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DESTRUCTIVE GENERATION: Second Thoughts About the '60s [Paperback]

Peter Collier , David Horowitz
4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)


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Book Description

August 12, 1996 0684826410 978-0684826417 1
Collier and Horowitz--former editors of the 1960's New Left magazine Ramparts discuss their "second thoughts" about the social revolution of that decade. 9 cassettes.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.


Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

A compilation of memoirs and reportage on the New Left, valuable for its insider insights on New Left strategy and tactics. The authors, celebrated biographers of the Fords, Kennedys, and Rockefellers, primarily use interviews and personal recall to reconstruct an era when moral causes summoned many, but where a willful minority dominated the parapets of activism. Their account might have been enriched with greater psychological analysis of those in the New Left, although their simple analogy of the Left as "like those Japanese soldiers who wandered for years in the jungle, unaware that they had lost the war" may be a more biting explanation. A readable recounting of lost times, lost souls, and lost opportunities. Recommended reading for the politically innocent. Conservative Book Club selection.
- James L. Jablonowski, Marquette Univ., Milwaukee
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 400 pages
  • Publisher: Free Press; 1 edition (August 12, 1996)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0684826410
  • ISBN-13: 978-0684826417
  • Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 0.9 x 5.5 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
  • Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,266,909 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

4.1 out of 5 stars
(26)
4.1 out of 5 stars
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
39 of 43 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars A Penetrating, Critical Look at the Sixties July 15, 1998
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
As far as I know, this is a unique book. It is an important document for those who want to understand the politics of the Sixties and what has happened since. It is also an antidote to the romanticized versions of the period that are all too common in books, movies, and personal storytelling.

At its best, when the authors provide reportage on the events of the period--and keep their commentary to a minimum--it is a devastating indictment of the nihilism and recklessness of some of the leading actors. The chapters on the Black Panthers and Weatherman are particularly strong.

In the later chapters, the sweeping statements about "the Left" become too broad and tend to condemn too many for too much. Not everyone who protested the Vietnam War was a Stalinist or endorsed terrorism. And not everyone who views the period differently than the authors is motivated by dishonesty and moral cowardice.

To the authors' credit, they include a telling annecdote: t! ! hey confront the writer Susan Sontag at a book festival, and finally, she refuses to talk to them any further, expressing frustration with their "Manichaean" view of politics. A fair-minded reader can appreciate Sontag's comment, even agree with it, without dismissing the book.

By the time they wrote this book in the late 1980s, Collier and Horowitz had a lot to get off their chests: "second thoughts" about their radicalism in the Sixties, disgust with the refusal of former comrades to critically examine their own political involvements, and a need to settle scores with those who had shunned them since they broke ranks with their radical friends.

That striving for vindication, and the need to be listened to, has an obsessive quality that comes through in this book. Many readers will not be persuaded to embrace conservative Republican politics, as Horowitz (at least) has done. (I, for one, see more shades of gray than do these authors.) Nonetheless, t! ! his book is one that anyone who cares about the subject sho! uld read before drawing conclusions about the Sixties.

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30 of 34 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Not Quite The Devils, but almost February 8, 2003
By Greg
Format:Hardcover
In Destructive Generation, Peter Collier and David Horowitz put together an account of 60s radicalism that acts as an excellent antidote to the songs of U2 or Howard Zinn's chic People's History of the United States. The book goes a long way toward discrediting the fantasy of the 60s as a time of idealism and harmless rebellion, and resurrects the nearly forgotten "dark side" of the 60s.

At times, the book reads almost like a latter-day version of Dostoevsky's classic, the Devils. Like the Devils, the radicals portrayed in Destructive Generation -- notably Huey Newton, Bernadine Dohrn, Billy Ayers and Tom Hayden -- seem to behave the way they do not because they believe in revolution, but because they hate the system and they seem to be fascinated by nihilism and violence. The chapters on the Panthers and the Weatherman are the most instructive, while Horowitz's "letter to a political friend" is the most moving part of the book. If you are looking for the antithesis to Noam Chomsky, you will find it here.

The only drawback to the book is the way in which it uses sources. Footnotes are sparse, and paraphrases are often vague. Because of this, the book reads like one long editorial, rather than a work of history. One hopes that Collier and Horowitz will return to this work and create a second edition, with better notation.

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94 of 116 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
How does it feeeelll... To be on your own... no direction known... like a rollin' stone...

This Dylan lyric depicts the disarray in which the intellectual Left finds itself in the aftermath of voluminous setbacks over the past century. David Horowitz and Peter Collier recount their personal intellectual metamorphoses' as they wend their way through the chapters of "Destructive Generation."

They begin with a particularly heartfelt portrayal of a Leftist attorney, Fay Stender, trying to do good for poor black victims of a racist society. What Stender fails to comprehend, which leads to one of the purported victims shooting her in a bizarre ritual of hatred for all white people, is that these victims are thugs who prey on the very people she presumes she represents. Her actions are borne of a fatal miscalculation of murderers like Jonathan Jackson and his friends. This story, skillfully related by H&C, shows that the law of unintended consequences always seems to prevail, and often fatally, when put to the test by Left-Liberal nostrums. They next visit the rise and fall of the Weather underground, Huey Newton, and the Black Panthers, all grisly stories with a less than savory end.

