The counterculture of the 1960’s sits in our past waiting for an explanation, and it’s all over the Internet right now as we edge up on the 40th Anniversary of the Woodstock Concert. It’s odd to me. I don’t much relate to Woodstock as anything other than a large Rock Concert that came at the end of the 1960’s – a time when the nonviolent Civil Rights Movement and the opposition to the Viet Nam War gave way to a hedonic culture of Drugs, Sex, and Rock and Roll. It was a sad time to me. I guess it couldn’t be helped, but it gave the forces that it opposed a caricature to mock for the last 40 years without acknowledging their part in creating it.Racial Segregation was an intolerable blight on the American Consciousness – and the resistance to Integration was vicious and shameful. The forces that created and pursued the Viet Nam War were equally shameful. The government’s response to the resulting dissent was as unacceptable as some of the fringy protests. The counterculture said to hell with it and acted like children. None of it was pretty.
What’s to say about it now? Nothing much that I can think of. Some good music. Some not so good. Ironic that the tea-baggers have adopted some of the "hippie" protest techniques. Maybe they’ll have a Rock Concert…
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