wmurray42-- Hi Bill. Good to see you out here again. Bill Strauss has already acknowledged your identity and credentials, but let me express a public debt of gratitude to you. When I was first visiting the waza.com site that Jessica Bailey (I hope Jessica is doing well these days--she's one voice I'd love to hear from on these Boards), you very generously encouraged some of the generational research I was trying to provide. Your Time Page is one of my favorite sites on the entire Web, and I'm so glad Bill Strauss could give your site a plug, too.

And in honor of you as one of the few Silent voices we hear from here, I'd like to remind persons of another site, just for Silents, based on Bill and Neil's original work in Generations-- http://www.csulb.edu/~wwwing/Silents/. I hope Jim doesn't mind a few visitors dropping by (and there's another gentleman I'd wish would join us here!)....

Bill-- Thanks for the insights on the Nazi-Christian parallels to bin Laden and Islam, too. History shows many wrongful acts have been done under the auspices of religious fervor and faith, and sometimes, as in Hitler's case, it's just been a convenient shield for a very different set of ideas and aims.

I hope we'll continue to see your thoughts and ideas on this site.

Thanks,
Wes



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Wes Volkenant

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: wesvolk on 2001-09-24 00:07 ]</font>

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: wesvolk on 2001-09-24 00:09 ]</font>

I used the Beastie Boys as an example because theyve kind of ridden the whole Xer youth scene since its emergence in the early 80s.
Theyve gone from being very obscene and immature *License to Ill was originally titled Dont Be a Faggot*
To kind of being elder statesmen of the Gen X music scene.
Plus they put together the Tibetan Music Festivals which was as close as Gen X ever got to a communal Woodstock like moment.
..........................................
I know its totally irrelevant, but when alot of my friends and I were growing up, sex was to be found everywhere. If it wasnt the sound of the neighbors knocking the boots, it was the fact that my friends parents made no effort to hide stacks of playboys and penthouses that were lying around.
The oddest thing was that when I was a kid...my Dad wanted me to see Caddyshack and Cheech and Chong. He purposefully showed me those movies because it was cool and nobody cared back then.
Then I remember when I was 8 he caught me watching something from that late 70s/early 80s TnA era, and he pulled the plug on the HBO.
Whats up with that. One minute Caddyshack and Cheech and Chong and joints and breasts are fun and normal and then their dirty...
You got me.
//////////
Silent parents vs Boomer parents.
Believe it or not, I know alot of kids my age with Silent dads and Boomer moms.
Growing up it was kind of like the Dad did his own thing and the Mom was on the PTA, and involved with community things. I have two friends whos dads fought in the Korean War.
Those guys are definite Xers, even if they were born in 1980.
Having Silent parents must be weird.
My mother was always not a big fan of Silents.
She called them Do Nothings.
But you must look at me like having Boomer parents is weird.
They are a very opinionated and judgemental bunch.
I remember when the Silents were the midlifers.
Being 50 in 1985, was a little different from being 50 in 2000.
I smoked pot with a 50 year old guy this year.
My memory of the Silents in midlife is that they were very drab and stuffy.
Was Captain Kangaroo a Silent?
I know Bob Denver was.
and the cast of Star Trek for the most part.
Such a strange group of people.
Silent women were the most odd. Alot of them seemed depressed that I knew, just very rapped up in the whole looking good-social BS-woman role, yet just totally oppressed by it on the inside.
All my Silent teachers were the coolest. Seriously.
Especially the guys, they were very good listeners, and seemed kind of Xer in a way.
They seemed weak. The Boomer women I know were very strong, kind of fuck you attitude.
and the Boomer men I know...goddamn.
Xers must come to places like the internet to quietly discuss what they think without some loud mouth Gallagher turned Senator that wants to tell you what should be doe, and how it should be done, and who should do it.
Whew. Im done with this rant.

Oh yeah, is 911 the catalyst?
Pretty early to be jumping on that boat.
At first I thought it definitely was, but I am feeling back to normal here in Copenhagen.
My priorities are back sort of where they used to be, and Ive begun to drown out the news again.
Last night I had a conversation with a 1982 cohort. She was very Xer like (had attempted suicide, morbid emotional problems) compared to the millies in the room (the eldest was born in 1987-88)
But she seemed very involved in trying to find a solution to the crisis in America.
The way it has been going, Ive given up on that. I can only watch now.
I felt like saying, you can do only what you can do, so dont worry about it.
Perhaps thats a difference.

I was rather astonished by the '52 poster who argued that GIs were behind civil rights, the antiwar movement, etc., in the 1960s. Silents deserve most of the credit for the Civil Rights movement (the leading GI civil rights leader, Thurgood Marshall, was actually upset by demonstrations and sit-ins: he wanted to work through the courts.) Some GIs (McCarthy, McGovern, Fulbright) took up the anti-war cause, but it was a Silent/Boomer thing. In any case, the major awakening revolt was against GI values--see the movie Getting Straight, or the documentary Berkeley in the 60s, to get a good picture of it. The one GI I can think of who contributed enormously to the Awakening spirit was Joseph Heller and I wish I understood how he could have written Catch-22.

I welcome all the new posters, but at the risk of sounding like a pain-in-the-ass Boomer, I would point out, as others have, that there are many forums on this site where some posts could more naturally fit.

Now, first of all, a column from my local paper to show that the Silent Generation is still alive and well can be found at:

http://www.projo.com/cgi-bin/story.p...n/06234271.htm

In re the Pearl Harbor analogy, if you look into it, you will find that FDR had been talking about the Axis the way Bush is now talking about Bin Laden since the late summer/fall of 1940. That is why I can't really buy that analogy and why I think 1929 is appropriate: we didn't see it coming, and it took years to find a coordinated response.

I have received an email that originated in the Turkish press, arguing that we are planning a two-pronged invasion of Iraq and the occupation of several major Afghan cities. In short, the author seems to think he knows a lot more than any one of do. I'm not saying I believe all this, but it will be interesting to see if anything comes of it.

