Of late

Of late there has been a new spirit manifested in the youth which is growing up with the depression. This spirit is more purposeful though still confused. It wants to create a new world, but is not clear as to how it wants to go about it. For that reason the young generation asks for saviors. It tends to believe in dictators and to hail each new aspirant for that honor as a messiah. It wants cut and dried systems of salvation with a wise minority to direct society on some one-way road to utopia. It has not yet realized that it must save itself. The young generation has not yet learned that the problems confronting them can be solved only by themselves and will have to be settled on the basis of social and economic freedom in co-operation with the struggling masses for the right to the table and joy of life.

– Emma Goldman, “Was my life worth living?” Harper’s Monthly Magazine, v. 170, December 1934.

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One Comment

  1. Posted 5/22/2009 at 1:45 pm | Permalink

    And yet, Generation X used to get regularly trashed because we shunned the cut and dried and embraced the gray areas and complexities of life; tried to integrate within the society we had found making changes on an individual basis instead of seeking to stand up with a megaphone and lead the crowd; and because we believe(d?) that ultimately, the solution to any problem lies in our own hands, not in the hands of leaders of any stripe. I’m inclined to agree with Caprica 6. All of this has happened before, and all of it will happen again.

    o/` The wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round… o/`

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