Love, Annamill

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Jan 05 - 04:54 PM

My friends from the 60s....

Bob's dead. Stomach cancer, caused by the cigarettes he couldn't stop smoking after his tour at Qui Non.

Tommy's dead. Overdose. He laid for a couple of days in a closed room in an Indianapolis summer before they found him.

Steve's dead -- died about a year ago. He'd had throat cancer; cigarettes again. I wrote a letter to the local draft board, asking (as a veteran) that they classify him as a CO.

Sue's living in the Bay area with her second husband (a great guy). One of her daughters has retinitis pigmentosa; the other works in Anchorage.

Peggy's out of the marriage she put up with for 24 years and 3 daughters. She walked -- with the girls -- out one night when he became abusive again and she had had enough. Took her maiden name back and is now working on an annulment.

Leo's dead, of cancer. He went up to Alberta with the US Army (and the Black Watch) to test protective suits against dilute mustard gas.

Rowdy died when a tractor he was driving tipped over on him.

Linda's living near Akron, Ohio.

Dunno what happened to the rest of 'em. But one of them became my best friend, and I married her, and we're still that way.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: dianavan
Date: 01 Jan 05 - 05:53 PM

I am happy to have lived through the sixties. It was a time of great social change. I am proud that I was a part of it. It was not, however, all flower power and free love.

I think the availability of the birth control pill can be said to account for the so-called 'free love'. This new freedom created a struggle for a new morality. Some people rose to the challenge, some chose to ignore the emotional implications of sexual freedom.

We had no guides. Our mothers could not equate our reality with the moral guidelines of their generation. Dependency on the monogamous relationship was no longer necessary.

Yes, many children were born "out of wedlock". So what? Marriage is no longer the only option. Thank goodness being a 'bastard' cannot be seen as a justification for excluding someone from society.

The sixties was a time of inclusion. Many people who had previously been marginalized because of sex, colour and religion were brought into the mainstream. We re-examined our political and social beliefs. We had the courage to question authority.

It was a wonderful time to be an idealistic youth. As a generation, we had the power to create real change. Where there is a will, there is a way and we experienced this collectively. There is nothing like the sweet smell of success.

Our numbers alone, made us powerful. We still have the power because of this. We also have the experience and financial means to use that power in ways that were not available to us as youth.

Why don't we do it in the road?

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Metchosin
Date: 01 Jan 05 - 06:28 PM

Cause you get tar and gravel on your bum? LOL

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Jan 05 - 08:21 PM

There are also a lot more cars and trucks than there were in the '60s.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,hilda fish
Date: 02 Jan 05 - 03:16 AM

60's exposed me to carrot cake, wholemeal flour, organic food, equality, ecology, the idea of communities working equally to achieve common social goals, that children were valuable in themselves, that relationships should be based on love and respect rather than pre-defined roles, that conscription and notions of war were horrific for a broad spectrum of reasons, that we lived in a world, not just a region, that pictures were worth a thousand words, that words were better than the gun, making love not war was not only an ideal but pratical, and fun too, that we mattered and that we could talk to the past and the future, that drugs, good or bad, were a choice like everything and on and on and on....... I was an kid from the country who came to the big bad city on the back of country music and fell in love with music (folk) and rode a wave that hasn't stopped since. The '60's were great. They were my times but then, my daughter would say that these times are great 'cos they're her times. And then stop for a minute because of the war in Iraq, the suffering of our people (Australian Aboriginal), the nature of American foreign policy, terrorism, and so on. I would have stopped in the same way because of Vietnam and Cambodia, East Timor, White Australia Policy, Racism and so on........ So it's crap if you wanna think that or it's not if you wanna think that ............. and what am I saying anyway?

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: GUEST,282RA
Date: 25 Mar 07 - 09:01 PM

>>The 60's did produce an eclectic, outrageous band called the Fugs. We'll definately never see and hear a band like that again!<<

Even the Fugs were not untouched. Drummer/co-founder Kenny Weaver eventually became a right wing born again.

I was pre-teen in the 60s and that was a good way to be. It was cool to live through Beatlemania which was over by the time I turned 11. I took bubblegum music more seriously than I would have had I been older. Jimi Hendrix was totally mindblowing to me. It was all like a magical musical universe. If I had been older, I probably wouldn't have tuned into it. I hate everything that comes out today.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Folk Form # 1
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 04:58 AM

I was 2 in 1960. I remember good television from Deputy Dawg to The Man From UNCLE. DC and Marvel comics. I rather enjoyed it, but the pop culture was for older kids. The 70s were my time.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 08:53 AM

First: kiss, glass of alcoholic drink, hangover, sexual encounter, suede shoes, guitar... The 60s were grand.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Rasener
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 08:58 AM

Weren't they just George

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 09:02 AM

Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll, as the late great Ian Dury said.
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Scoville
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 09:17 AM

You want crap? I was a kid in the Eighties. All we're known for is Spandex, mall hair, and the New Kids on the Block. And possibly Michael Jackson when he was still recognizably human, at least during the early part of the decade. Yikes.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: kendall
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 09:20 AM

I was listening to the radio when they announced that FDR had died. I was 10, and I remember being worried that our form of government was finished. He was a democrat, we lived in a democracy, etc.
By the time the 60s came around I was a member of the establishment. Captain of the EXPLORER, republican, thinking that the students at Kent State were asking for it...God, was that really me?
I read a book titled "Black Like ME" what an eye opener. I remember thinking that Rosa Parks was a hero, and that hasn't changed. I remember thinking, let all those yellow bastards run off to Canada and shoot the ones who try to sneak back after the war. Today, I'd be showing them the way!

Yesterday, Jacqui and I watched a film on tv called "A Time to kill",based on a book by John Grisham. A great story of how things were, and how they have changed.

I remember when the Beetles put the Kingston Trio out of business. That didn't set good, but of course, they were ready to go anyway...I'm rambling. Sorry.

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: Grimmy
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 09:25 AM

Anyone remember topless dresses (in the UK at least)? That could ONLY have happened in the 60's. (Gloriously non-PC too!)

"We who dreamed young
And were silent this autumn"

Subject: RE: BS: The 1960s was crap.
From: jacqui.c
Date: 26 Mar 07 - 09:38 AM

I became a teenager at the start of the sixties and that was my decade, in a lot of ways. My kids were born in the 60s. I have a feeling that their being there actually protected me from a lot of the excesses of the latter part of the decade.

I remember the Liverpool Sound that changed the music of a generation in the UK. Some good, some not so good, but it was different. Mini skirts arriving and the hippie movement, which I longed to be a part of but couldn't, due to my circumstances. The arrival of tights, freeing women from the stockings and suspender belts that were always so uncomfortable. Denim jeans becoming fashionable, rather than just being seen as workmen's wear.

Like most of my generation I know exactly where I was when the news came of JFK's assassination. I remember being sick to my stomach during the Cuba crisis, having read Nevil Shute's On The Beach only s few months earlier. Being worried about my childrens' futures at the start of the Six Day War and recieving a letter from my brother, a soldier in Cyprus, describing how they would sit and watch the fireworks from the area that was worryingly close to him. Robert Kennedy's assassination - wondering when all of the killing would stop.

There was good and bad, a lot of it forgotten until I really dig down into the memory banks. By the end of the decade I was divorced and starting a new life with my children.