My own review, published yesterday, of General Wesley Clark's book on the Kosovo war, can be found at
http://www.calendarlive.com/top/1,1419,L-LATimes-Books-X!ArticleDetail-43882,00.html

It could have been subtitled, "War in a Third Turning."

On 2001-09-24 06:43, KaiserD2 wrote:
I was rather astonished by the '52 poster who argued that GIs were behind civil rights, the antiwar movement, etc., in the 1960s.

Just to clarify, my post was in response to a comment from a 1984 early Millenial who feared that his brand of anti-establishment passion would be marginalized in the coming 4T. I think it's clear that there are no rigid lines of demarcation between the generations; one builds upon the other. Hence, I wanted to reassure him that Heroes play an essential role in the emergence of the Prophets, and are not merely their opponents.

As for my "assertion" that the "GIs were behind the civil rights movement," I wrote that the <u>foundations</u> were laid by them (wartime unity is translatable into a quesitoning of the status quo of segregation), but that they lacked the prerequisite anti-establishment fervor to bring it to the nation's consciousness. Certainly the Silent/Boomers were spearheading the passion, but LBJ (GI) is not just the President who pushed for the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution; he also demanded passage of the Voting Rights Act.

I do think it's common to understate the contribution of GIs to the Awakening, and not just as a foil for Boomers. In addition to the names already mentioned, add Dr. Benjamin Spock, frequent war protester; science fiction writers Robert A. Heinlein (Stranger in a Strange Land) and Frank Herbert (Dune) for early foreshadowing of Awakening themes; and many others. And finally, never forget that what Boomers are is what GIs raised us to be. They may not have understood or approved of all the weird ramifications, but they saw the need for change in society early on, being a generation that in its own time fomented a lot of it. The "generation gap" was not a simple thing.


Regarding whether we are now in a 4T, I found an experiment that is useful. Re-read the first few pages of The Fourth Turning, which is describing the mood of the Unraveling era, and see if those words apply to today.

America feels like it?s unraveling.


Though we live in an era of relative peace and comfort, we have settled into a mood of pessimism about the long-term future, fearful that our superpower nation is somehow rotting from within.


Neither an epic victory over Communism nor an extended upswing of the business cycle can buoy our public spirit. The Cold War and New Deal struggles are plainly over, but we are of no mind to bask in their successes. The America of today feels worse, in its fundamentals, than the one many of us remember from youth, a society presided over by those of supposedly lesser consciousness. Wherever we look, from L.A. to D.C., from Oklahoma City to Sun City, we see paths to a foreboding future. We yearn for civic character but satisfy ourselves with symbolic gestures and celebrity circuses. We perceive no greatness in our leaders, a new meanness in ourselves. Small wonder that each new election brings a new jolt, its aftermath a new disappointment.


Not long ago, America was more than the sum of its parts. Now, it is less. Around World War II, we were proud as a people but modest as individuals. Fewer than two people in ten said yes when asked ?Are you a very important person?? Today, more than six in ten say yes. Where we once thought ourselves collectively strong, we now regard ourselves as individually entitled.


Yet even while we exalt our own personal growth, we realize that millions of self-actualized persons don?t add up to an actualized society. Popular trust in virtually every American institution?from businesses and governments to churches and newspapers?keeps falling to new lows. Public debts soar, the middle class shrinks, welfare dependencies deepen, and cultural wars worsen by the year. We now have the highest incarceration rate, and the lowest eligible-voter participation rate, of any major democracy. Statistics inform us that many adverse trends (crime, divorce, abortion, scholastic aptitudes) may have bottomed out, but we?re not reassured.


Optimism still attaches to self, but no longer to family or community. Most Americans express more hope for their own prospects than for their children?s?or the nation?s. Parents widely fear that the American Dream, which was there (solidly) for their parents and still there (barely) for them, will not be there for their kids. Young householders are reaching their mid-thirties never having known a time when America seemed to be on the right track. Middle-aged people look at their thin savings accounts and slim-to-none pensions, scoff at an illusory Social Security trust fund, and try not to dwell on what a burden their old age could become. Seniors separate into their own Leisure World, recoiling at the lost virtue of youth while trying not to think about the future.


We perceive our civic challenge as some vast, insoluble Rubik?s Cube. Behind each problem lies another problem that must be solved first, and behind that lies yet another, and another, ad infinitum. To fix crime we have to fix the family, but before we do that we have to fix welfare, and that means fixing our budget, and that means fixing our civic spirit, but we can?t do that without fixing moral standards, and that means fixing schools and churches, and that means fixing the inner cities, and that?s impossible unless we fix crime. There?s no fulcrum on which to rest a policy lever. People of all ages sense that something huge will have to sweep across America before the gloom can be lifted?but that?s an awareness we suppress. As a nation, we?re in deep denial.


While we grope for answers, we wonder if analysis may be crowding out our intuition. Like the anxious patient who takes 17 kinds of medicine while poring over his own CAT scan, we find it hard to stop and ask: What is the underlying malady really about? How can we best bring the primal forces of nature to our assistance? Isn?t there a choice lying somewhere between total control and total despair? Deep down, beneath the tangle of trend lines, we suspect that our history or biology or very humanity must have something simple and important to say to us. But we don?t know what it is. If we once did know, we have since forgotten.


Wherever we?re headed, America is evolving in ways most of us don?t like or understand. Individually focused yet collectively adrift, we wonder if we?re heading toward a waterfall.

I can't speak for anyone else, but to me, that passage no longer seems to describe the country's mood at all. If I had any doubts we'd crossed the line, that experiment dispelled them.

I would not consider peace protests by civic generation members as proof that the United States is not in a Crisis. In 1933, the students of the Oxford Union voted 275-153 on a resolution stating that they would not ?die for King and Country.? Some of the students who voted for the resolution went on to be decorated RAF pilots during the Blitz.

