Walter Russel Mead has a post up about The War Against The Young: Warning From Italy and Japan. I left a comment in reply to something we see all too often posted on the ‘net.
We know the 1960s didn’t work.
The 60s worked for me. Four kids.
1. Artist
2. Russian Language graduate
3. EE 4th year
4. Chem E. 3rd year
There was a religious revival going on in the 60s that was nipped in the bud by Christian Moralists who didn’t want to see their religion in decline.
Ah. Well. If we can get the moralists off our backs we might actually get back to a place of great faith. Which would be good for all religions.
It would be much better if everyone was talking to the Head Office vice having to listen to ministers preach.
And why did I have 4 children? Well the Head Office told me to. There are many different routes to open your heart to the Maker. People truly interested in religion would not shut off any of them. There is in fact not one way. Only one Maker.
That “No one comes to the Maker except by me” shit has got to go. Because it is a lie. And a religion based on a lie will not prosper.
The 60s in fact was an attempt to corner the market on religion by passing laws (sounds like crony capitalism doesn’t it). It will not last. Or prosper long term. And the end of the long term is at hand. Forty years later.
H/T Instapundit
Cross Posted at Power and Control
Comments
3 responses to “The 60s Actually Did Work Until Crony Religionism Killed It”
The 1960’s were a mixed bag IMO. But then again, what isn’t?
Over the years, many conservative commentators have pointed to the events of the 1960’s as being the catalyst for the rise of orgs like the Moral Majority, Christian Coalition, etc. I tend to agree with that assertion.
My question to them is this:
If you’re fairly certain that events from the 1960’s gave rise to the pushback from the “Religious Right” that began in the late 1970’s, isn’t it likely that the events of the 1960’s were in response to situations, attitudes and events that pre-dated that decade? I say yes.
Look at what had transpired in the previous generation or two before the 1960’s. It was the rise of Big Business, Big Labor, Big Education, Big Welfare, and Big Government. It was the rise of the collective in various ways. Individual liberty had taken a backseat for some time, since the arrival of the “Progressive Era” in politics in the early 20th century.
Hypocrisy abounded in America:
In the land of the free where everyone was supposed to be equal before the law, bigotry was commonplace and enshrined into law in some places.
The inherent hypocrisy of then-existing drug laws vs. those for alcohol was there to see for anyone that cares to look. Still is.
For many, there was a stifling conformity that eschewed any thought or action that was outside these ever-encroaching social, poltical and workplace norms. In the name of freedom and liberty, America had become a lot less free in many ways in the preceding decades. That’s not to say that progress wasn’t made on other fronts, but liberty had lost on many fronts during the first 60 years of the 20th century.
Could these things have given rise to the social changes in the 1960’s? Seems possible.
IOW, there were some very cogent criticisms of the American project that were part and parcel of the 1960’s. It would be nice if those who connect the 1960’s to the rise of the Moral Majority in the 1970’s would realize that the 1960’s didn’t happen in a vaccum either.
These social critiques brought fwd in the 1960’s were lost in the noise of the Viet Nam controversy, race riots, campus unrest, etc. The efforts of the New Left to marshal these ligitimate criticisms to further their own socialist agenda have tainted the view the Right has on the 1960’s to this day.
IOW, the baby was thrown out with the bath water for many on the political Right when it comes to the 1960’s.
Some of the issues that divide us today, especially the WOD, are politcal proxy wars that began then and are still fought to this day. We not may not be over the 1960’s until everyone that experienced them has assumed room temperature, myself included.
I’m not going down without a fight. 😉
[…] Also for your amusement my recent article on the religious revival of the 60s: The 60s Actually Did Work Until Crony Religionism Killed It […]