Film/TV Aug 27, 2009 at 4:00 am

You've Gotta Join in Demonstrations!

Comments

1
Mark my words, someday you're going to bore the fuck out of your own kids and grandkids and all their friends with your dewy memories of Lollapalooza or the Warped Tour or Sasquatch or that rave where you became one with the glow stick.
2
@1 Nah, it's going to be the Obama election. I am already preparing my 90 minute "I was there in Grant Park" monologue.
3
Fuck. You. I've got your self-absorbed hanging right here!
4
Aw, sour grapes, maddogm13?
Did someone piss in your Metamucil this morning?
It's really hard to become irrelevant, isn't it?

5
This is my generation and I agree with you -- sort of. If I never heard another Beatles tune again, it'd be fine with me.

Part of the draw of Woodstock and such was the unifying concept we had that is missing from pop culture now. We really believed we could change things! Since there were fewer choices, we all had many more shared experiences that created a sense of commonality.

The current corporate blight on music and the attendant consumerism has dulled the spirit of youth in the last 30 years.

It was a golden time, but yeah I am tired of the navel-gazing.
6
i don't know...the post boomer generations tend to be huge bores when it comes to:

Star Wars
Lord of the Rings
comic books
shitty tv shows
Twilight
pop kulture in general

EVERY generation is a huge fucking bore about shit they liked when they were 12-25 years old and the irritating hipster ones tend to revere the shit they were too young to participate in, ie stuff from just before they were born to puberty.

Get over it.
7
@1: Yes and I can only hope they start making boring ass movies about it. Or you know, like 10 boring ass movies.

Maybe a Forest Gump for the 90s? Or instead of the Doors, do The Shins? Or perhaps instead of Woodstock we can have a movie about the warehouse scene in Detroit, and HOW IT CHANGED THE ENTIRE WORLD.
8
Since when was the 1960s about what actually happened? And yes Lindy, the 1960s really did change the world - Mexico, China, Germany, France come to mind - and I think Woodstock kind of encapsulates for Americans everything that the 1960s was.
9
most of us millennials, or "tail end of Gen-X'ers" don't identify with the Gen-Y narcissism. we're the "Loser" generation. I don't know how old the author is, but if they were born much after 1980, yeah...they're gen-y and they kinda think the world owes them a livin'. (of course, i generalize a great deal...but you get/see what i'm talking about.) bottom line, if your parents were boomers and your grandparents were "the greatest generation," (the one from WWII) then you're a Gen-X'er.
10
Woodstock was probably an amazing experience. This movie does not look like it could EVER live up to that. Just watch the Woodstock movie, you'll see all sorts of narratives that are real and compelling.
11
Actually, katallred, I'm looking forward to becoming irrelevant. It's your turn to Deal With It - have fun!!
12
@5: You had fewer choices, and choices solely determined by megalithic entertainment corporations, and you were the untainted generation? Now we are living in a time where those same record labels are being tossed in the dustbin of history, and somehow we're in the sway of rampant corporatism?

Excuse me?

You know who played Woodstock? Sha Na Na and Mickey Dolenz. Mickey Fuckin' Dolenz, who was in a goddamn fake fuckin' band. No wonder you failed at changing the world.
13
Thank you, Lindy West, for saying what needs to be said. No one has navel-gazed more than the baby boomers, and nothing epitomizes this more than the fucking gauzy false memories of Woodstock.

And they accuse us of narcissism? Please. We grew up being forced into what Douglas Copeland called "legislated nostalgia" in Generation X:

To force a body of people to have memories they do not actually possess. "How can I be a part of the 1960s generation when I don't even remember any of it?"


We grew up being force-fed these memories by the previous generation as if they were the only memories that counted. Our own cultural memory is an echo of the generation the preceded us instead of our own created narrative, and I'm sick of the lot of them. Do we have to wait for them to die before they'll shut the fuck up about themselves?
14
Did you just call me a raging homophobe because Brokeback Mountain sucked(dick)?

no.you.didn't!
15
I would comment but I don't understand the internet. Where is the tube I'm supposed to put my comment in? Also, is the Internet on the VHF or the UHF dial?
16
To force a body of people to have memories they do not actually possess...