<Danger! Long, drawn-out opinions ahead!>

William and Neil -- is there any data on the historical *affinity* of one generation for a particular era? Of course many Xers will continue to look to the 70s and early 80s for cultural touchstones -- but as we begin the transition to 4T (and like weather, I don't think we can be more certain than that), I'm finding myself realizing many things about 3T life that I'd taken for granted. Things that I expect to miss. I don't feel like I miss them yet for three reasons:

A) - it isn't gone, just yet. It may be leaving, fast, but the door hasn't slammed shut. Seasons don't change that fast.

B) - As I understand turnings, 3T (or any T) doesn't tend to change all at once, there's a transition, often a lenghty one. The catalyst may mark a turning point, a very visible one, but things still don't change overnight. Think of the artistic movements of the 30's, deco in particular. Very high degree of art in many everyday objects, that stemmed from the Arts & Crafts movement but transcended it completely.

C) As eras turn, things reach a zenith, then trickle out. Yes, immigration is clamped down on (the ultimate example is the Jewish refugee ship from Hamburg (I believe) in the late 30's that was turned away from many ports, including New York. But, that zenith of xenophobia didn't come in 1930, but likely 1938-9. In other words, even the cultural diversity that marks the 3T won't go away, it will merely start it's decline. I think the High is the point where xenophobia will be at an all-time high. At least then we'll have new beatniks (I hope).

That said, I feel the whole (are we in a 3T? Is this the 4T? is itself a very 3T debate. I see it this way, ... we've had a first frost. I don't know if the snow is going to stick, or if we've got some winter weather on the way. But, I do know that winter is coming, it's not summer anymore.

Also, based on my own very biased opinion, the music of the early Unraveling is far more diverse, exciting, engaging and, well, just a purer form of what it's trying to be than the music of the early Awakening. (This is *not* an attempt to reopen the culture wars, assuming they've been closed.) Take for example the early Who, circa 1966. Great stuff, to be certain, but far, far less consistent than anything similar out of the early 80s. For every "Whisky Man" (summed up their style perfectly) there was a "Boris the Spider". By contrast, Lloyd Cole and the Commotions, the Jam (yes, I know they were Who clones on the surface), or any one of the other hundreds of bands that, to quote the Beat Farmers, "picked up guitars and rode in search of the truth." (which of course is a very Awakening statement).

I can remember the dawn of the 3T very clearly now -- even though I had no idea it was actually any type of 'turning.' In "Generations" terms it was merely an "inner driven era" which was nondescript enough to completely let me gloss over what that meant. At the time I read it (1991) it struck me as merely one of those labels that can apply easily to multiple times, so no sense into me figuring out what it meant. And the upcoming Xer/Boom debate sounded like more fun than anything esle, it was annoying waking up in their shadow, I was itching for a little action I guess. Part of that is becuase in many ways the Unraveling was my 'home' era. I'd like to isolate those objective qualities that make a 3T so nice from those things I have an affinity for simply because they're "mine." It would be interesting to see how other Reactive generations have, well, reacted.

But, things like a very open culture (movies, ethnic foods, especially music) were things I thought would never, ever change. Before 1979, music seemed so incredible stale, no sense of irony, it was hard to take. I can remember in 1979 when the first rumblings of a new musical style were coming across the Atlantic (I beleive the Punk riots in London were primarily Awakening phenomena -- sheer conjecture on my part), and there was an almost violent reaction here in the states, coupled with a 'nail-it-in-the-coffin' attitude of "Hey, Punk is as dead as Disco". There was a palpable sense of, to me, an incredible new combination: Here was a way to annoy people merely by showing them how things were going to change! And they really hated it! Even the skinny new-wave ties drew sharp criticisms from our next-elders. By the time things literally exploded in 1982, things *were* changing. Now entire new genres were taking off, homemade record labels, spin-off bands with spin-off bands themselves! Irony and annoyance aplenty. This cultural attitude affected the cinema as well, so that now by the end of the 90's we have independent film festivals that are themselves a sneak-preview for the majors. In many ways, the entire sense of 'weird' (bad) has been replaced by 'ironic' (good). I know I'll miss that as it drifts away. I do think the 3T is/was a high point for cultural irony, but as I mentioned, I don't believe irony will immediately leave the arena, it's simply on the way out.

As any cultural trend is on the wane, it's still possible to create some of the most shining examples of that trend (the annoying and non-ironic music of U2 on the Joshua Tree is an excellent example of Awakening era music, even though I hated it compared to the much more ironic and deliberately annoying Achtung Baby) -- but they'll have to be good to be noticed. Maybe something else will come by that makes "Nevermind" look less galvanizing by comparison. It could happen.

When did the 3T start? Is it the Election of 1984 as the authors suggest? To answer that is to answer whether or not we're in a 4T right now -- to which I say 1979 had some 3T weather rolling in, but then like early-morning fog, it burned off by the summer. 1980 had some more weather (first punk stores appear on Melrose Ave. in L.A.), but by 1983, at least in Los Angeles, the weather had changed. Naling down the precise moment of a national, major cultural shift isn't like plotting the lines on the football field, and therefore the weather analogy fits best, better even than a theoretical calendar.

As far as who has won, or is winning the culture wars, I'm sure it's just like last time (1920s) -- setbacks and advances for both sides.

Listening to various reports of Arab opinions of recent events, I am left pondering several points.

While we may (or may not) be uniting into a fourth turning mode, the Middle East seems still to be unraveling. Views from that part of the world seem many and varied. While there are certainly many other factors involved in the militant Islamic community?s culture, the militant movement was forged fighting the Soviets in the recent Awakening. They are displeased that the focused holy fervor of the Awakening has dissolved into the diversity and decadence of Unraveling. Naturally, they would seek someone to blame (corruption from the west) rather than seeing decadence as part of a natural expected progression. This is not to excuse their acts, but just trying to get into their perspective. From a T4T perspective, they are trying to halt the tide. Intense Awakening level fervor would be viewed as the natural state of mind to a fundamentalist who came of age in an Awakening. Aging hippies remembering fondly the Summer of Love might understand a desire to freeze the clock. However, the militants will not halt an unraveling using bombs. They might trigger an early crisis. I suspect, from their perspective, that they triggered the wrong population.

