The Sixties IS iconography and Mythology

drieux H. (drieux@wetware.com)
Wed, 1 May 1996 10:11:21 -0400

p1: in response to Jeff Apfel's general critique of the
problme of Generalization, we must try to remember that there
is a difference between the lives that we LIVED, as personal
history, and the 'collective memory' and myth systems that
are currently active as a part of the current culture. In this
I do support Grover's Alledged Intentions to debunk the SubKult
of ColdWarMentality, since some of the alledged 'recieved text'
leaks a little between the Heiligeschicht and the mere facts of the matter.

p2: Among V-Vets, and WarMongerBabyKillers[vn[tm]] in general,
there is always the conflict between the 'recieved text' and
the 'being there' positions. This is of course complicated by
the fact, that in general the Akademiks were a part of the
"THEM" who oppose us, and now are afforded the luxury of
canonizing the Myths as History. As I have noted to a few of them,
given as we tend not to be on our feet at the end of many of our
cultural rituals, we will be best served by having sober Akademiks
to do the write ups of our 'indigenous culture, it's rites and rituals'.

{ Allow me to Plug 'Warrior Dreams' again, as at least an initial
effort to differenciate between the Military Culture, and the
JonnyRamboWannaBeKult. As I say, it is not as 'good' as I would
like, but it starts the vector. }

I also point to Erwin 'The Desert Fox' Rommel's papers, and a somewhat
ascerbic section in it, where he takes to task 'staff officers' and
their 'book learning' approach to warfare. Which is a bit silly of
sorts, since Rommel was working on a follow on book to his classic
write up of small unit tactics from WWI. Someone will do the write up,
and we will see in the next round, who really learned anything from
the 'recieved text' and who was merely passing the class.

p3: some of the Apparent Chaos on the side of the 'Radicals' who
were committed 'activists' sounds, In My Most Humble Opinion, to
be similar in content to the Traditional Kvetch I hear amongst
the WarMonger Community, as the 'percieved' myths have less than
an accurate reflection of What Happened, as well as the motivations.

Not all VVAW were PaidRedAgentsOfMoskva, just as not all members of
the OEO were PaidRedAgentsOfMoskva, and contrary to the Popular Mythology
not all the CuteHippieChics were getting the best sex since the end of
the Victorian Era. Equally True, not all the Weed was better then....

But I had been under the Impression that since it was Akademiks
writing up the Myths of the Akademiks that there was Suppose to
be less anxiety about who was adjusting which portions of the
history to be more 'accurate' as it were.

I guess the Notions of the GreatMonolithicRedKommunistDominated
ModernSeXularHumanistIvoryTowerRevisionists may be little more
than a myth of the sixties and/or nineties....

p4: all of which brings us crashing back towards the fundamental
warfare between 'historians' and 'folklorists' - the later, from
my limited experience, coming more out of the Shamanistic Communities
and traditions, and are more concerned with the 'usefulness' of
the tale, than the 'implementation specific' details. There are more than
enough running jokes about the 'quest for relevance' that was a hallmark
of 'akadamialand' during the 'sixties' - of which I keep a cartoon from
punsch, in which the professor begins his lecture on mathematics, noting
that there is some concern that he denounce kapitalism, or some such, and
he does, and then procedes along to the basics of mathematics. Where as
we now have the 'great backlash' to all of this, namely, "back to basics"
without any real debate about 'what is worth learning?' along the way.

As I see this fight, from sitting on the outside, we Have 'historians'
attempting to inject 'meaning' into the "mere facts", while all the
time pretending to some stance of 'neutrality' - and we have 'folklorists'
dilligently trying to hammer down the 'detail specifics' of this and/or
that Myth; and we see this played out from time to time here on this list.

Which is REALLY the more important minutia, that the Cops burned this
set of papers, or that the Popular Culture, through the Connivance of
the RedKommunistDominatedLiberalMedia, would lay the 'blame' upon those
evil Kids? Should we recall 'woodstock' as the Grand Symbol of What could
have been the dawning of a New Age of Consciousness, or merely as that
generation's expression of the Sqaulid Waste of Affluent Middle Class Kids
who were sheltered from Real Responsibility by the Evils of the Kapitalist
System and it's process of Global Exploitation backed up by the Imperial
Storm Troopers of the American Military Industrial Complex? { to be honest,
I prefer the later, but I still like the sound track anyway. }

I am all in Favor of the Creation of Chronologies, and Biographies, and
the Gory Boring MinutiaMunching that are the Hallmarks of Classical Histories.
But given the Power and the Majik still attached to the Holy Icons of the
Sixties, and the various Myths about the Manifestations of the EVIL DARK LORD
and the Minnions of Satan, { whether we are talking about Nixon or the
Arrival of Martin Luther King Jr. } we really should step back and see that
we are dealing with the 'kult rituals' of a rather 'primative' people who
still consult the oracles of economists to seek the divinations of the future.

Oh for the Simpler Process of merely being able to 'deconstruct' to the
appropriate atomic elements, and from this arrive at the True Facts, and
spin it all through the applicable Formulae and Out Plops the History,
complete with a standardized 50 question Multiple Guess Test for validation
that the student has arrived at the correct understanding in a clear and
measurable manner.

But if we learned anything from the 'sixties' it is the frailty of the
KultOfScience and The IdolatryOfNumerology to lead us any closer to
'the truth' - in spite of what our Parents had told us about the Great
Awakening of the Technological Revolution, and the New Day coming
just beyond the horizon with the Ultimate Success of the Atoms For Peace
Program which would provide everyone with everything.

As Michner would say in his book 'Hawaii':

"The Times are Hard when the God's are Changing."

And clearly we will all agree, that such is a good summery
of what the 'the sixties' were.

The problem now is to sort out which were the Slight Of Hand
used by the EvilLordOfDarkness, and which were the true Bright Lights.

ciao
drieux