I know the feeling. Just imagine growing up remembering the Great Depression and then suddenly realizing one day that you weren't even born then. Oh...and World War II. It's like I lived through the whole damn thing. Multiple times. Before I was even a teenager.

17
So maybe we could all quit buying into the media stereotypes of which generational box we fit into. Really the only thing unique about the "baby boom generation" was that there really was an unusually high birth rate for about ten years after World War II. By the late sixties, half the population of the US was aged 25 or less. The only thing that was ever important about the baby boomers (and still is) is that there were just so fucking many of us. And we bred less than our parents, so now there are fewer young people in the country. Now will you kids get off my lawn.
18
The deal with Woodstock is that an assload of people showed up. That is all.
19
Silly fool. This movie wasn't made for boomers - it was made for the 25-25 market, your generation.
20
@4 Nope--just saying that EVERYONE eventually gets old and recalls his/her Glory Days of Youth with deep fondness, thereby rendering him/herself completely ireelevant and out to lunch in the eyes of people younger than they who are going through their own Glory Days.
21
Brokeback Mountain had terrible makeup. My husband and I comforted ourselves that this was why it lost for best picture.
22
oops, that is to say, the 25-35 market, unless you are 25. then stick with the first one. Boomers must be completely uninterested in Demetri Martin. John Stewart has him on because some producer told him the millenials think he's funny...
23
This Generation has a few things similar to Woodstock. Like Burning Man for example. The difference is that it is sustainable and happens ever year. It'll never get put on the same pedistal as Woodstock since it's not a pop-culture event and is still attainable (and will be for the foreseeable future) and is therefore exempt from the nostalgic reverie.
24
I'm a boomer and I'M NOT LAUGHING AT LINDY WEST ANYMORE. Or I'll try not to. Anyway, she's really W'm Stephen Humphrey. Has anyone seen them in the same room at the same time? I don't think so.
25
Woodstock has jumped the shark.
26
I like a lot of things from the baby boomer generation, music included - this just looks like a crappy film.

I also agree that they are an extremely narcissistic generation & so are we.
27
I would personally like to thank the baby-boomers for pulling up the ladder after themselves. I'll enjoy the pile of shit you left us later generations.
28
Umm...I'm 25-35 and I'M completely uninterested in Demetry Martin. Yes I get it...you're a prop comic hipster who plays guitar...congratulations, you're the new Jimmy Fallon...
29
You guys! My only point is that IT'S BEEN COVERED. No more movies about Woodstock. Not necessary.
30
fuck, maybe we need another woodstock.
31
Unless the current youth of today create their own Woodstockish event (9-11?), they will go on Xeroxing such ideas without end. Maybe this failure to generate anything new while coasting along on the dregs of the previous generations explains the endless sluice of remakes, sequels, prequels, and the movement of hideous television shows of the 1960's and 1980's onto the big screen.
32
"IT'S BEEN COVERED. No more movies about Woodstock. Not necessary. "

Oh, honey, if necessitude was the criteria for making movies there would be what, three movies a year? And then what would you be doing with your time?

Plus it's an Ang fucking Lee movie. It's worth seeing even if it's a moldy, festering turd, just to figure out wtf happened.

33
Dear Lindy,

Yes, already been covered. To death. You are right.

Dear Boomers,

I'd really like to find the importance of it now, but in your youth you decided that you were going to change the world and then did a 180 and created the greed and excess that was the 80s.

I'm sorry to have to say it, but can you seriously think of a more self obsessed load of bullshit. You all had the opportunity to change the western world, but when you got to your 30s, you went all "oh, fuck! I really do want corporations and money!!! I was just doing a shit load of drugs in my youth 'cause you know, the 60s!"

At least those who lived through the Great Depression and WWII were just trying to find a steady non-starving kind of life. They were uptight, racism of course was a fucking issue (love to give the credit to the boomers with the civil rights movement, but alas, you were too young), but they were trying to survive and make sure that you shits had all the opportunities that they did not have.

So, no we don't have FUCKING HEDONISTIC WOODSTOCK of our own. Don't even try to say that a music festival is going to do it. We're trying to clean up the fucking mess you made.

Thanks for being spineless!