There are issues in the Middle East that we would address using secular language, which their more religious culture is addressing in religious terms. We might speak of civil rights, religious tolerance, imperialism, and economics. They would look at the same situations and see unbelievers blaspheming holy ground, or the word of God being ignored. Western politicians and many main line Muslim clerics have been denouncing radical calls for jihad as ?bad Islam,? and repeat assurances that Islam is a religion of peace. However, I would not entirely dismiss religious based calls for justice without first striving to translate the core of the complaint into Christian or liberal language. Again, this is not to excuse their deeds, but to attempt to understand where they are coming from. Still, it is not uncommon for religious individuals seeing injustice to claim God sees the same injustice, and strive to stamp it out. Our Gray Champions are not alone in speaking in God?s name, in attributing their own thoughts to God.

The irreconcilable difference is between western freedom of religion and Islamic religious police. While the Taliban practice a very extreme form, in many parts of the Middle East both church and state enforce religious laws. (Our own system of laws evolved from religious law, as well.) From a western perspective, it seems obvious that varied religious, ethnic and racial groups are going to have to learn to tolerate each other?s life styles and ways of seeking God. From another point of view, if Islamic culture is to remain intact, if any are to remain who follow God?s true ways, then corrupting western influences must be walled out or destroyed. While other problems seem open to plausible compromise, assuming parties interested in compromise, this cultural difference seems pretty basic. Given the Internet and Satellite TV systems, walling out the west will be a difficult project in the long term.

Up until recently, I considered the Waco, Ruby Ridge, OKC internal spiral of violence as being domestic and entirely independent of the Middle East spiral of violence. Tim McVeigh, however, was a Gulf War veteran whose hatred of the US federal government began with his viewing the situation in the Middle East. In philosophy as well as in violence, the two spirals seem no longer entirely independent. On the other hand, if McVeigh had links to both the Middle East and the conservative militias, I would not pretend to see links between the Middle East militants and the conservative militias. On the contrary, I?d think the terrorists might want to steer clear of militia country.

I?m not sure we can go anywhere with any of the above. I?ll make a token attempt.

Let?s assume US culture mixes military, economic, liberal, religious and ecological value systems, among others. Recent events have raised military issues of security several steps higher in importance at the expense of the other value systems. However, I expect the other four sets of values contain the seeds of the violence. The lack of security has underlying causes. If this is truly the beginning of the crisis, we will likely have to see how effective the terrorists long term campaign might be, and how effective the coalition counterattacks. I don?t anticipate much addressing of underlying causes while the balance of power between terrorists and coalition remains unknown.

I haven't read all of the posts on this subject (58 pages worth!) but I wanted to mention something. I think that overall a 4T will be marked less historically by what we do (e.g. all out war) and more by the changes in our culture caused by the events. For example, our culture today is marked less by WW2 and more by the effect of industrialization, mass commoditization, etc.

To that end I'd just like to make a couple of points about possible changes in our culture as a result of a "war on terrorism" and its inevitable blow/counter-blow:

http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/ne...llsn092301.htm
Larry Ellison (Oracle) proposes national ID card system; polls
indicate Americans strongly support such a system

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk_...00/1559245.stm
British Home Secretary considering compulsory identity cards
despite growing opposition to them

I've also read about new technologies being considered such as those that could do face-matching out of a multimillion face database in less than 10 seconds, concerns over encryption, etc.

I would suggest we think about the changes that are coming over the next 20 years as opposed to the possibilities in the next 20 months...

I realize this is pages and pages ago, but I wanted to put in a plug for Jenny Genser:

She is exactly right on with her "9/11/71" supposition, IMHO. You hear a few 3T murmurings (from Falwell, Robertson, Sontag, etc.) of how we brought this on ourselves; but you would no doubt have heard a lot more from the very Boomers who are now clamoring loudest for war in 1971. (The fact that they would have had to fight in that war then, and now can sit at home and watch it on CNN, being of course a complete coincidence.)

And knowing the inner rage (expressed more in the ballot box and commentary than in street demonstrations, per their type) many Silents expressed over "Tricky Dick," you would not have found anywhere near the unity and will to fight an unseen enemy that the country is now seeing.

I am Ivory soap (99.44%) sure that this is 4T, but it's not because of the event itself -- it's because of America's collective REACTION to the event. Jenny's post helps focus us both on that key to S&H and how the generational line-up makes for such fascinating dynamics in that reaction.

As this 3T/4T debate goes on I would encourage anybody who would like to look beyond the anecdotal a little bit, and closer at how the actual numbers stack up according to theory, to check out the Generations and Turnings by the Numbers thread here:

http://www.fourthturning.com/forums/...=199&forum=6&9

btw, anybody remember "mood rings" back in the '70s? Sure could use one now, huh? :lol:

JustinLong mentions? I've also read about new technologies being considered such as those that could do face-matching out of a multimillion face database in less than 10 seconds, concerns over encryption, etc.

Agreed. New technology including retina scan, fingerprint sensors and facial recognition software combined with Internet access to large data bases could vastly change the problem of keeping illegal aliens out of supposedly secure areas. Such technology could also raise significant civil liberties problems, though at the moment this may seem to be the lesser concern. An investment in such technology that would secure against terror would also make a significant dent against crime. This could be a significant mid-term impact.

The US government also wants to continue freely reading telephone and e-mail traffic. Available software could block this, at least on the e-mail side. Long term, technology will make communications secure, which some worry could make us less secure. We have grown greatly dependent on signal intelligence.

The right to privacy might short term come under siege. Right now I?m not in such a mood to throw a tantrum if it starts to happen.

On 2001-09-24 10:26, robocooper wrote:

I'm glad that I generally agree with the other poster with my name and birthyear.

The only slight amplification on his remarks, would be that in 1979, there was a feeling that he perceives as a Third Turning, but that I had perceived as that of a Fourth Turning. I remember growing up hearing about the national mood after Pearl Harbor, and thought I saw some of that mood at the end of 1979.

