How The Music Of The 60’s Influenced The Differences And Beliefs Between The Older And Younger Generation
10 Pages 2539 Words
s among their own institution, furthering the fear that society had of communism taking over the United States. This "Red Scare" lasted through the Fifties as a popular belief, and one that the older generation advocated it in the Sixties. Consequently, when the war in Vietnam was being fought, in the 1960s, there was a gap in beliefs. The older generation supported the war, based on anti-communism, as North Vietnam was anticommunist (it was a dictatorship instead) and South Vietnam was communist. The United States believed in the "domino theory," which stated that if Vietnam fell to communism, as would all the other nations of Southeast Asia, and eventually, the re!
st of the world. Popular opinion at the time also reflected that both the Soviet Union and China were actively supporting those of South Vietnam.
The "counterculture" generation was against the war, as they thought it to be violent, as well as a civil war, and not something that the United States should be involved in. Protests occurred on campuses, and on a few occasions, violence erupted. At Kent State, for example, during a student sit-in, the National Guard was called and four students lost their lives. Thus not only did the hippies associate the war with violence, but the protesting as well. Many songs on the popular music front were anti-Vietnam. The popular musical group Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young wrote a song describing the occurrences of Kent State titled “Four Dead in Ohio”.
Tin soldiers and Nixon's comin'.
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drummin'.
Four dead in Ohio.
Gotta get down to it.
Soldiers are cutting us down.
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her and
Found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?
Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na.
Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na.
Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na.
Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na.
Gotta get down to it.
Soldiers are cutt...