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Call me another rebel with a cause

or should I say causes, epending on how you choose to see things: but although I have gotten older and grayer decade by decade, I have not yet given up my determination to make sure that any marks I leave on this earth are not scars, and that any words that still hang in the air or in anyone's heart are dedicated to serving the greatest possible good, and not to some petty revenge or selfish afterthought. Naive? Perhaps. Idealistic? You bet. Socialist—not hardly. I might cringe when I hear the goopy song We are the World, We are the children, scoffing at it as glib and trite, but all in all it's not such a bad anthem.
I'm not sure the hippies all burned out (they weren't my parents, just my older friends, siblings and cousins); many of them MovedOn, so to speak (Ben Cohen is a great example, as is Paul Hawkins). Many of them—those not killed in Vietnam or lost to drugs or simply returning to their pre-Woodstock dreams—simply had children and bought homes and cars and found that they had to try to change the system from within the system. They started "green" or at least people-centered companies such as Smith Hawken, Ben & Jerry's, the Body Shop, and Apple Computer, and they tried to teach by example. WE try to teach by example, too, those of us mini-hippies-turned 40something now who followed adoringly at the heels of our big sisters' and brothers' Birkenstocks. We start charter schools, grassroots Dean for America campaigns, we blog to the unbelievers. We all do what we can.

posted by MizMax on October 10, 2004 at 6:21 PM | link to this | reply

I am, have always been, will alway be a rebel.

I don't know any other way.  The comfort zone is a mighty powerful mistress.  She gives great, um, back rubs and never talks back.  No pain.  People don't want to see, they don't want to know.  I thought Sept. 11 would shake things up more in the long run then they did, which is really disappointing.  We could have pulled some really good things out of that tragedy.  I think I leaned towards socialism a bit for a while, but now, I think any system is flawed so we should do the best with what we have.  Do you speak fluent Spanish, Jimmy?

Watch out, love, your revolution is showing. ;)

posted by Temple on October 7, 2004 at 11:12 PM | link to this | reply