At that time, there were the US hostages held by the government of Iran, which was accompanied by people flying the flag, a generally patriotic mood, and by formerly apolitical Gen-X'ers drawing anti-Iranian graffitti. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan , which soon followed reinforced that mood, of the nation being close to a war.

That mood was followed by the election of a new President, and a new agenda. S&H place that era (end of 1979 to 1983) as the counter wave of a Second Turning, where conservative youth are energized and a society in flux still grapples with ideas and philosophies.

The political infighting 22 years ago was set aside for maybe 2 months. After that the idealogical challenge to President Carter by Ted Kennedy became apparent again, while Reagan emerged from the fray of several Republican challengers to take on a weakened Carter, and restore confidence in America.

Clearly, 13 days is too soon to conclude whether the national mood has changed for an era, or for a short while, but this time it looks like a Fourth Turning.

On 2001-09-24 09:28, Brian Rush wrote:



I can't speak for anyone else, but to me, that passage no longer seems to describe the country's mood at all. If I had any doubts we'd crossed the line, that experiment dispelled them.

Thanks Brian - doing that experiment, in addition to convincing me that Winter is here (not that we won't have some more warm days in the next few years, maybe even an Indian Summer) also crystallized something else for me.

For all that we're going to have to resist, change and topple many elements of the therapeutic Silent culture that made our 3T, re-reading that post made me appreciate how the harvest time prepares us for the winter. More than ever, we must realize how dependent everything is on everything else - how the 3T, for all we might deplore it's excesses, was necessary to prepare us for the Fourth.

Not long ago, America was more than the sum of its parts. Now, it is less. Around World War II, we were proud as a people but modest as individuals. Fewer than two people in ten said yes when asked ?Are you a very important person?? Today, more than six in ten say yes. Where we once thought ourselves collectively strong, we now regard ourselves as individually entitled. Yet even while we exalt our own personal growth, we realize that millions of self-actualized persons don?t add up to an actualized society.

Optimism still attaches to self, but no longer to family or community. Most Americans express more hope for their own prospects than for their children?s?or the nation?s. Parents widely fear that the American Dream, which was there (solidly) for their parents and still there (barely) for them, will not be there for their kids

When it comes down to facing the challenges of the 4T who's to be the ones who have to face it? The members of the 3 "spoiled" post-WWII generations who spent the last 20 years of peace building up enormous reservoir or self-confidence. I don't think even the authors realized that that self-confidence is the true "harvest" of the Third Turning. We're going to be facing some tough challenges in the years ahead and it's going to take all those reserves to get us through. Our society becomes a cohesive civic unit in the 4T BECAUSE OF, not despite, the fact that we as individuals believe that we can do anything.

Boomers: They've spent their whole lives feeling vaguely guilty that they never measured up to "The Greatest Generation" but incredibly confident that they were the apotheosis of humanity. At least part of the Generation Gap of the '60's was Prophets looking up to their Heroic parents and sensing in them the hands that could build the incredible visions that they could only see. The fact that the GI's wouldn't listen was the source of their frustration.

Now that Boomers are in positions of true power (something that will only deepen as the years move on) they are sensing in the Crisis and the Millenials a new chance to implement their visions with a young, strong group of hands to build it. We will need their confident, clear vision in the days ahead - their whole lives have been building up to the moment when they could take the mantle of Gray Champion.

X'ers: The wild, fragmented Nomads who danced through the Unravelling in a wildly individualistic culture. What lives in them is the belief that they as an individual can cut through the nonsense, do what needs to be done and be effective - even if it's only on a small scale.

The Crisis offers them - at last - something to believe in that's bigger than themselves. X'ers have always known that if we could just find one thing that would make all our hands move in the same direction, we could make our mark on history - we're just that good. Once Boomers coalesce their fragment 3T Culture Wars into a cohesive goal, a lever, they will hand that goal to us collectively and say "bring us this!" Xers will take that lever, set it in just the right place - and move the world.

Millenials - We were worried in the 3T that these pampered, spoiled children would be too soft to be the shock troops of the Crisis. They won't be. Like every Hero Generation, they'll be asked to grow up a little sooner than they might want to - but they were raised with the idea that there wasn't anything they couldn't do if they worked together - now they'll have to prove it.

And Silents? - They will be derided for holding back during the 4T, but their over-medicated, over therapied, over-analyzed 3T culture is what GAVE us the confidence to do what needs to be done. Once again, the subtle gifts of the Artist will go unnoticed and unappreciated.

Every generation works to fill in the gaps that they percieve in the world around them - and the generation with the most massive insecurity problems and feelings of inferiority rebuilt society in the 3T to help them overcome it. It might not have worked on them, but it did wonders for those who were younger than they were. Let's hope they harvested all we'll need to get us through the coming storm.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Delsyn on 2001-09-24 13:37 ]</font>

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Delsyn on 2001-09-24 13:41 ]</font>

Smcd posts: Actually Barbara, if Straus and Howe are right and this is the fourth turning going against the grain is not wise. I believe that the reaction to the peace protests will tell for sure whether this is the fourth turning. If the Peace Protests do for the left what Jerry Falwell's comments did for the religious right. By this I mean marginalize it, then I will be convinced this is the fourth turning.

Respectfully, to Smcd and anyone else trying to intimate that anyone shut up their voices of what you might call dissent but what is in fact only debate and discourse, out of fear or concern for others' safety or otherwise, I guide you to President Bush's words to Congress last week:

"Americans are asking, why do they hate us? They hate what we see right here in this chamber -- a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other...I ask you to uphold the values of America, and remember why so many have come here. We are in a fight for our principles, and our first responsibility is to live by them."

Further, I was not aware that S&H had posted a definitive YES, we are in a 4T. The last I heard, they were still being true to their original assertion, that I agree with, that we cannot know now.

I also respectfully disagree that the Peace Protests be a marker for whether we have turned to the Crisis or not. If anything, it would be an indication of where a faction of the Millies (and the nation) stand in their coming of age years. Again, we are all enjoying the debate, but it is prediction only, gambling. Hindsight is not possible for a long time to come. Bobc makes a good point about 1979 and the similarities in mood and, although unlike him I am not yet willing to say YES to 4T, 13 days is clearly too early to tell, especially for me who has seen 25,550 days and counting.