34
It's the same as fucking burning man. Let's get high off of our parents money and get spiritual. SOOOOOO SPIRITUAL.

35
I like the Woodstock but the Burning Man can go pour gasoline on itself. I tried shirt cocking way through the art carts one time and came about a dickhair away from getting cornholed by an old school David Crosby cokaine moostache lecher who tried to lure me into depravity with a wink and a nod and big-ass tray full of huckleberry mohitos. Not a hater. Just sayn what a big sitnky ol dung smear on the playa's what that shit is compared.
36
Most Boomers knew nothing of Woodstock until it was over. I was working, going to college, trying to move my wife and son to a better life.

Most of the commenters sound like crybabies. But Woodstock or not, we worked on, busting our butts. Got a problem with that?

Like it or not, Woodstock was an event most of us would have attended-if we'd only known. And had the gas money.

As it turned out the evening news reports made us smile. Not life changing, just a lot of fun. I'm glad you missed it.
37
Lindy, yeah we're two old boomers.Shame on you for your stupid cracks about our supposedly inability to use the Internet. Hey it's the damn boomers who invented the WWW and the Internet and the tools to use them. Get over yourself! (and BTW who the hell knows why Ang Lee decided to make this movie, Hell he was a pre-teen in Taiwan during Woodstock.)
38
The whippersnapper is right. Save the golden memories of the mass convergence of being covered in mud and clanging coke cans together to make it stop raining so The Grateful Dead can put everyone to sleep before the band that the kids in Nam listened to (CCR) came on at 2am.

The real joke is that the Woodstockers are being portrayed as the spokespersons of our generation when in fact they were the clueless children who never grew up and insist on living in the past.

And to top it off, there are a much larger percentage of them in today's generation. Reflect on the great, influential music being made now (I'll need your help here), Nazi-Killing fantasies and the coolness of a WW2 flick accompanied by Bowie's 'Cat People'.

Yawn.
39
Hi Lindy,

I read your column while sitting at a counter in a small cafe staffed by heavily tattooed waitresses and felt moved to demonstrate my (I'm a baby boomer) internet skills with a brief response to your column. Look, I know that Dan Savage sets the juvenile snark bar very high there at The Stranger, and it must be difficult for a young writer like yourself to meet that standard every week, but I want to comment on your belief that we boomers view your generation as narcissists. Of course, I can speak only for myself. I do-sort of. I spend a lot of time on Capitol Hill. Here is what I see when I observe many individuals of your generation.

First I notice the smell. That week old dirty ashtray smell that permeates your hair and clothing. And then there are the tattoos. Already fading, losing detail, merging into a blob, and out of style they look like shit. The neck tattoos and the sleeves-wow! Perhaps you guys are so distracted by your ipods and cell phones that you didn't notice how older tattoos look on people. And I find it interesting that although you would likely never commit to wearing the same shirt everyday for the rest of your life, you are willing to inject grams of ink under your skin to remain there until you die.

And then there are the stretched ear lobes. Can you guys really think that looks good? And that it will look good when you are forty? I don't think that is narcissism. I think that is fucking stupidity. There is a lot about my boomer generation worthy of ridicule. But even stoned we knew better than to step into the street in front of a bus which is an intelligence that you can't claim for your constantly connected and distracted cell phone clinging generation. Life is passing you guys by; your culture is tattoo deep; but hey-you know how to use the internet.

The boomers, silly as they could be, were at least idealistic. We did try to make the world a better place for children and other living things; and many of us continue to work for that goal. We didn't think that snark was the highest value. And that everything and everyone was fair game for our personal enjoyment and career enhancement. Check this out.

http://tinyurl.com/dhye5k

40
Hi Lindy,

I read your column while sitting at a counter in a small cafe staffed by heavily tattooed waitresses and felt moved to demonstrate my (I'm a baby boomer) internet skills with a brief response to your column. Look, I know that Dan Savage sets the juvenile snark bar very high there at The Stranger, and it must be difficult for a young writer like yourself to meet that standard every week, but I want to comment on your belief that we boomers view your generation as narcissists. Of course, I can speak only for myself. I do-sort of. I spend a lot of time on Capitol Hill. Here is what I see when I observe many individuals of your generation.

