i think it's fair to say i now completely understand first hand

[Soylent Brice]

how the last generation felt about Vietnam.

frustrating
depressing
saddening
angering

it's clear that the most recent generations since have become apathetic almost to a point that is seemingly impossible to repair.

i want to hear this song:

"The war is over
The rain is falling
And all that's left has blown away
Your eyes are haunted
By what you wanted
I surrender (I surrender)
The war is over"

"the war is over (if you want it)"

or perhaps:

"(Let me tell you now)
Ev'rybody's talkin' 'bout
Revolution, Evolution, Masturbation, Flagellation, Regulation,
Integrations, mediations, United Nations, congratulations
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance"

but instead i hear this one:

"All eyes on me in the center of the ring just like a circus
When I crack that whip, everybody gon' trip just like a circus
Don't stand there watching me, follow me, show me what you can do
Everybody let go, we can make a dancefloor just like a circus"





what is my generation doing wrong?

people are too comfortable, or rather just zombified. maybe a mix of both. either way, social and political awareness appears to be dying. along with the uniformed men and women of our Armed services. our brothers and sisters.

3 more dead today. maybe a couple more tomorrow. maybe another one on sunday. maybe none next week, maybe twenty. will the average american know? will they care? in any case, be sure to tip toe, as to not wake any of our fellow zombie citizens. the shock may kill them.

someone tell me these wars will end. please.

[Hydra]

1. "We like war! We're a war-like people."

As posted yesterday, the Anti-War community is having a harder time these days because we don't have Bush in office.

[Soylent Brice]

3. supposing that it was easier

to express anger over the wars because we had Bush to pin it on? is that the assessment? i don't agree. war is fucked up, and it doesn't matter who's in office. that's how i feel, at least.

[Hydra]

51. That's how I feel too

But it was "Ok" to criticize Bush. It's NOT ok to criticize a Dem in office, even if he's wrong.

There were FAR more anti-war supporters with stronger spines during the Bush Admin...rather disappointing, if you ask me.

[SammyWinstonJack]

65. +1

:thumbsup:

[TahitiNut]

2. I seriously doubt it.

My "generation" didn't have a single feeling about Viet Nam. It was a VERY chaotic and diverse set of reactions.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

6. But we had passion -

and all the sides in the riots over Vietnam were out there, making their views known, making noise.

We sure didn't sit on our asses, as people do today.

Of course, we didn't have such comfortable chairs, the Internet, or all these great diversions.

We did have the draft, which was a wonderful motivational tool.

When you're afraid of dying in a far-off country for no discernible reason, you tend to move it and do everything you can to bring the way to an end.

When your biggest concern is whether you have enough room on your hard drive for more music, you can be sure that the war will continue ...............................

[TahitiNut]

7. We live in an age of 6 gigabyte iPods and 2-bit attitudes.

:shrug:

[Tangerine LaBamba]

8. And asses that would be immensely fat

if their owners didn't take a break to go to the gym to work out.

Maybe that's where the passion is - at the gym.........................................

[Soylent Brice]

9. you make a lot of really good points

but i feel we have just as many reasons for my generation to stand up against these wars.

it's still WRONG.

the average person is either aware of or admits that we were lied into the war in Iraq, yet all we see is inaction.

the average person knows that * lied about torture.

the average person knows that the country has been basically robbed.

nothing but inaction.

most people just don't care (or don't act like it, at least) anymore about what is right.

[dana_b]

18. devils advocate

or it could be that they DO care but they are so busy working 40+ hours while taking a pay cut or looking for a job so that they can feed their families and put a roof over their heads that they have put the wars on the back burner.

Look - i'm not saying that a good portion of the U.S. citizens aren't complacent, because we are. However comparing the Vietnam era to today doesn't work. People came out in droves at the beginning of the Iraq war and then lost their will when they realized that the previous administration didn't care what any of us thought or wanted. We also are going through something extrordinary during these times. A recession that hasn't been felt like this since the depression. People do have less time to fight for causes. it doesn't mean that everyone is out there sitting on their asses enjoying the technological advances without a care in the world. We have more technology but do we have it better overall? Can we afford a car, a house and to put our kids through college on one salary like they did in the fifties and a good part of the sixties? Or are people stressed out and struggling to survive? American Idol (as used in many examples of complacency) is an escape from all of this. Can we mentally take working 40+ hours plus the stress of surviving, debt, lack of social life, etc. AND all the external factors like war, famine, climate change, etc. without losing it mentally? Some can and some can't.