BTW, going against the grain is never wise if your aim is to be sheep. And I doubt Falwell's and Robertson's remarks hurt the Religious Right one bit. Actually, I've been thinking about that more. Had Falwell mentioned all he did, but couched it in terms of what the Taliban or bin Laden thinks as opposed to what he and his espouse, NO ONE would have objected to him. Interesting quirk there......

Poor Smcd unwittingly got me on a roll, I'm afraid.

You know, in this current terrorist "war", I have been struck by something which today was voiced by a reporter to Press Secretary Ari Fleischer as a question, to paraphrase: "Aren't you asking us to trust you, yet not providing any evidence for that trust?" Stonewall and others have alluded to this, and I now add my voice.

The press again today, obviously buoyed by many conflicting global reports as they've worked to find news that the Bush Admin won't give, spent a good many minutes on this subject. I admit, I'd been rather negative about Bush's Admin refusing to share with other nations the evidence against bin Laden. Now, they are saying they will share, but that prior -- shall I call it -- arrogance has bothered me greatly.

That, and the executive order Bush presented Congress as to his "war" powers, written in the BROADEST possible terms, almost seemed like a gameplay to me. A most overreaching one, IMO. At best, he didn't know the respectful protocal? I doubt it. It was meant to put Congress in a clear position to not be able to protest. Games, games. But, I do hand it to him, it worked, gamepoint Bush.

Day by day, it appears to me that this whole idea of "war" is such a far stretch, so blustering, bluffing, arrogant, and impatient, which I wouldn't really care except that the behavior represents ME by virtue of representing America. I have up to now tried to refrain from posting my suspicions, in an attempt to be trusting and fair and united. But I am growing weary of this blind trust, this knee-jerk warmongering, even in the face of this mortal wound we have been dealt.

It sometimes seems to me that the Bush Admin reacts as if 911 had been a personal, private assualt on Bush himself. And, in light of Bush the Elder's complicity through his CIA association and leadership in creating these current-day Arab demons, aka Saddam and Ussama, I'm not ruling that possibility out, in a ironic gallows humor sort of way. While I am NOT predisposed AT ALL to suggesting that Bush caused by ordering or ignoring knowledge of the attacks, sometimes I do possess a nagging thought that the attacks were not so much a message to America as a message to him, or that it was both.

Additionally, I also would feel more trusting of the surface facts were things not to be SO MUCH in Bush the Younger's political favor NOW. Coincidence? And a coincidence that Bush the Elder played the same bet during his term? Before the 911 attack, Bush the Younger was vascillating and floating in the political wind, as we may recall, and our economy was already cracking at the seams. No matter how one feels about partisan politics or the particular politicians, is this a way to gain the advantage? I look at the Republican Party's behavior up to now, and that is not encouraging. I look at how Hero Giuliani steadfastly handles the daily, hourly pestering at him to even discuss a term limits reform so he can be Mayor again. That DOES encourage me. Congressional minority members who forge ahead and ask the Patriotically Incorrect questions - THAT encourages me.

As to Stonewall's assertion of fact that we had indeed had these very terrorist items on our defense plate prior to 911, I agree it looks rather plausible that 911 could indeed have been a response to some kind of secret, classified intervention. Especially the travel warning issued the weekend before. And, I carry the nagging thought further, was it an unforeseen response to some behind-the-scene bungling of relations or intervention on our part. Some may reply these are moot nagging thoughts, but here we are consistently trying to predict 4T events that can only be known in hindsight. I therefore contend the floor is open to all debative aspects with no known answers, and without the implication that the dissenters love this country one ioda less than those who go along with the get along.

As to Bush's Congressional address the other night, many in the media and some here brought up the question of why he did not mention Communism, and that if it was to not provoke China then was that wimpy or wise. That 'ommission' didn't much bother me at all, and I thought it probably wise to omit the word. Fascism and totalitarianism were broad enough terms to my mind. What struck ME as slightly disingenuious (though I do understand and agree why he didn't) was the reasons Bush gave for the attack, in answering the abstract questions posed by Americans. Not one time did he mention free-market capitalism, the ability to go anywhere on this globe and entrench ourselves like it's our divine right. That global criticism was not addressed, nor was the already well-documented contention that we continue a militaristic presence in Saudi holyland. I assume I know why there weren't mentioned, as that invites introspection, and that was not the intended message of that speech. But it was an official repsonse that says to some these things don't matter, and when discussing only the extremely out of proportion attack, then rightly so. However, were we to have not done 3 things: side with Israel, promote US corporate globalism and consequently promote the American culture, and maintain militaristic presences in holy lands, I seriously doubt we'd have been or continue to be a terrorist target of this magnitude.

So, that leaves to address this fact: we have done what we've done, and here we are. We are apparently staying the course of our decisions. Were this a clear enemy as we have faced in the past, I'd have no nagging thoughts whatsoever, no matter how I personally feel about those 3 things we've done. But, this isn't a war that can be won. It can be posed to look like it has been, again and again, but the threat, the war will remain. We'll win the battles, but not the war. Therefore, the time will eventually come to have to address these 3 issues and do something about them, if we are to be truly free of death and destruction by lotto.

Bob Butler speaks good words, to wit: Let?s assume US culture mixes military, economic, liberal, religious and ecological value systems, among others. Recent events have raised military issues of security several steps higher in importance at the expense of the other value systems. However, I expect the other four sets of values contain the seeds of the violence. The lack of security has underlying causes. If this is truly the beginning of the crisis, we will likely have to see how effective the terrorists long term campaign might be, and how effective the coalition counterattacks. I don?t anticipate much addressing of underlying causes while the balance of power between terrorists and coalition remains unknown. Bingo to that last sentence especially.

