From: rks@cscns.com (Island's Child)
Subject: Re: cynicism
Organization: Community_News_Service
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL3
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 04:00:15 GMT

: a growth period that included a stage of idealism in which they could go
: about trying to achieve political and personal goals without being 
: hampered by a sense of futility.  Today's "youthful" generation -- college
: age or somewhat older (slackers?) -- seem to share an early cynicism that
: squelches any idealism they might have at an age where they might also
: be politically/culturally active.

       I think this ultimately relates back further than you might think
initially. The futility doesn't seem to be limited to the 'college-age'
group. It has been perhaps passed along by those of us who were late 
teens or early 20s in the '60s. 

       It is unfortunate in many respects that the 60s were such a
dismal failure. What began as an attempt to change the culture turned
into unbridled hedonism instead of a firm commitment to new ideals. 
The ideals we espoused were possible -- and many of us knew that the
answer was within us as people rather than externally. One can 
create all the legislation in the world and it can not convince people
or control value systems. It can only enforce a given value system. 

       I believe our cynicism began with the assassination of John 
Kennedy. Those of us who were born int he early 50s had heard all
of the propaganda for years: that we were the luckiest, that we
were the freest, that we were infact the chosen nation of "God" and
that we were blessed in a way that no other nation had ever been blessed.

       The only homeless we saw as children were burned out 
alcoholics and bums. We were brought up to believe that we could accomplish
anything -- with the will to do so. 

       In the years between 1963 and 1970, we saw the blatant murder of 
those politicians and national leaders who wanted to make change that wuld
benefit the most. The corruption within the political system was 
revealed in a sensational (in the negative sense) manner. The one who 
told us that he had a dream, that all of us could work for and achieve
human rights and dignity for everyone was shot down and the idea died with
him. The kennedy dynasty was revealed as a dynasty. Although they made the
right noises, the fact remained that they were as rich as God and their
loyalties would always remain with their own. 

      Over the years, we further saw the devastation wreaked upon our 
lives and the environment by mga-corporations who saw us and our 
environment as tools for profit. We began to see that everything in
the US is for sale -- including human rights. One only had human 
rights if one could afford human rights. 

      Then there is institutionalized racism. In capitalism, the resources
are limited. One of the ways to segment those resources is to use the 
most obvious: skin color and race. Now that is no longer working -- it is
too transparent -- so we use other means to discriminate. Gays, single
parents, those who make lifestyle choices that are out of the mainstream
and those who actively rebel against the system. 

      In my own case, I vacillate between cynicism and anger. I spent 
the majority of my college-age years in a state of anger and disgust. 
I worked with many different radical groups who fought for the change
of a system which had become necrotic. I worked with organizations which
ranged from SDS and the Congress for Racial Equality to Democratic
Socialists of America. Like most college students of that era, I also
had my love affair with Marxism and was an active member of the CPUSA for
several years. (I discovered that the CP is the sorriest collection of
has-beens and power seekers I'd ever worked with and consider them a 
disgrace to the Left these days.) Nevertheless, it was an expression
of my desperation and anger at the time. And it was legitimate anger.I
saw a country with which I was unabashedly in love falling into the
very abyss that Neitzsche warned us about. 

     Over the past 25 years, I have seen the abyss coming closer and 
closer and I feel us becoming engulfed by it. And is it George Bush
and trickle-down economics that is leading us? No. It is ourselves. It
is ourselves and our commitment to self-absorption, an unwillingness
to accept that we all live on one planet together, to materialism and
personal gratification. We have become callous to the fact that none
of us can be free as long as any of us is imprisoned by poverty and
hopelessness. We avoid the homeless (actually that terms bothers
me. I talked to a homeless woman one time who told me that "I am not 
homeless. Home is in here," she said, pointing to her heart. "I am 
only without shelter.), we avoid the hungry and most of the time, we
avoid each other. 

     Am I cynical? Not really. I still have faith in the ultimate 
resiliency of human beings and I believe that we can pull ourselves
away from the abyss. Am I angry? No. But I am frustrated. It 
frustrates me that it is taking so long. It frustrates me that this
rotten system still stands and is ever-powerful. It frustrates me that
we have not evolved as a culture to the extent that we realize the 
basic truth that we are all in this together and that we *must* unite
if we hope to survive. I still carry my same values. Although I 
realize that it has problems, I am still a convinced socialist and
believe it is the only possible solution -- applied with democracy. 

     We can not give in to cynicism. If we give in to cynicism, they
have won -- and we will have lost -- everything. It will take a great
deal of work -- and, yes, sacrifice -- but this system must be 
torn down and rebuilt into something in which we can be proud. Again, 
as Neitzsche said "if something is tottering, give it a final shove."

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