Maslow's Hierarchy of needs. if they are worried about food, housing, etc., the external factors become secondary or even unimportant to some. My kid sees pictures, films and reads about how it was in the fifties, for example. It seems strange that a mom didn't have to work. That kids could go to college for free or drastically reduced prices. That people had time to protest.

Not in any way do i make excuses for myself or my family. I'm talking about our current society in general. People feel frozen, helpless and stuck.

[Soylent Brice]

28. i see your point,

but you would think that people would come to the conclusion that the source of their problems are directly related to a previous administration who decided to loot the country, and send its children to die in a war that only served as a distraction while they completed said looting, as well as utilize the war as a propaganda tool to keep the remainder of the herd in line.

i'm pretty sure there are plenty of activists on this board who are enduring the same things you just mentioned, but still find the time to do what is right by fighting the good fight.

to your devil's advocate, are you implying we've lost the art of multi-tasking?

[dana_b]

50. maybe we have

or the will to. It's a tough one.

Also you are correct - there are a lot of great people on this board who work, stress, and still manage to fight for their causes. I think those people did so in the better times as well though. Which goes to your point - some people don't give a damn.

Now I'm talking in circles!! lol
There are substantial reasons why some people don't get involved and some who just won't bother, I guess is what I'm trying to say. I don't understand them either but I think that the latter are far fewer than the former.

[omega minimo]

31. We have lost our elected representation, not our will

[Tangerine LaBamba]

36. We didn't have a whole lot of back-up

from our elected representatives when Vietnam was raging, so, no, that can't be hung on the dolts in Congress.........

[omega minimo]

52. I was responding to this:

"People came out in droves at the beginning of the Iraq war and then lost their will when they realized that the previous administration didn't care what any of us thought or wanted."

It was not just the admin, it was the electeds who didn't care.............

[Tangerine LaBamba]

54. Right -

and that's what I responded to - when we protested Viet Nam, no one in the government wanted us to do it.

But we persisted. We didn't quit because "... they didn't care..."

What a whine that is. "They didn't care." Of course they didn't care, and that's exactly where the protest draws its strength.

But, instead, they whined and went home and do nothing......................

[omega minimo]

56. People have not lost their will. They have lost the mechanisms to reach those who don't care........

It's a different world.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

57. It is a very different world,

but it is the same old war. And if the old ways don't work - although I firmly believe in the old ways - then this generation should have found new ones. God knows they have far more wonderful tools at their command.

No, it takes bodies in the streets, and time and energy and commitment and the refusal to give up, because our kids were being murdered, and a whole lot of little yellow people were being slaughtered, and no one could tell us why.

It's not that different - I don't see any protestors prowling the halls of Congress, seeking face time with our elected representatives, holding press conferences when they're either successful or turned away. We did that, and one by one, we got some people to go public with us and to make statements against continuing the atrocities in SE Asia.

Now, no one does anything. And that means they get what they deserve. In my life, I'm glad of what we did, and I'm proud of what we accomplished, but we weren't lazy. Today, people are lazy - they want it done for them.

Just that comment - "... they didn't care..." tells it all. You failed the first time out, so quit.

Not in my lifetime, but we did the best we could, so we can rest now. We did everything we could........................

[omega minimo]

59. The difference is between real life and life in a bubble

Then: real life. Down and dirty, not mediated to abstraction, aware that you or someone you knew was involved, real life on TV and the fight in the streets was also for civil rights.

Now: bubble life. Wrapped in plastic, "amusing ourself to death," awareness limited by no real life on TV AND worst of all: youth think they have rights because they're Americans, while those rights have been stripped away and they don't think it matters.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

60. God, your words went right through me -

because they are so right. So terribly, terribly right.

They have rights because we fought so hard for them, and the sense of entitlement defines them. They have absolutely no idea what went into getting them all that they take so for granted.

When I went to law school - thank you, Affirmative Action - women were rarities in that profession. Now, more than a generation later, it's not unusual to find a woman working as a lawyer, but you bet not one of them endured being called "Lawyerette" when a male professor who didn't want us there decided to call on us in class. Not one.

A couple of years ago, I had an encounter with a young female lawyer who came after me like a hungry pit bull, and I stopped her, calmed her down, explained the situation to her, and then watched in amusement as she tried to digest the complexity of what I had just fed her. Then she started snarling again - apparently the only mode she had - and I said to her, very quietly, "You know, I busted my ass and put up with all kinds of bullshit to become to lawyer and to help pave the way for people like you to be able to follow in my footsteps, and right now, the way you're behaving, I'm starting to think I really fucked up."

