Just a short retort: ========= This article and its sources is the kind of dribble of those in their academic ivory towers SDS always fought against. SDS's semi official membership hovered at around 100,000. That can be multiplied by 10 to get a more accurate figure and multiplied again to get at those SDS's actually directly influenced. For instance one campus I organized on had about 6 official member regularly got 50-70 per meeting. If we had crucial meeting or rally that would grow into the hundreds. If we called a demonstration the figure would be in the thousands. In Los Angeles the vast majority of SDS chapters were on working class campuses, including high schools. Its true that SDS began with what could be described as intellectuals, though most were activist of one sort or another. But nation wide SDS was primarily a working to middle class if you say middle class were the working class folk who had decent well paying jobs at the time. SDS had ties and relationships with a wide variety of other groups., Black, Hispanic, Asian, labor, the military, the arts, women, etc. SDS members were prime movers in the Teamsters for a Democratic Union. They were into practically every realm of society, organizing as they went and many never stopped in 1968, 1972 or any other year.. SDS was one organized aspect of the movements of the Sixties. That larger movement forever changed this country in most every aspect. But its also true there was a major counter revolution, led by the Government, the right-wing and capitalists. They killed, jail, disrupted with the funds of the government, while the organizations had barely nothing but their commitment. And yes capitalists took some of the superficial aspects of the Sixties and sold them back to the middle class. The right wing suburban really middle class Orange County adopted the whole drug and free sex aspect in the Seventies, of course without any of the philosophy of the Sixties. Activist of the Sixties continued to organize in the Seventies and were very active in the anti-war in Central American movement in the later Seventies and early Eighties. This has continued today with this new movement made evident in Seattle. Many "ex-SDS" were the organizers behind the actions at the Democratic Party Convention in Los Angeles this August. And some like myself, proud to proclaim the fact that we still are SDS. >Vol. 6, No. 4 - May/June 1996 >COVER STORY >Who Owns The Sixties? >The opening of a scholarly generation gap >By Rick Perlstein > >ON AUGUST 13, 1994, some quarter- million pilgrims journeyed to upstate >New York to experience Woodstock II. They were searching for the spirit of >the Sixties. What they found was a messy debate over whether that >staggeringly commercialized event was a proper tribute to the decade, or >its proper burial. John Johnson Change-Links Progressive Newspaper change@pacbell.net http://www.labridge.com/change-links/ Subscribe to our list server. Email change-links-subscribe@egroups.com (818) 982-1412
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