General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: 1968 (Your Help, Please!) [View all]Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)I suppose the most honest response to your question is to describe the first thing that came to my mind, instead of sifting through the year and trying to decide objectively what was most important.
When I read your post I immediately saw myself walking into a high school classroom. We had our final exam in math that morning. It was the morning after Robert Kennedy had been killed.
There were Kennedy supporters, McCarthy supporters, Humphrey supporters, Republicans. It didn't matter. We were all numb.
We all just looked at each other. We didn't even say anything. We didn't talk about the assassination, or anything about politics. We didn't talk about the exam, or the impending end of the school year, or any of the other casual subjects that would have fueled the chatter on a normal day. There was no need to talk. Everyone understood how everyone else felt, and it was some comfort just to be with friends that morning.
Sometime in the week or so thereafter, I changed my mind about the death penalty. I had thought that it was appropriate in some particularly serious cases. Now, this latest horror, coming so soon after the assassination of Martin Luther King, left me with an overwhelming revulsion against all the violence. I didn't think there was much logical connection -- I just felt that there had to be an end to the violence and that it should start with the government. There was too much killing. The government shouldn't kill people. That's still my view.