That shut her up.

Next, watch what young women do when Roe v. Wade gets narrowed and, suddenly, they don't quite have the options they truly believe belong to them forever....................................

[Tangerine LaBamba]

38. There's no comparison -

do you think that when we protested the Vietnam war the administration was BACKING US?

Did you notice that they HATED us?

They hated us and everything we stood for and they did everything they could to hurt us, to stop us, to shut us up, to put us out of business.

We fought AGAINST the administration, so your stance fails on that front.

As for working to survive, well, we had jobs, too, and we had responsibilities, and we managed to stay politically active. Things were hard then, for a lot of us - our families weren't helping, and our dedication to stopping the war meant we had to do it ourselves, on our own time, after work, after tending to our families.

I was a young wife, a stepmother of three, a full-time undergraduate student, and a faculty wife with a part-time job, but I was out there every day, doing whatever I could to aid the cause. It wasn't all marching in the streets - we organized seminars, wrote papers and letters, distributed leaflets - there was no Internet - and knocked on doors.

See, it's much easier now for people to protest, but as long as you hide behind the excuse of "having to provide for the family," well, guess what you're going to be leaving your family?

[Tangerine LaBamba]

23. I absolutely agree

that your generation should be out there, fighting against these invasions and occupations, demanding that our troops be brought home immediately - if not sooner.

But, as I said, it's a matter of passion. Your generation, alas, seems to think that, without the draft, they have nothing to fear or to risk, so they just blithely live their lives and don't look up.

It's very, very sad........................

[Oregone]

10. There was also a whole lot more death and a draft

To add to the chaos

[truedelphi]

19. The draft was key. The minute that Nixon replaced

it with a lottery, then much of the fervor went out of the protests.

When the individuals representing half the population of a single genertation know taht their butt may well be on the line, people are anything but apathetic..

[TahitiNut]

41. Yup. Protests were mostly "anti-draft" under the guise of "anti-war."

The hypocrisy was clear, even then. :shrug:

[Lochloosa]

4. War

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d8C4AIFgUg

[Soylent Brice]

5. can't access youtube here,

but saved the link.

[islandmkl]

11. if that long arm of war-death was reaching for all our people...our YOUNG people...

i guarantee there would be great attention paid to this situation...

the MIC got exactly what it wanted with the 'volunteer' military: a military that could operate without affecting the 'lives' of most americans, while still raking in the money...

who needs a 'communist threat', which (in theory) involved land masses, populations, etc. (with the attached resources) PLUS a valid security threat (a-bombs, anyone?)...when you can spend trillions conducting vague 'wars on terror' and chasing strawmen all over the globe...where lack of success provides for even more funding and more profits for the war machine industries...

tell every 18 year-old, male AND female, to register for a REAL DRAFT, institute that draft, and watch the level of citizen awareness and action rise...

never happen...it would hinder the profit pipelines....

[Soylent Brice]

12. wow

that basically sums it up.

now how do we stop it?

[dixiegrrrrl]

26. I hear you. A lot of tools to stop it are absent now.

The government was really concerned about demonstrations, riots, people in the streets back then.
In' 68 especially there were riots, Watts, Chicago police brutality, and 68 was the Tet Offensive which shocked a lot of people here at home ( my brother was in 'Nam then)
( Michael Lewis wrote a good book about the time, title "1968")
The universities for the most part had leftist /supportive teachers. So the students had liberty to express themselves.
And the war was being paid via taxes, mostly.
The media reported more honestly about the protesters, esp. CBS news.
And the elections were not rigged, or not as rigged, politicians really worried about elections.
Hell, Nixon was indeed driven from office, tho he had Ford rig the pardon deal.

Now, the news is heavily censored, the war machine is run by debt, and by other countries' money, voting obviously makes very little difference since both parties have been bought by the
corporations and banks.There are 3 times as many "contractors" in Afghanistan as there are troops.
We as citizens have no real power over how our money or policies are used at the national level.
And the plans for a "global solution" to make us even further removed from any control are procedding quickly.