First I notice the smell. That week old dirty ashtray smell that permeates your hair and clothing. And then there are the tattoos. Already fading, losing detail, merging into a blob, and out of style they look like shit. The neck tattoos and the sleeves-wow! Perhaps you guys are so distracted by your ipods and cell phones that you didn't notice how older tattoos look on people. And I find it interesting that although you would likely never commit to wearing the same shirt everyday for the rest of your life, you are willing to inject grams of ink under your skin to remain there until you die.

And then there are the stretched ear lobes. Can you guys really think that looks good? And that it will look good when you are forty? I don't think that is narcissism. I think that is fucking stupidity. There is a lot about my boomer generation worthy of ridicule. But even stoned we knew better than to step into the street in front of a bus which is an intelligence that you can't claim for your constantly connected and distracted cell phone clinging generation. Life is passing you guys by; your culture is tattoo deep; but hey-you know how to use the internet.

The boomers, silly as they could be, were at least idealistic. We did try to make the world a better place for children and other living things; and many of us continue to work for that goal. We didn't think that snark was the highest value. And that everything and everyone was fair game for our personal enjoyment and career enhancement. Check this out.

http://tinyurl.com/dhye5k

41
Hi Lindy,

I read your column while sitting at a counter in a small cafe staffed by heavily tattooed waitresses and felt moved to demonstrate my (I'm a baby boomer) internet skills with a brief response to your column. Look, I know that Dan Savage sets the juvenile snark bar very high there at The Stranger, and it must be difficult for a young writer like yourself to meet that standard every week, but I want to comment on your belief that we boomers view your generation as narcissists. Of course, I can speak only for myself. I do-sort of. I spend a lot of time on Capitol Hill. Here is what I see when I observe many individuals of your generation.

First I notice the smell. That week old dirty ashtray smell that permeates your hair and clothing. And then there are the tattoos. Already fading, losing detail, merging into a blob, and out of style they look like shit. The neck tattoos and the sleeves-wow! Perhaps you guys are so distracted by your ipods and cell phones that you didn't notice how older tattoos look on people. And I find it interesting that although you would likely never commit to wearing the same shirt everyday for the rest of your life, you are willing to inject grams of ink under your skin to remain there until you die.

And then there are the stretched ear lobes. Can you guys really think that looks good? And that it will look good when you are forty? I don't think that is narcissism. I think that is fucking stupidity. There is a lot about my boomer generation worthy of ridicule. But even stoned we knew better than to step into the street in front of a bus which is an intelligence that you can't claim for your constantly connected and distracted cell phone clinging generation. Life is passing you guys by; your culture is tattoo deep; but hey-you know how to use the internet.

The boomers, silly as they could be, were at least idealistic. We did try to make the world a better place for children and other living things; and many of us continue to work for that goal. We didn't think that snark was the highest value. And that everything and everyone was fair game for our personal enjoyment and career enhancement. Check this out.

http://tinyurl.com/dhye5k

42
Sorry about the triple posts. But the damn things didn't show up for quite awhile.
43
Now that I've figured out this new fangled here internet allow me to add a little to my above comment.

Tens of thousands of your generation are being sent off to fight and die and be maimed in two illegal wars. Your government is torturing prisoners as a matter of policy. It is holding citizens in secret prisons without trial or access to lawyers. It is spying on you and constantly working to subvert your civil liberties.

All that, yet you don't give a shit. As long as you are entertained; as long as you have the latest gadget; you are just fine. You won't get off your complacent ass to say a word about your government's abuse; but you will find time to ridicule the few that do.
44
I like this erection guy. He's full of piss and vinegar - we need more of that.
45
Good job, Lindy. Every week, I'm amazed (in a good way) by how many people take you so seriously. Plenty of writers out there who *try* to do this every week, with genuine causes, can't get readers to give a shit.
46
@39-43 Andy Rooney was never more funny than right now.
47
Nothing is funnier than the tool with 15 pieces of metal in his face pouring me my latte' and telling me the Beatles Hendrix and Stones suck but Kings Of Leon are the shit. I heard the same nonsense before about Nirvana, Pearl Jam, The Red Hot Chile Peppers, The Black Crowes, The Strokes yawn yawn yawn.

The best thing of all was then overhearing he and his co-worker discussing Heroes and Hell's Kitchen. I never heard what they thought of America's Top Model or Dancing With The Stars.

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