I have never cared so much about anything else. What I believe accounts for the passions of that time, and specifically of the antiwar movement, was the intersection of massive, institutionally-mandated violence on the one hand, and the sense of alternative possibilities on the other. The violent response to the civil rights movement domestically and the violence of the US government in Southeast Asia stood in daily contrast to the free universities, kitchens, theaters, communes, and political organizations widespread at the time. Additionally, the cultural messianism of the hippies, fueled partly by frequent ingestion of LSD and other drugs, and partly by music that celebrated alternative visions, served to further underline the contingency and transience of the existing order. Anguish and hope were intertwined, and the personal threat of being drafted and sent off to war or jailed for resistance intensified these extremes.
Today is a far different reality.
However, the personal sense of threat and also of hope are not comparable to that felt by masses of people during the Vietnam war era. I say that not to downplay anyone's feelings and certainly not to suggest casualness about committed involvement in ongoing social struggles, but as a recognition of the relative lack of perceived alternatives at the current time. This is the key. While things were certainly bad during the 60s, there were many visible signs of institutional transition to a sought-after world. What was once an opening has now become a co-opted cubicle in business as usual.