Author: jscully2

I began this semester with a blog post about how I believed history always repeats itself whenever one generation of humans doesn’t learn from the mistakes of another. This post was written in a negative light, comparing the struggles and turmoils of 1968 and 2020. However, over the course of this semester, I’ve started to realize that 1968 wasn’t all anarchy like it may seem from the outside. There are many valuable lessons that we can learn from 1968, besides those regarding protests and hatred. For example, in my essay I’m writing about fear, how establishments use it to quiet people, and how people must overcome it if they hope to gain liberty. In many ways, 1968 was instrumental in causing people to challenge the people above them, and fight for what they truly believe in instead of taking everything for granted. Fear is obviously something that will never go away, but I see in 2020 many similarities to how people reacted to fear in 1968. MLK was tired of the oppression his people faced, so he overcame the fear the system hoped to impose on him and led black Americans to a brighter future. In 2020, I see many of the same hopes with the Black Lives Matter movement. Essentially, I’ve come to learn throughout this semester that when we think about history repeating itself, we don’t have to focus on all the negative. Yes, 1968 will always be remembered for the Vietnam War, the Troubles, and a multitude of other events that shaped a generation of people. Likewise, 2020 will always be remembered for the coronavirus pandemic, police brutality, and the heated election. However, I don’t believe this needs to be our focus when we look back on these controversial years. Instead, it is very much possible to look back and remember a time when people linked arms and fought for their voice. 2020 will not be the last tumultuous year during our lifetimes, but if we take what we’ve learned this year, we will be more prepared for the next time history repeats itself.

These past two weeks we’ve read two plays with similar backbones: a group of people finding something wrong with society, showing their displeasure about it, and being brought to court as a result. However, the two plays read extremely differently, which I believe is a result of one thing in particular: the judges of the trials. Judge Hoffman in the Chicago Eight trial is blatantly dismissive of the defense. He attacks their attire and mannerisms, rejects their attempts to voice their opinions, physically silences one of the defendants by utilizing an out-dated law, and restricts the defendants’ free speech. Judge Hoffman’s actions are so flagrant and biased that every single conviction he hands down is eventually overturned on appeal. In contrast, in the trail of the Catonsville Nine, Judge Thomsen gives the defendants a fair trial. Although setting the nine men and women free was unlikely to ever be an option, Judge Thomsen did everything Judge Hoffman refused to do, including allowing the defendants to speak about the social injustices they had been protesting. The men and women on trial in Catonsville were ultimately sentenced to prison, however their goal of spreading awareness about the atrocities, and inhumanness of the Vietnam War succeeded. After reading the Trial of the Catonsville Nine, I couldn’t help but wonder what would’ve happened if the judges in the respective trials were switched. There was nothing essential to either Chicago or Catonsville, Maryland in either event, as the protests were about American society as a whole. Therefore, it is reasonable to wonder if the results of the trials could’ve been different under different judges. Personally, I believe both trials would’ve ended much differently. Judge Hoffman’s outrageous biases against the Chicago Eight clouded the fact that there was really no sufficient evidence to charge the defendants (hence, why the US government declined to re-try them after the successful appeal). The Catonsville Nine incident led to an increase in anti-draft and anti-military protest – movements that eventually morphed into anti-nuclear weapons protests. Had the trial of the Catonsville Nine been made under a judge who did not allow the defendants their right to air their grievances against the nation, perhaps these corollary movements never take off. While the answer to this thought experiment will obviously never be known, I think it’s worth thinking about how often random chance can influence how we remember history.

“In every struggle for liberty and justice, we are weakened when we shape our strategy to keep powerful interests onside.” I believe this quote, from the introduction of Eamonn McCann’s War and an Irish Town, perfectly exemplifies why true change is so difficult to come by in our society. The whole point of social change – to disrupt something powerfully ingrained in our lives – is nullified because our society is structured to protect power. Power makes reputations, furthers careers, and writes paychecks. Although powerful people are highly scrutinized, they are also protected from mainstream society because of the power that defines them. To ask someone to give up their power (whether politically, financially, or other) is to ask them to put down their shield. However, social change is impossible without someone losing some type of power. Something has to give.

