New at Reason

In the cover story from reason's July issue, Brink Lindsey re-examines the 1960s for evidence of how the decade created two absolutely divergent cultural movements.

Comments

Warren | June 27, 2007, 12:38pm | #

I was hugely disappointed in this article. I don't think the author supports his thesis at all. Amongst the more egregious errors (as I see it) is how he vastly undervalues Vietnam, and the draft in particular, as a motivating force of the 60's counterculture. The whole article strikes me as a series of unsupported and dubious claims around a central theme.

It reminds me of the sort of "how many dust bunnies can dance on a bowling pin" stuff the Liberal Arts people fret over.

joe | June 27, 2007, 12:43pm | #

I don't get the alleged contribution of the Evangelicals to this supposed "libertarian center."

The contribution of the Aquarians is clear - they pushed for a level of personal freedom and self-expression that did not have much of a voice prior to the New Left movement. But what was the Evangelical contribution?

But having beat their intellectual retreat, evangelicals summoned up the fortitude to defend a cultural position that was, to a considerable extent, worth defending. In particular, they upheld values that, after the Sturm und Drang of the ’60s and ’70s subsided, would garner renewed appreciation across the ideological divide: committed family life, personal probity and self-restraint, the work ethic, and unembarrassed American patriotism.

There were people all over the political spectrum arguing for each of these already. Patriotism, family life, personal probity and self-restraint, and the work ethic were in no way under-appreciated or undefended values in American political and social discourse, the way the individual freedom and innovation trumpeted by the hippies were.

Brian Sorgatz | June 27, 2007, 1:30pm | #

The contribution of the Aquarians is clear - they pushed for a level of personal freedom and self-expression that did not have much of a voice prior to the New Left movement. But what was the Evangelical contribution?

For one thing, the libertarian movement in education is supported much more by the evangelical right than by any major demographic on the left. Speaking of Vietnam, I've often seen militant atheists (like the ones who comment here) rationalize taxpayer-funded schooling as a way of rescuing kids from "fundie" parents. In other words, we have to destroy the village of liberty in order to save it.

VM | June 27, 2007, 1:30pm | #

ba zing! Warren gets a dig in on liberal arts!

According to yesterday, LA students get worked up over coed bathrooms :)

ChrisO | June 27, 2007, 2:01pm | #

Both sides of that "coin" have contributed to the cloying sentimentality so prevalent in the USA today. Which contributes in myriad ways to the increasingly authoritarian nature of American society. Libertarianism is a far older strain of American culture.

Jesse Walker | June 27, 2007, 2:15pm | #

he vastly undervalues Vietnam, and the draft in particular, as a motivating force of the 60's counterculture

You're confusing the counterculture with the New Left.

Big Moe | June 27, 2007, 2:26pm | #

"Speaking of Vietnam, I've often seen militant atheists (like the ones who comment here) rationalize taxpayer-funded schooling as a way of rescuing kids from "fundie" parents."

So, what exactly doest this have to do with Viet-Nam?

There's a huge difference between taxpayer-funded schooling, which can include vouchers used to send kids to religious schools, and public education (aka state-run schools).

Militant atheists? WTF? H&R posters comprise a wide spectrum of belief, or lack thereof. Hardcore fundies ideas don't get a lot of respect here (however, the right to be a superstitious anti-modernist is greatly respected). Perhaps you're confusing this blog with, say, Austin Cline's?

Big Mo | June 27, 2007, 2:27pm | #

Typo, should read: So, what exactly does this have to do with Viet-Nam?

VM | June 27, 2007, 2:42pm | #

Big Mo

about as much as this hier

mitch | June 27, 2007, 3:08pm | #

joe,

The article may not be arguing this explicitly, but one could argue that the evangelicals invigorated the conservative movement that triumphed with the election of Ronald Reagan and other Republicans in the 1980s. Reagan and crew worked to protect capitalism from unions, the Democratic Party, and the like, through legislation and also by changing the national mood to one less suspicious of wealth. Capitalism, which Lindsey mentions time and time again in the article, is the portion of libertarianism rescued by the evangelicals.

Has any body read that Bobos in Paradise" book? How would its thesis differ from Lindsey's? Does Lindsey focus more on the evangelicals?

joe | June 27, 2007, 3:35pm | #

Brian Sorgatz, mitch,

The problem is, the article doesn't examine the issue on the level of policy or even partisan politics. It's about broad social trends redifining the culture as a whole in a libertarian direction.

The hippies' influence on our broader culture is pretty obvious - freer speech, freer expression, greater questioning of authority. The Evangelicals didn't push for more capitalism - they were highly suspicious of capitalism.

mitch | June 27, 2007, 3:50pm | #

joe,

You are right that the evangelical part of the article is weaker than the hippie part, and that if the evangelicals helped save capitalism it was largely by accident. It would be interesting to hear Lindsey himself respond to your criticisms.

