Author: wosterga

As the end of the semester comes up, I am reflecting on what the role of witnesses are in the grand scheme of history. It seems to me that there are many different ways to be observers of history without even knowing it. Of course, there are plenty of people who seem to have awareness of the gravity of things around them. However, this is often the role of the radicals. People like Eamonn McCann, Huey Newton, Daniel Berrigan, and others know the importance of the situation at hand. They would not be taking such serious action if they believed it was not a historic moment. Revolutionaries certainly seem to ascribe to Lenin’s, “There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.” The question is whether or not this sentiment is shared with the general public. The critical factor for remembering these events is that many of these “radicals” are the ones writing about it, at least in popular history. Did the rest of the population actually see the late 60s as a time of historic importance the same way the radicals did? Truthfully, I don’t think we can answer that question with any confidence. When asked if the late 60s were significant, almost everyone who experienced them said that they were and that they knew it. However, this is probably largely influenced by their memories changing based on what the narrative was. Someone who watched the riots at the DNC on TV is going to say it was a big deal to them at the time, but how much is that simply what they are supposed to remember? Do we truly understand the significance of what is going on right now in 2020? I don’t think so, mainly because our memories of this year 30 years from now are not going to be the same as our experiences. How can we be good witnesses if we are told what to remember?

One of the themes I have noticed throughout many of the texts we have recently read is the idea of “martyrdom.” This usually does not mean actually dying for a cause, but instead displaying oneself as a victim of something. This is especially evident in the last two texts, Voices of the Chicago Eight and Trial of the Catonsville Nine. In both cases the defendants do not seem to be very invested in actually proving their innocence, at least that is the way the authors portray the trials. Instead, it seems that the point of the trial was really to display injustice to the general public. This seems clear to me; however, I am not entirely sure if this was their mindset before all the events took place. Did the Chicago Eight and the Catonsville Nine intend on becoming “martyrs,” or was it something that they were simply willing to accept as a side effect? You could certainly argue that they set out to be “martyrs” because this would draw more attention to their causes. There is no doubt that suffering for a cause you believe in is more powerful in the public eye. In fact, we probably would not be reading about them right now if they weren’t these “martyrs.”

This power from “martyrdom” also requires the role of an author, or at least someone to tell your story. The point of being a martyr is to amplify your message through the idea that you are willing to suffer for it so that others can be drawn to your message, and therefore the actual dispersion of your message is critical. These authors are critical for actually carrying the message, but they also profoundly impact the message itself. A lot of people might say that is bad thing, and that authors and journalists should not put their own analysis on things. However, it seems to be more complicated than that. Analysis is important, but it’s impossible to analyze anything without skewing the original idea or message. Is the cost worth it? Does analysis provide a more narrow-minded message, or does it add layers to the discussion of an issue?

One of the things that has been on my mind for the past couple of weeks is the idea of radicalism, and how it is perceived by others and the radicals themselves. This was especially so after listening to Eamonn McCann speak during class. I suppose that there are varying degrees of trust of radicals, but it seems that the average person is generally distrustful of radicals. There are probably many reasons for this, but it seems that most of this distrust simply comes from the idea of change, especially change to the extent where you enter the realm of the unknown. Even if the system in place is problematic and sets up people to suffer, the idea of entering the unknown often is seen as more problematic that maintaining the status quo. I suppose this is the same logic many people apply to the fear of death. Despite many people’s belief that death is the ultimate neutral state, they would rather continue living in moderate pain. Of course, this is not to suggest that a radical revolution is the same thing as death, it is simply to point out the shared feature: uncertainty.

I suppose this idea of uncertainty must also be present in the mind of radicals, just probably to a lesser extent. I seriously doubt that radicals can dedicate great chunks of their lives to a cause without the constant weight of some amount of doubt about how their visions will actually manifest themselves. Maybe it’s just me, but I have a hard time believing people can be so sure of their imagined future. Based on this assumption, which to me seems perfectly reasonable, I wonder what exactly keeps radicals going, and how they deal with that uncertainty. Maybe it’s the belief that their future will at the very least be better than the current system. This further begs the question of whether or not radicals base their beliefs more in the hope for a new future or in the hatred of the current system. What is scarier to the average person?

While listening to the presentation on Dr. King this week, I had the thoughts surrounding the his legacy and movement in mind. This is especially true in relation to the 2020 reaction to systematic racism. Ever since the murder of George Floyd, one of the main points that people have brought up is how they think Martin Luther King Jr. would view the current protests and the Black Lives Matter movement. To be honest, I kind of hate these types of questions where people try to assume what historical figures would say about the current situation. The reason I dislike this so much is because I think its a mostly useless exercise because contexts change. I know it’s a common to say that history repeats itself, and while there is some truth to this, I think it is an overused saying that stems from the natural human desire to simplify and categorize. I think it would be better to say that events and patterns emerge in a loose framework of history. Yes, there are many similarities between 1968 and 2020, but there are many details that are different, and these details are incredibly impactful in the way people form their beliefs.

This is why I think it is so hard to answer the question, “What would Dr. King say about 2020?” Would the fact that racism has persisted in strength more than 50 years after his death change his viewpoints? Would the fact that the opposition to the movement lies more in the population that believes systematic racism doesn’t even exist change anything? Would he even be happy with his legacy? The truth is that we don’t know. The people with the best answers to the issues of 2020, are the people of 2020, not the  surmised opinions of past figures.

One of the things that popped into my mind on the first day of class when we were discussing the overview of the class was, strangely enough, a Don Henley lyric. It came from “The Boys of Summer,” which is his famous post-Eagles song that has been overplayed so much to the point where it is, quite frankly, exceedingly irritating. However, I still recalled the phrase, “out on the road today, I saw a Deadhead sticker on a Cadillac.” As we further discussed the class and started moving into the material, this lyric still stood out to me because it matches a really interesting theme that seems to apply to so many “68ers.” Henley himself was a young person during the “long 68” and experienced, “The Thing,” as Enoch Powell called it. “The Thing” can be interpreted in many different ways, but it seems to fundamentally mean the movement across the world, especially in the western world during that time. This ranged anywhere from civil rights, political movements, violence, and counter-culture that help define the dynamic nature of ’68. Of course, Henley is referring more to the counter-culture aspect of “The Thing” by mentioning “Deadheads,” a term used by some lovingly and by others with disdain to describe the followers of the Grateful Dead.

When you think of the the late 60s, Deadheads are kind of the epitome of counter-culture, with many of them emphasizing lifestyles of anti-materialism, free love, and (not always, but often) drugs. Henley points out a glaring contradiction he observed in the 80s. The very ideals of being a Deadhead just don’t seem to be compatible with owning a Cadillac. Henley points out that the 68ers have grown up, and in the end they wind up living the life they tried so hard to avoid in their youth. However, they still carry on the memory of ’68 and the impact on their lives. This seemed especially profound considering Vinen’s discussion of how impacts of ’68 extend decades later, with people like George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, whose lives were shaped by ’68, even though they seem to be living a contradiction. While so many people seemed to live on past the “long ’68,” its impact is still clearly relevant and present decades later.