The only options are to take to the streets and/or to Starve the Beast by not buying the corporate goodies. Yet even people here at DU have not stopped using BOA or Citi, or taken their money out of AIG retirement funds. ( I did a poll)


Maybe too many people nowadays don't remember what semi-democracy felt like even 30 years ago, or perhaps they are focused on day to day getting by.
Maybe folks are not hurting enough yet.
All I know is that anger is a good motivator, and I do not hear a lot of anger, I hear resignation
and hopelessness and a feeling of powerlessness. I hear victimhood.
As yet, I have no clue what it will take to light the powder keg.

[omega minimo]

13. The apathy was done TO you, intentionally, by systematically dismantling what contributed to people

power.

[Soylent Brice]

17. i can see that as a huge factor, but

there has to be some kind of accountability from my generation. it's the younger generations that have always kept those in power in check. our generation fell asleep at the wheel.

[omega minimo]

20. There are some conscious young folks doing good work, aware that they make a difference.

One answer to your searching here is that you are one of them. You make great contributions to DU. You look around and see things need to be done, you have good ideas. Then you realize you get to be the one to do them :spray:

If you're asking about responsibility of younger generations,
it seems awareness and action depends on having confidence and



Those who are bamboozled and led by the professional crazymaking are the ones who feed the gamed system.

"If you ain't part of the solution, you're part of the problem." As true now as it ever was.

IMHO -- and we've seen it a lot in life choice threads on DU -- people think it has to be All or Nothing, Either/Or and don't consider doing what they CAN, where they are, in a way that works for them.......

Then you get older and find out the cliches are true: people don't heed warnings or avoid preventable problems, they let the shit hit the fan and then sort it out; people don't learn from history -- it repeats itself -- esp. in an age when history isn't even taught (most current generations).

That's why some here are calling for the draft as the only thing that will get people's attention beside $4 gas.

And then you see even older folks like the Vet with the BS Protectors, still active, still aware, still out there making a difference.

[Soylent Brice]

24. wow

:blush:

thank you.

i think that the shit hitting the fan mentality is wearing me down. MoveOn was trying to recruit people to hold Health Care Reform rallies the last couple of weeks. I was trying to do it. I was contacted after responding with info, etc to get a rally organized. it was for my local town. it never happened. i couldn't get anything organized. i couldn't get anyone to join the cause, or gain any support. it was AWFUL.

this is the kind of thing that continues to bother me. there are those pockets of people all over this country who just refuse to budge. unless they want to get teabagged, apparently.

it's the same mentality towards the war. these are the forgotten wars.

side note: i'm really bad at returning compliments, almost as bad as receving them. with that said thank you! and ditto!!

[omega minimo]

32. You can start

your own thing, from the point of need you recognize. Maybe MoveOn ain't the ticket for some...... there are larger forces that have everyone scared shitless, not least of which are those that took Impeachment Off The Table (does anyone know the real reason) and MoveOn.org to go silent after the SECOND stolen election, when they had been organizing nationwide house parties the week before.

What it comes down to, you do your Soylent best, in a way that renergizes you and may be your own creation. You'll find others to work with. You can spend 30 years wondering when people will wake up (like since Reagan was installed). Maybe never.

:grouphug:

[mmonk]

14. My generation had a press that covered the war and finally brought

it to an end by showing it to people. It wasn't out of sight and out of mind, especially with a volunteer army and no or little first hand video and photographic coverage.

[Soylent Brice]

16. i agree, we definitely have a more complicit media these days.

[omega minimo]

21. See #13

:hi:

[Soylent Brice]

25. lol

point taken.

[livetohike]

27. That and 55,000 deaths and most of us knew someone

personally that died in Viet Nam.

[sweetpotato]

15. Because the attitude that I got mine, screw you is pervasive

As long as I'm not experiencing any discomfort, then I don't need to change anything.

If there is a threat to my comfort (like the draft, say) then I'm much more motivated.

[omega minimo]

22. Thank Ronny Raygun!!

[timeforpeace]

35. Part of the problem is blaming presidents from long ago and not the current one waging the wars.

[omega minimo]

53. "I got mine, screw you" is thanks to Ronnie Raygun, thankyouverymuch. It's epidemic.

Reaganism is why your economy just collapsed. Perhaps you're not aware of that. 30 years is a long time. Just long enough to build a warmongering power to bankrupt the people before bankrupting itself.

[Soylent Brice]

29. definition of bizarroworld:

an anti-war thread being unrecommended on a progressive liberal democratic political discussion board.

