new thread
I ran across this article and wanted to share it with everyone here.
"Jerry Rubin: Activist changed his rap
By Barry M. Horstman, Post staff reporter
The man famous for saying ''Don't trust anyone over 30'' became - to use another phrase he popularized in his youth - a capitalist pig in his 40s.
He went from being a hippie to a yippie and finally a yuppie, trading his Che beret and anti-establishment tirades for short hair, a suit and Wall Street.
But Jerry Rubin insisted he hadn't sold out to the Man, man.
''I would be copping out if I stayed in the myth of the '60s,'' Rubin said two decades later. So, when he changed his rap from ''Money is violence'' to ''Money is power,'' he said this radical transformation reflected growth, not inconsistency."
More at this link:
While I can accept people mellowing to accomodate the realities of life, especially realities of a time when the economic securities of the 50's and 60's have given way to the insecurities of of our time, I consider Jerry Rubin's 180 degrees reversal and open advocacy of the opposite of his earlier beliefs a total sell out.
I could accept it even if he cut his hair but continued working and fighting for the principles of his youth through more mainstream means like writing, involvement in political parties, societies, advocat groups or even charities.
There's an interesting paper called The Californial Ideology which explains this change in youth culture from radicle anti-capitalism, anti-establishment to acceptance of and co-option into the system they formerly opposed, especially in the 1990s.
One thing Barbrook and Cameron left out was the end of the source of that polarising factor -- IE. The Vietname War.
However, there still are people from Rubin's era who in their own ways, continue working for the original ideas of his generation.
One of them who comes to mind is Richard Stallman of teh Free Software Foundation, the peace activists, social activists, environmental activists and so on.
Charles