On College Campuses, Students See Military With New Set of Eyes


Where are some of our 15 yr old boy's heads right now?
My son sent this article to me from one of his musical fan sites. It is a reply to the editor of the NY times regarding an article in which they were mentioned. The article was written Nov 26 2001.
Article headline: “On College Campuses, Students See Military With New Set of Eyes”.
Excerpt where Anti-Flag is noted: “Mr. Carpe said he used to worship
anti-establishment punk-rock groups like Anti-Flag, ‘but I feel totally
weird listening to that now.’ A fan of Neil Young, Bob Dylan and other
singer-song writer icons of the 60’s, he suddenly finds the lyrics of
protest to be off-key.”

An excerpt of their reply:
"Free speech and dissent are the backbone of democracy. In modern times, it has been the unofficial role of the artist to encourage alternative discourse and ideas."
The letter discusses domestic policy, and alternatives to militarization, and the demonization of artists who question.

My son is quite bright and sees the facism, but is beginning to feel discouragement, hopelessness, powerlessness and fear. He said, 'There's nothing we can do'.
A 15 yr old really has no voice, but the drive to defend a democracy has to be kept alive. I'm trying to give him an idea of what could be possible when information is shared and how to share it. I put the article up permanently in the musings/social issues section of this site.
posted by Cyndy | link | | |
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