Helter Skelter

In America, any mention of the 1960s evokes a multitude of attitudes, ideologies, and styles, each unique to the decade. Among the most important changes of the decade were political. It was a decade in which the legal defense of free speech was championed as never before, in which people of color won important victories in the ongoing fight for justice and equality, and in which women found a voice in culture and politics. It was also a decade defined by violent and retributive reaction to those political changes.

Richard Nixon, voted into office in 1968 on a conservative campaign, evoked a “silent majority” of Americans who quietly went to work, paid their taxes, didn’t want any trouble, and voted for Richard Nixon. In doing so, he simultaneously evoked an unspoken “loud minority,” a mass of elite journalists and nonconformists who spoke up, caused trouble, and did not vote for Richard Nixon. This was an attitude that did not distinguish between Walter Cronkite, the beloved nightly news anchor who declared the Vietnam War unwinnable, and Abbie Hoffman, the “yippie” activist who claimed that he would telekinetically levitate the Pentagon through mass action. 

It was an attitude that did not distinguish between Martin Luther King Jr.