last december nazy wrote an article called “my generation.”
it actually began as a post on jahanshah’s photo essay “daughter of the revolution.”
it was a very important time for this website. they were two very important threads, i thought. we were just starting to come out of the “wild wild west”–an embryonic system of moderation was being implemented following a collective discussion. and on these two threads, i think, people began to look at themselves and look at each other and at their roles in the revolution and ask questions that united rather than divided.
but the generation of the revolution was my generation too. i was twenty in 1979. and as a child i was a child of the woodstock generation. i was only nine in 1969 but i was very precocious and sensitive and aware and so i was very much a child of woodstock. and i have been thinking about your generation, nazy, and about my generation. about our generation.
i have been thinking that every generation leaves a mixed legacy. my generation’s legacy was very mixed. the chaos, the excessive hedonism, the rampant drug use, the irresponsibility. but what were the IDEALS of my generation? one must take the best and leave the rest. the greatest ideal of the woodstock generation was hope for a better world.
every generation leaves a mixed legacy which can only be evaluated in terms of how the next generations choose to build on it, and how the youth of that generation who have now become elders, choose to guide them.
it must be very very difficult for many iranians who were part of the revolution of 79 to find this mixed legacy. what earthly good can there possibly be in stringing people up over major commuter thoroughfares in a world capital? what good?
(what good is there in iraq?)
it must be remembered that the greatest ideal of your generation was the same as mine. it was also hope for a better world. one must take the best and leave the rest.
and one must also remember that blood shed is the same blood of blood ties. the ties that bind.
so i have been thinking about our generation. nazy, and i thought and i looked around and i decided that this was the best expession of the best legacy i could find of my generation.
of your generation. of our generation.
we are stardust, billion year old carbon, we are golden, caught in the devil’s bargain, and we’ve got to get ourselves back to the garden.
joni. take the best and leave the rest, take the hope in her eyes.
ps serendipitously i just happened to remember that the three-day festival began on august 15 1969.