The Second section of the book deals with how the Left-liberal press poses as a 5th column for America's Marxist intellectuals. It shows how their intellectual allegiance to the social policy concepts of Marxist regimes leads them to conspire to deceive the American public. Their goal is shown to be undeniably subversive to America's national interest. Prominent public figures of the Left mentioned here include man of the cloth William Sloane Coffin, former Democratic congressman from Oakland Calif. Ron Dellums and his aide Carlottia Scott, NYT journalist Anthony Lewis, and former Dem. Cong. woman from Denver, Patricia Schroeder, with a host of lesser light attorneys and enablers achieving minor notoriety.

They next romp through the Left's portrayal of Joe McCarthy. History has absolved McCarthy even though his method for outing U.S. government Communists was reprehensible. This chapter is followed by a marvelous piece on the Left's takeover of the city council in Berkeley California. All the familiar antics of Leftist rule are on display here and the chapter provided me with many belly laughs. In another way it's just plain sad that these people seem to learn nothing from history. They act like an intellectual version of the mindless Kudzu weed that if left untended continues to grow and expand over any and all obstacles until it consumes the landscape. All Communist-Socialist governments end up creating shortages and a vastly reduced standard of living for all people, but these idealists never seem to get the message. H&C hope to help them. Perhaps a 12-step program will be forthcoming.

In chapter eight H&C reveal their assumptions which have led to their transition from Radical innocence to Radical guilt. They do a wonderful job of dissecting the American-hating propagandist from MIT, Noam Chomsky. They also take apart Tom Hayden and his ilk, showing them for what they are and what they stand for; it's not a pretty picture.

The final section of the book deals with their growing up and beyond the Leftist mythology that held them in its thrall in their early years. They also explain the reason that former comrades must treat them with such disdain as they recount the smearing administered at the hands of these old friends, who remain continuing Communist sympathizers to a man/woman. Their views are recapped in a series of letters and other correspondence.

They conclude the book by citing how the Cold War caused comrades, from their legions of the Left, to leave the faith in the face of mountains of lies and policy failures resulting from the Fatal Conceit of Communist-Socialist Utopians.

This is a great book for anyone, especially disillusioned post-graduates who sense that something is awry in their worldview. They should read it two or three times just to make sure they retain some of its wisdom.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars You won't be able to put this down
This book - really, a collection of long essays - is absolutely excellent. Both Horowitz and Collier contribute to the thorough, wholly honest assessments of the personal and... Read more
Published 14 months ago by EMG
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent information - David Horowitz is my new favorite author
I'm reading all the things I can written by David Horowitz - a voice of sanity and candor. He should be required reading for our students - both high school and college.
Published 15 months ago by Debbie Forbeck
5.0 out of 5 stars Pathetic Leftists: the do-gooder that never did anybody any good (or...
A classic. Collier and Horowitz were part of those crazy nut Leftists of the 60s and 70's. Only they were honest enough to recant and be converted to common sense middle age. Read more
Published 16 months ago by Quilmiense
1.0 out of 5 stars Right Wing Trash
Too bad Betty Van Patter didn't live. The ranting and raving in this book made it very hard to get through. Read more
Published 20 months ago by R. Schwartz
1.0 out of 5 stars One sided view
This book is very incomplete. It presents and documents well some aspects of the sixties and ignores others. Read more
Published 24 months ago by James Simon
4.0 out of 5 stars CHILLING & INSIGHTFUL,BUT...
Having lived through the '60's as a college student,I was profoundly affected by it. Like Mr.Horowitz,I began having second thoughts & reevaluating my political opinions as I... Read more
Published on September 17, 2010 by DAVID GROESBECK
5.0 out of 5 stars What's next?
There's a lot to learn from the few 60s radicals who took a serious look at what they were doing and decided it was destructive. Read more
Published on July 12, 2009 by Springfield, MO
4.0 out of 5 stars Growing Up Is Hard To Do
For those today who think that the decade of the 60s was little more than the flower power of Woodstock, DESTRUCTIVE GENERATION is a sorely needed bucket of cold water wake up... Read more
Published on April 4, 2009 by Martin Asiner
5.0 out of 5 stars Absolutely outstanding.
"Letter to a Political Friend, one of the essays included in this book, is perhaps the most brilliant piece of political writing I have ever read. Read more
Published on December 7, 2008 by Renee Singer
5.0 out of 5 stars Collier and Horowitz Fly Over The Cukoo's Nest
Peter Collier and David Horowitz kick off their classic sixties memoir with a sixties moment at a cocktail party attended by French ex-con author Jean Genet,the Black Panthers and... Read more
Published on March 27, 2008 by Brian Schiff
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