Goodman Warns Of Youth Revolt

Youth is building "a separate nation," characterized by its own "youth history" and its own mores, according to sociologist Paul Goodman.

Deeply alienated by the incompetence and immorality of their elders, teenagers today are estranged from the adult generation which processes them according to alien, inhuman goals, Goodman said in his address to the Ford Hall Forum.

Anything more than ten years old is not real to today's youth, Goodman continued. Their new history is composed of the Beats, Castro -- "But he got himself mucked up with the senile power structure --", Kennedy -- "martyred too early" -- the Battle of the Steps as documented in the film "Operation Abolition," Mississippi, and Sproul Hall.

Class loyalty is more important to the teenage generation than economic or political principles, Goodman said. Youth is not interested in taking power, "for fear of getting caught in the old rat race," he continued. COFO's work in Mississippi two summers ago demonstrates the spontaneous, non-hierarchical "populist movement" which characterizes today's youth, according to Goodman.

The next demonstration of the new class loyalty will be a high school revolt "that will look more like Watts than Berkeley," Goodman prophesied. "Some principal will make a guy cut off his locks," he will commit suicide from humiliation, and his friends will burn down the school.