[lbo-talk] kids today

[Mark Bennett]

I read "Steal This Book" in high school in the early '70s, but I only knew
one other student who also read it - and he stole it from me.  On the other
hand, just about everyone was reading, or had read, "The Lord of The
Rings".  If the Harry Potter and Meyer series had been around then I'd
venture to say that they would have been just as popular as they are now.
Three students in my high school did put out a couple of issues of an
"underground" newspaper, based upon some of the radical military newspapers
that were floating around at the time (some of which were pretty damn
radical).  The students were expelled, ostensibly for smoking dope, but
everyone knew it was because the paper.

On Fri, Mar 6, 2009 at 11:25 AM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:


> <http://gawker.com/5165556/college-radicalism-replaced-by-tucker-max>
>
> KIDS THESE DAYS
> College Radicalism Replaced by Tucker Max
> By Hamilton Nolan, 12:25 PM on Fri Mar 6 2009, 4,421 views
>
> Back in the sixties, college kids read books—books about revolution and sex
> and drugs. Today, college kids read Harry Potter books and whine about cops
> touching their Macbooks. Who's responsible? Tucker Max.
>
> A cranky old Sixties guy in the Washington Post points out that in less
> than two generations, college kids have gone from "Steal This Book" to
> "Pretend Vampire Stories."
>
> According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the best-selling titles on
> college campuses are mostly about hunky vampires or Barack Obama. Recently,
> Meyer [the author of the Twilight series] and the president held six of the
> 10 top spots. In January, the most subversive book on the college bestseller
> list was "Our Dumb World," a collection of gags from the Onion. The top
> title in January was "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" by J.K. Rowling.
>
> This whiny Sixties guy happens to be right! Even the cool kids today are
> still reading the same books that they wrote back then. This generation has
> jack shit, except an ultimately pointless internet fascination, on the one
> hand, and frat icons, on the other. Here's one "lit mag" undergrad editor at
> Kent State:
>
> "People think we're really liberal," he says, "but we're really very
> moderate." Submissions to the lit mag so far this year are mostly poetry and
> some memoirs about parents. "The one book that I know everyone has read," he
> says, "is 'I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell.' "
>
> From Malcolm X to Tucker Max, just like that. Thank god Dr. Gonzo's not
> around to see this.
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