Lord Jubjub | June 27, 2007, 4:06pm | #

Capitalism and Christianity. One name explains how they combined.

Amway

Warren | June 27, 2007, 4:17pm | #

Jesse,

You're confusing the counterculture with the New Left.

I don't think so. Civil Rights may have given birth to the New Left, but the counterculture gave it growth and vitality.

Even so, wasn't Vietnam center stage on the New Left agenda as well?

Brian Sorgatz | June 27, 2007, 5:25pm | #

Big Moe:
So, what exactly doest this have to do with Viet-Nam?

You need to read my paragraph all the way through. The Vietnam reference is to my next sentence, which you didn't copy and paste: "In other words, we have to destroy the village of liberty in order to save it."

By militant atheism, I'm basically talking about the Sam Harris mentality, which is well represented among H&R regulars and amounts, IMO, to almost a new bigotry.

Debra Arthur | June 27, 2007, 7:19pm | #

Brilliant! When we first decided to homeschool 13 yrs. ago, I got my first taste of the religious right. (Made a couple of life long friends.) WHile their reasons for believing in their values may come from a different "reason", they do have more in common with the far left than the middle of the roaders. I also found the leftist hippies and have many wonderful life long friends from that group as well. Each side believes they can do a better job than the government schools are doing and from all indications, they have been right. The people who are far left or far right are more willing to step out and state their beliefs (because they believe them so strongly) and fight for them than people are don't believe as strongly. These will always be the changers of society because they are willing to be different and accept the criticism of a world that doesn't champion that.

Bob | June 27, 2007, 8:32pm | #

"There is no point in mincing words: The stunning advance of evangelicalism marked a dismal intellectual regress in American religion. A lapse into crude superstition and magical thinking, credulous vulnerability to charlatans, a dangerous weakness for apocalyptic prophecy (see the massive popularity of the best-selling nonfiction book of the ’70s, evangelical Hal Lindsey’s The Late, Great Planet Earth), and blatant denial of scientific reality, resurgent conservative Protestantism entailed a widespread surrender of believers’ critical faculties."

This is a total mis-characterization of evangelicals. Let me not mince words here. Christianity delivered the world once from the same superstition it is heading back into with all vigor. Christians who stand on the authenticity of the Bible resist it. I am sure this genius is referring to the evolution/creation debate, labelling all who believe in a 7-day creation scenario as intellectually deficient. Based on his criteria, Isaac Newton would be considered stupid given the fact he wrote about apocalytpic events including the return of Jews to Israel 2oo+ years before it occured.He used the same set of scriptures as Hal Lindsey.

Christianity in the US has surrendered to materialism and walked away from the One who is to lead. This the Bible predicted as well. In addition, it predicted the fate of all who refused to have God in the intellect and suppressed the Truth by their unrighteous living. He will send them strong delusion that they will believe the lie (in the last days) that they may condemned.
Jesus is the Truth. All who hear His voice are of the Truth. All the rest is just intellectual meandering of lost men.

Randolph Carter | June 27, 2007, 11:47pm | #

Oi there, Warren, I did my thesis on the phrenological history and gender significance of Dust-bunny pin dancing in medieval Oriental cultures. So screw your "science," square!

Mr. Raven | June 28, 2007, 12:41am | #

@Brian Sorgatz

Yeah how dare I question that the world was made in EXACTLY 11 minutes by the flying spaghetti monster, it says so in the book of noodle.

Now that I have realized the error of my bigotry against religious lunatics I am so ashamed, sob.

Robert | June 28, 2007, 7:00pm | #

I second Warren's criticism, which is what I thought when I read the article in print. Looked to me like a strained excuse for a single article on a couple of subjects the author had some facts about.

John | June 29, 2007, 2:43pm | #

The Vietnam War and the draft were a large part of the reason for the birth and blossoming of the left counter culture. The war was not in defense of our national interest. It was sold on pretenses that were as easy to fault then as the Iraq war’s pretenses are today. The new left counter culture gave millions of draft-age men moral support for our resistance to and revulsion by the government’s demand that we go and die without question.

"In the process, the Haight’s anarchic innocence was destroyed....Its special magic never returned; instead, it dispersed throughout the country, and a thousand sparks began to blaze."

Living far from San Francisco, I and my like-minded friends participated vicariously in the Summer of Love and became one of those “thousand sparks” that began to blaze throughout the country. We banded together to share our fear of the personal effects of our government’s misbegotten war; to try to live with a little more freedom and joy; and to plot our course through those long and troubling years.