VLVL(6) the Movement WAS Re: Absences in VL

[Doug Millison]

It's true that in VL, Pynchon shows how young people in the 60s, 70s, and
80s were just as prone to buy into society's "dark dream" (Frenesi's
betrayal vividly illustrates that), as he showed us they were prone to do
during WWII, as he shows the same forces at work to divide and separate
people and support war in M&D -- the implication at the end, when Prairie
longs for Brock to come back, points to a future in which the powers that
use Brock as a tool will once again be able to seduce young people to their
cause.

But, following David's thoughtful post, I'll add that in the end the
anti-Vietnam War movement in the U.S. was in perhaps the most important way
successful:  without the steadily escalating protest, the
military-industrial cartels and their puppet politicians could have kept
the war going far longer --  the protests forced the issue and helped end
the war.  And it wasn't all fun and games for the protesters, either
(although there was certainly fun and games associted with the movement) --
too many killed, clubbed, gassed, jailed.

I hope we don't have the occasion to see whether or not "kids nowadays"
would rise to the situation with similar courage, although I suspect they
might, despite 30 years of brainwashing, if half a million American
soldiers wound up bogged down in foreign combat for reasons difficult to
explain.

-Doug