Oh, and Delsyn's last post: positive comments toward Silents are welcome here, as they are few and far between, so thank you. I think the oft-mentioned comments about Boomer bashing are old hat now. But, more importantly, this was a great idea you have, Delsyn, and the only truly wise one because, frankly, every generation has its hideous warts.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Barbara on 2001-09-24 14:01 ]</font>

A Link to A Prophet Past on the matters at hand.


With apologies to Gilbert & Sullivan; the Rev. Robertson and Rev. Falwell look like "terrified amateurs". HTH

Susan said(a long time ago)" As to your concerns about continuing 3T behavior, don't be surprised. Stauss & Howe compare turnings to seasons. You don't just suddenly go from summer to fall, or from fall to winter overnight."

well, you do in Chicago. :smile:

Okay, now I have to catch up on the other 56 pages of messages in this thread. (I lose access to the internet for two weeks and look what happens!)

angeli



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: angeli on 2001-09-24 14:45 ]</font>

I'm not going to quote Skytrax's long essay, but simply argue with the Silent reaction to the 911. I for one kept right on working, cleaning house, wrote a check for the Red Cross, tried to get through to the blood bank, ordered new windows for my house from my across-the-street neighbor who is from India, wrote a letter to the college paper (I work at a university) urging that we find out precisely who ordered this atrocity before we jump, and on the way to church mentally wrote a blessing on each generation facing this thing. I guess that's just sitting and staring in too much shock to get off my fat 60-something ass.

A few thoughts.

One indication we are in 4T is the sudden disappearance of the boomer-bashing that used to run rampant on this site. Maybe Xers and Boomers finally figured out they must use each other's strengths in this crisis instead of sniping on each other's weaknesses. Likewise, Boomers of both red and blue zone leanings realize they must do the same.

I noticed something strange about Crises (and Highs), supposedly the two culturally blandest turnings. While music and forms of mass entertainment homogenize and lose their spice, visual art does the opposite. In fact, it flourishes, especially during Highs. The Renaissance was a High, not an Awakening as many believe, and produced many of today's recognized great artists, sculptors, and architects. DaVinci, of course, was also a man of science (a true "renaissance man"), who also designed precision machines, including an airplane, and texts on human anatomy that are still used by medical students.

The Great Power crisis produced the likes of "Persistence of Memory" by Salvador Dali, "Guernica" by Picasso (probably his best known painting), surrealist/dadaist works by Miro, and Paul Klee. During the American High, abstract expressionism exploded with works by GIs Jackson Pollack, Willem DeKooning, Francis Bacon (the guy who painted disturbing paintings of sides of beef), and Mark Rothko. None of these painters was a feel-good Norman Rockwell; all produced works that were disturbing rather than pretty, abstract and nonrepresentational rather than realistic, and highly individualistic. All these High-era painters were GIs (the Crisis era painters were mainly Lost), presumably those, like Craig, who did not feel they fit into the generational norm that was expected of them. They expressed their frustration with society through their works.

Perhaps the reason why visual art (including architecture) flourish during Crises and Highs is that these are both hands-on, "building"-type activities that Heroes are naturally so good at.

In contrast, music and filmed entertainment flourish during Awakenings and Unravellings, but fine visual arts are less distinguished and find a much smaller audience.

Any thoughts?

Barbara says? As to Stonewall's assertion of fact that we had indeed had these very terrorist items on our defense plate prior to 911, I agree it looks rather plausible that 911 could indeed have been a response to some kind of secret, classified intervention. Especially the travel warning issued the weekend before. And, I carry the nagging thought further, was it an unforeseen response to some behind-the-scene bungling of relations or intervention on our part. Some may reply these are moot nagging thoughts, but here we are consistently trying to predict 4T events that can only be known in hindsight. I therefore contend the floor is open to all debative aspects with no known answers, and without the implication that the dissenters love this country one iota less than those who go along with the get along.

Did FDR deliberately withhold advance knowledge of Pearl Harbor from the commanders there, to guarantee national unity? Did Lincoln order Ft. Sumter defiantly held to provoke an incident that would justify his calling up troops? Who, at Lexington Green, really fired the shot heard round the world?

I don?t know. My company?s ?The Security Connection? bulletin, July-September 2001, has the headline ?U.S. Remains ?Target of Choice? for International Terrorists.? The text includes? ?The statement was a reaffirmation of a May 11 warning that American citizens abroad may be the target of a terrorist threat from extremist groups with links to Osama bin Laden?s AlQaida organization? The warning comes on the heels of an annual State Dept. report that says global terrorist attacks rose 8 percent last year and terrorists are looking for easier targets as the U.S. government moves to improve security at U.S. installations abroad? (!) The report shows that 19 Americans were killed in terrorist attacks last year ? 17 died in the October terrorist bombing of the destroyer U.S.S. Cole in Aden harbor, Yemen.?

I don?t know. There was a vague alert coming before the attacks, but the location and scale were way off. It is too easy to see vulnerabilities with 20 20 hindsight. Give Tom Clancy the 20-20 foresight award, then move on. Perhaps the sort of conspiracy theorists trying to blame FDR for Pearl Harbor will shift their attention to Dubya until Day of Infamy III. Perhaps we ought to add conspiracy theories related to catalyst and trigger events as a formal part of T4T theory. However, historically, if the Establishment has ever really been to blame, the conspiracy theorists have never been able to nail the sitting administration firmly. My thought is that conjecture along this line might best wait a few years.

While I am not opposed entirely to Barbara?s opening the floor to debates on such subject, and reluctant to disagree with one who emphasized the core of my own view, she has provided an excuse to quote Churchill. Having quoted Jefferson, FDR and Lincoln recently, I?ve been looking for an excuse to go with Churchill.

I am not reciting these facts for the purpose of recrimination. That I judge to be utterly futile and even harmful. We cannot afford it. I recite them in order to explain why it was we did not have, as we could have had, between twelve and fourteen British divisions fighting in the line in this great battle instead of only three. Now I put all this aside. I put it on the shelf, from which the historians, when they have time, will select their documents to tell their stories. We have to think of the future and not of the past. This also applies in a small way to our own affairs at home. There are many who would hold an inquest in the House of Commons on the conduct of the Governments-and of Parliaments, for they are in it, too-during the years which led up to this catastrophe. They seek to indict those who were responsible for the guidance of our affairs. This also would be a foolish and pernicious process. There are too many in it. Let each man search his conscience and search his speeches. I frequently search mine.

