An addendum to all that, not for on-air

I thought I would throw this in just for the heck of it. As long as I am, as I'm sure some of you think I am, wallowing in aging hippie nostalgia, I figured why not.

A while back, I came across a discussion among some young folks - and as I was pushing 70 at the time, I think I can use that expression - who were complaining about what they said was all the attention given to the '60s, particularly regarding the political movements of the time.

I replied that I didn't see this mass of fawning attention, indeed most of what I saw seemed more sneering than swooning, "but," I added, "eye of the beholder and all that." Still, I went on to say, if you're looking at us old farts and want to shut us up, then show us up: Use the '60s as a marker and turn it into BFD material.

"If you do that," I said or at least as close to this as memory allows, "I guarantee you'll find us old farts cheering you on and standing right there beside you."

The reason I bring this up is that as part of that, I threw together a short list of signs of the cultural impacts of the '60s. I noted that none of these originated in the '60s, but it was that time in which they were brought into the mainstream. This was the list:

- When you see people not blinking at an interracial couple - that was us.
- When you see men wearing colors - that was us.
- When you see women comfortably wearing jeans - that was us.
- When you see two adults unselfconsciously holding hands in public - that was us.
- When you see two men unselfconsciously holding hands in public - that was definitely us.
- When you think about being environmentally-conscious - that was us.
- When you see companies finding it necessary to try to convince everyone how environmentally-conscious they are - that was us.
- When you see companies actually being environmentally-conscious - that was definitely us.
- When you see people admitting that there is a glass ceiling - that was us.
- When you see women challenging the glass ceiling - that was us.
- When you see women actually breaking the glass ceiling - that was definitely us.
- When you hear anyone defining patriotism in terms of willingness to challenge authority when it's wrong - yeah, that was us.

Again, I'd never claim that any of that originated in the '60s and you can certainly find antecedents in earlier times, sometime multiple decades earlier. But I still say that in terms of widespread acceptance? Yeah, that was us.