In the early 1900s when Ireland separated from Britain, Britain didn’t budge on granting the six counties of Northern Ireland independence. Many believe this reluctance was influenced by Belfast being a valuable port city. Belfast rewarded the British power in the form of profit, and regardless of the social upheaval that the partition of Ireland caused, the British had interests that they deemed worthy of defense. Today we see something similar in many struggles for social change, including with gun laws in the United States. Despite horrific mass shooting, the intertwined web of interests at the top level of the country has prevented major change from ever occurring. Which is why, as Emory Douglas stated, and quoted by McCann, “real change, if it comes, will come from below.” The power struggle at the top will never sort itself out in time for social change to happen. As a result, it’s the people who don’t have these competing interests that need to lead the charge.

People don’t want fiery rhetoric thrown at them with nothing to back it up. Mr. McCann likened it in our class discussion to being at a Bruce Springsteen concert by yourself; it would be terrible, because so much of the experience is being alongside others feeling the same excitement. People don’t want to be told that they, as an individual, have the powerful politicians on their side. They want freedom and liberty, and to experience these alongside their peers. In order for this to ever happen, we must recognize that those with power might not be the strongest allies.

The “Us vs Them” mentality has a stranglehold on our society. Humans tend to view the group they belong to, whether ethnically, religiously, socioeconomically, or other, as being the center to which all other groups are measured against, and as a result we seem to constantly be at each other’s throats. We see this trend all the time in politics, war, and even in completely trivial matters such as sports. There is something innate to the human psyche in the desire to see our people “win” and finding joy in seeing those opposite us worse off. All of which makes the mentality of Dr. Martin Luther King – one of love, forgiveness and equality – all the more impressive.

Two sections from our readings really stood out to me in regards to Dr. King’s steadfast commitment to non-violence. In The Power of Nonviolence, Dr. King states “love the person who does the evil deed while hating the deed the person does.” In late 1950s and 1960s America, a period ripe with tension, possessing this mentality of loving those who hate and spite you, while belonging to a group that had suffered under systematic racism for centuries, in a state that set dogs loose on peaceful protestors, and where the governor believed in “segregation now, segregation tomorrow and segregation forever” seems unbelievable. However, Dr. King backed up his words in the most powerful way. After a woman plunged a blade to within an inch of his life, not only did Dr. King forgive and pray for the woman, but he deepened his faith in non-violence.

America in the 1950s and 60s may have been an inch of blade away from being much more violent than it was. Today, it seems like the never-ending Us vs Them mentality keeps us an inch away from conflict at all times. We’ve already seen it in the myriad of senseless killings of unarmed black men and women. We continue to see it in today’s political landscape, which often feels more like a Colosseum fight to the death than a productive discourse. What I find most upsetting is that, like Dr. King says regarding the black population, we can be so much stronger and achieve so much more if we all come together and pool our strengths. The Us vs Them mentality not only places our society on a constant edge, but it prevents us from moving forward. As long as we continue to worry about our differences, we won’t achieve greater good for all.

I’ve always been a strong believer that history repeats itself. Hitler’s failed invasion of Russia in 1941 mirrors Napoleon’s blunder in 1812. Massive amounts of consumer debt helped lead to the Great Depression, and within 80 years the Great Recession followed a similar path. Sure, there are coincidences, but I believe the underlying cause of why we see so many “déjà vu” events is because humans at their core share values and tendencies that don’t change with the times. One of which is the desire to see change, and revolt, when they believe something is fundamentally wrong with society. To understand trends like these is why I believe studying history has so much value. I’d love to leave this class with a better grasp of the mindsets of different groups during the ’68 period, in particular the marginalized of the era. In achieving this, I hope to gain clarity about our current time, and begin see society from the eyes of those who continue to be marginalized. So far we’ve talked about 2020 being another 1968. Whether or not this year is looked back upon, and studied, along the same vein as ’68, I have no doubt that the political and social upheaval of 1968 will be repeated at some point in the near future. If this class helps me broaden my viewpoint, so that I can understand violence, demonstration, strike and movement from more than just my current vantage point, I would consider the journey of this class a success.