Of this I am quite sure, that if we open a quarrel between the past and the present, we shall find that we have lost the future. Therefore, I cannot accept the drawing of any distinctions between Members of the present Government. It was formed at a moment of crisis in order to unite all the Parties and all sections of opinion. It has received the almost unanimous support of both Houses of Parliament. Its Members are going to stand together, and, subject to the authority of the House of Commons, we are going to govern the country and fight the war. It is absolutely necessary at a time like this that every Minister who tries each day to do his duty shall be respected; and their subordinates must know that their chiefs are not threatened men, men who are here today and gone tomorrow, but that their directions must be punctually and faithfully obeyed. Without this concentrated power we cannot face what lies before us. I should not think it would be very advantageous for the House to prolong this Debate this afternoon under conditions of public stress. Many facts are not clear that will be clear in a short time. We are to have a secret Session on Thursday, and I should think that would be a better opportunity for the many earnest expressions of opinion which Members will desire to make and for the House to discuss vital matters without having everything read the next morning by our dangerous foes.

It is the last paragraph, however, of this speech, which is remembered?

What General Weygand called the Battle of France is over. I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British life, and the long continuity of our institutions and our Empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us. Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this Island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was their finest hour."

Feel free to visit http://www.winstonchurchill.org I do from time to time. Perhaps this is why I was dissapointed by Dubya's recent efforts. Some of these guys were really good...

Forgive me, I'm quoting Lis from long ago:

"Three, you are correct, few people [in the red zone] think in terms of Turnings, but they do think in terms of Winter, and there has been a lot of pre-Winter thinking here that I have seen little or no evidence of in the blue zone. "

If you want to look at pre-Winter thinking in the blue zone, don't look at the talking heads of the blue zone. Look at the labor unions and radical Catholic priests and the Xer parents trying to keep their kids out of the gangs in a large blue-zone city like Chicago.

Last summer (for various reasons) I found myself covering a strike at a cheese factory. The Boomer teamsters and the Latino Xer non-union workers and day laborers and the Millennial anti-sweatshop students from Loyola university all marched around together. It was all about a love-fest, where the white guys and the immigrants and the middle class students all talked about economic justice and human rights abuses in sweatshops and organizing to make it happen.

Blue-zone liberal pre-seasonal behavior is present and accounted for, but the 3T media hasn't noticed it much.

Angeli! Welcome back! I was wondering where you went and I am glad that it was something as relatively minor as lack of Internet access. I missed your quick wit and knack for pithy phrasing.

Susan, those are really excellent points about visual arts florishing during a high. I thing the one thing we all need to keep in mind is that this 4T will not be WWII and the Great Depression and the next 1T will not be the Eisenhower Era. Boomers are not Missionaries and will not set the stage for anything that comparatively repressive. Besides, the really repressive part of the 1950's only lasted until Kennedy's election. It was a short-lived reaction to horror and upheaval and could not be sustained.

Oh, I give up. I'll never catch up on this thread.

My thoughts.

Northwestern is having a memorial right now. I'm skipping it. I'm kind of memorialed out. My neighborhood had one. Loyola University (in my neighborhood) had one. The chuch accross the street had one. My church (2nd Unitarian) had one. My regular literary reading group had one. The City of Chicago had one. I sang with some friends at a picnic at a high school for the developmentally disabled this weekend. They had one too. (at least there were hot dogs).

Lest this sound post-seasonal and cynical of me, I'd like to say that for me, personally, the Crisis started in Prague two years ago, with the bombing of Kosovo and the bomb threats on Americans and the neo-Nazis chasing me all over the place, and everything getting very weird over there. It felt like we were standing on the edge of a wide, vast sea of trouble, still holding on to the West by our pinkies.

I came home to an America that didn't know and didn't want to know that there was trouble out there. And being back here was very good and very weird all at the same time.

Now America has caught up to me.

I think this is the 4T, largely because that's people are reacting to it like a 4T. Yes it's early and yes that's probably bad, though I've been expecting an early crisis since Bill Clinton got elected.

It's not the danger that has changed. It's the perception of the danger. The awareness of danger. And some will carry on 3T -like regardless. Remember Casablanca, Rick sticking his head out for nobody right up til '41. But even Rick was aware that the world around him was full of danger.

Danger was already out there and nobody knew, nobody cared, nobody really wanted to know or care. And I couldn't really blame us, because I knew it was bad out there. I wanted to forget and a little bit I did forget.

I read David Brin's The Postman (no, not the horrible Kevin Costner movie, the book which is a thing of beauty) eight times in a row the first month I was back. I mean finished it, turned it over, opened to the first page and read it again. Eight times.

There's a little speech in it about America I just love And I've been having my own private little patriotic kick, getting a lift whenever I see the United States Postal Service for two years. But not mentioning it often. I thought it was geeky.

But mostly I forgot.

One of the things I forgot is what I knew about the Taliban, which is kind of strange. It was on Oprah and figured in the feminist press and the V-Day celebrations against violence against women.

I interviewed refugees from Afghanistan while I was in Europe. The horrible things that they do to women hasn't really much caught the attention of mainstream news here. Their first victims were their own countrymen and women who didn't support their own extremist view of Islam.

And I forgot that we had all these weapons being funnelled to the war in Kashmir because when the Cold War was over we just ditched stuff there.

I guess I kind of liked my Indian Summer there.

And I'm sorry it's gone. I've been pre-seasonal for a while, you realise. It's not that I'll miss my wild sexual exploits and high rolling life. :razz: It's more like I liked peace. A lot.

And so I have to say that my weekly limit of memorial services is at least 4 and I exceeded it. It's not that I don't care. It's that I'm going to enjoy these last rays of sunshine because when night really falls I'll be sorry if I didn't.