As a young man in the Late Sixties I formed part of that whole revolution that was called the "alternative" movement. We were out to rid the world of materialism and hypocrisy by liberating our bodies as well as our minds. While the battle with materialism was largely lost before it was even fought, many of us did feel that at least large areas of the ideological struggle had been successful. After 1970 it was no longer acceptable that people should stay in damaging, loveless relationships for the sake of appearances or whatever.... The ridiculous notion that your first sexual partner had to be your lifelong partner, whether the physical side of the relationship worked or not, was discarded. Victorian hypocrisy, in the form of prudity, was vanquished... people took their clothes off at festivals and no one in my circle of friends ever batted an eyelid if the conversation turned to body parts or functions. After the dull stifling Fifties of my childhood it felt so much like freedom!
As an adult, I blithely assumed the gains of the revolution were solid. I though that although it was obvious Materialism had triumphed, at least the ideological battles would never re-surface, would they? The naivety of my position was demonstrated a few years back when I went to a Madonna Concert (free tickets from a security guard friend) and was extremely disappointed that she was still able to shock the audience of largely young people by saying "prick and cunt" in public. Is every generation forced to fight the same old tired battles?
I have never understood why some people get so upset about open discussions of human body parts. Of all those offended the religiously inclined surprise me most. Is it not obvious that organized churches must have invented all that anti-sex culture? God must have made us the way we are and made our bits function as they do as part of his divine plan! Sex cannot possibly only be about procreation.... if so we would have been given "heat" cycles like animals. The fact that women have bodies which crave thousands of orgasms during a lifetime when they can at most produce around thirty children must point out that the creator had other motives up his billowing sleeves for our physical experience of joy. For me to be anti-sex is to blaspheme against creation!
I can however understand people getting upset about actions... I fully support anyone who is against rape (not about sex -but a power trip), or anyone who is struggling for a better world. I would ask those who find mere words offensive to ask themselves which is the greater obscenity... the word "Fuck" or what the Taliban are doing to women in Afghanistan? It was surely this perspective that was behind the famous Sixties slogan "make love not war".
That the social changes implied in the "Sixties Revolution" really had represented a serious threat to the established order was graphically illustrated recently by a fantastic documentary about the Black Panthers I saw on ARTE. In this film the ex-head of the C.I.A. openly confirmed, what many of us had suspected for years, that hard drugs had been deliberately introduced into the counter culture movements to kill them off.
Sexual freedoms also represented a major threat to the authorities (read Wilhelm Reich if you want to know why) but their strategy for that one took longer to develop. First there was the "Politically Correct" movement in which prudity came back in fashion, via the back door, disguised as dignity or whatever.... Then, either by accident or design, along came AIDS and suddenly the old order had a smile on its face again. As Reich once put it "Control people's joy and you control people".
I'll leave the last word on this rant to Robin Williamson, (of the Incredible String Band) who reflecting on the Sixties sang:
"I think we were duped, but I don't know yet.
The things that are true I believe them yet,
I've seen the new day beyond the sad sunset,
Looks so fine... Let it shine!"