Monday, June 09, 2008

street fighting years

The hillhead library tempted to me to check out "street fighting years" by Tariq Ali. This was a memoir of his time as a political activist in the 60s. Ali was born in Pakistan, but came o London to study. He was a leader in the movement against the war in Vietnam in the UK. As part of that he was (and perhaps still is) a Marxist. He organized meetings and did speaking tours. He also did a lot of traveling. For instance he went to Vietnam with a group to inspect the situation. Given that the passing of years, everyone has become very cynical about the 60s, fu*cking hippies and all that, but Ali was part of the committed political wing. The Vietcong clearly viewed the antiwar movement as a second front in their war. Although I work at a University I don't seem to meet any Marxists. Where they all gone. Perhaps to wallstreet? My one complaint about the book is that the cover features John Lennon and Yoko Ono, but they actually appear for a page or two. I have nothing against Yoko Ono. I really enjoyed her last CD. However Lennon worked with that McCartney bloke who is still filling the airwaves with his sound puke.