:wtf:

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

45. Definition Of Short-Sighted And Narrow Minded:

Thinking the thread is being unrecommended due to it being anti-war when it is really in fact due to the argument put forth itself being beyond fatally flawed.

:think:

[omega minimo]

55. Anything that even HINTS

at responsibility -- you don't even have to use the word -- never is popular here. :hi:

[Jakes Progress]

30. If there were a draft system with no deferments,

the war would never have started. If the republican war machine got it started, it would have been over in three months.

If there's not a chance that they or their children will be walking patrol, most people don't care and rarely even think about the war.

[Individualist]

33. DLC loves the military industrial complex,

so don't count on the wars ending anytime soon.

[timeforpeace]

34. Mostly it's because Obama is the president now and we don't want to seem critical of him.

[Soylent Brice]

37. being critical of the war is not being critical of Obama.

it's being critical of people dying for a lie(s).

[timeforpeace]

43. Why would you stop at criticism of Obama if he's the one waging the wars you abhor?

[Soylent Brice]

46. singling out Obama is not the answer.

Obama for not stopping them, congress for funding them, BFEE for misleading us into them, there are many to blame.

anyone in a position to stop the wars, or impede them, and don't, is culpable.

does that clarify?

[timeforpeace]

49. Well, you've just explained to yourself why they continue. Only 1 person is in charge, and the

inability to hold him accountable means it all continues. This is what people are referring to when it's said he's being given a pass on the wars. You're complaining about the wars yet giving the person in charge a pass because he's Obama. This is the mind set that has to be overcome to be able to end the wars. There is no difference or distinction between the wars and the person waging them.

[Uzybone]

39. March in the streets, that is what they did back then

luckily for the anti war effort in the 60's there were no message boards/internet/cable news to take up their time.

[Soylent Brice]

42. one person marching in cincinnati would get tased/arrested/shot

that's part of the problem. finding others around here that would be willing to march downtown, willing to organize, willing at all, not working out so well. they loves them some war 'round here.

maybe we could march on DC?

[hfojvt]

40. just the other day

I was at a party for a Democratic Rep who had come back on leave from Iraq. A poly-sci prof at the local community college was talking about Vietnam. He said, Nixon hit on something because the only thing less popular than the Vietnam war was the anti-war movement. I am not sure we want history to repeat itself.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

44. Trying To Compare Our Current Situation To Vietnam Is Beyond Foolish And Illegitamate.

Over 58000 american troop deaths in vietnam. Kids all drafted. Only 5000 total in both wars currently. No comparison. OP concept fatally flawed.

[Soylent Brice]

47. you again?

tsk tsk.

[KoKo]

58. Big Ass Full Caps Handle........it's always an attention getter.

[lunatica]

48. The biggest difference between the two wars is the military are volunteers now

We all got angry because most of the young men were drafted and never asked about what they felt the war was about. If anyone thinks dealing with the government is frustrating now, imagine what it was like when tens of thousands of your brothers, husbands, boy friends and male classmates were dying for the lies our government was telling us. And we were watching it on our televisions every day. We saw the bodies and the scenes of pitched battle and the wounded being helped. We saw the body bags every night during the news hour. Many young men left the US and went to Canada rather than allow themselves to be drafted knowing they might never be able to return. Then there were the Conscientious Objectors.

There are very good reasons why the wars are affecting Americans in such a different way. No one who doesn't join the military has to live with the gnawing fear of wondering when their or their son's, brother's, fathers, uncle's number came up. The stress we felt was real and in a way we had no choice but to object and march and demand that the war be ended.

It would be exactly the same in this war if we knew the truth and had to live the way we did back then.

[shadowknows69]

61. Hey Soylent. If I may whore myself for a moment......

I think we're on a similar wavelength today/tonight

Mind over what matters
<http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x6092700>

[shadowknows69]

62. Oh, and a K+R

[fishwax]

63. The Vietnam War persisted through ten years of protests

Through the election of LBJ to a first full term and then the election and re-election of Richard Nixon. Of course, the circumstances were quite different then (the draft, more American casualties, a far different media environment, an international situation that was tilting towards widespread revolution, etc.), so direct comparisons can hardly be considered definitive, but either way it remains a long-term project ...

[GeorgeGist]

64. In Destiny, my friend ...

there is no war. Be patient, you'll get there.

[defendandprotect]

66. kick -- need more than 24 hrs to rec a thread, folks!!!

Meanwhile, I don't think we get much of a LOOK inside this war --
if we did we'd be tearing our hair out!!