Were You There?

Saturday, July 20, 2013:

Last Night I watched the biopic about Abbie Hoffman titled “Steal This Movie” by Robert  Greenwald, released @2000, before 9/11. The flick, with Janeane Garofalo as Anita, and Abbie played by Vincent D’Onofrio, was interesting enough to hold my attention throughout. Old footage of the sixties, especially the Chicago riots, were spliced in awkwardly but worked well enough nonetheless. I suppose it is because the black and white or grainy color contrasted nicely to give a feeling for the times. One of the things about growing older is the sense that the reality I lived through is now damned near ancient history. Whenever I watch documentaries about the sixties and the Vietnam War protests I get an uneasy feeling… as though, just by being history, these times are made into little more than nostalgia for us (… the times are better now and that war was different!) or they are sometimes, as this one was, a weak call to arms for the youth of today.

            Another uneasy thing happens to me most of my generation doesn’t talk about that much (and this movie only touched on) is the feeling that our counter culture idealism was corrupted by the so-called leadership. In the beginning the movement leaders published as anonymous and everything was supposed to be free… and it remarkably was (I remember folks passing out Acid at concerts and on the streets free of charge). Most of the street level “Hippies” I knew of at the time were not involved in the politics beyond “rapping” about it while passing a joint. It was about the music and the drugs... and political rallies? They were more like rock concerts... maybe a chance to get laid or stoned or both. Reality sank in through the haze. We all had to get a job… sex wasn’t free after all. Babies sprung out and we needed to either support or abandon them. It was over before it started. Huge egos… folks like Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Tom Hayden, Bobby Seals, and the rest of the Chicago Eight were figureheads creating a nostalgic past before they ever went to trial.

Ya’ just can’t trust anyone over thirty, eh? Has age made me that cynical or is my cynicism based on reality? I admit, I was on the sidelines for most of this stuff but my activism began while I was still in High School… I have creds for that. I was part of the boycott of Woolworths back in the mid-sixties as a member of Friends of SNCC (Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee). And I took our daughter to No Nukes rallies in the early eighties. As a member of Solidarity I watched the Tom and Jane show try to organize the Campaign for Economic Democracy around their fame.

There is more but I’ll leave it there. I have to go out and smash the state.

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