In the spring of 2024, students of public universities across the country camped and protested to support the Free Palestine movement. This mission made national news several times and invoked strong opinions in every generation nationwide, therefore raising awareness for a topic Generation Z deems highly important. At the University of Maryland, students from the Student Justice for Palestine group sued the University of Maryland in Fall 2024 for violation of freedom of speech due to the university banning a vigil in honor of the ongoing genocide in Palestine. This lawsuit led to a student victory, showing how acts of political self-expression at the hands of young people remain relevant to national media and spread awareness. Actions like these are not the first time college students have banded together to support progressive political ideas.
The 1970s was an explosion of youth activism and self-expression. “The youth” is defined as anyone under the age of twenty-five since this is when the prefrontal cortex fully develops. We will explore how different social groups on campus revolted against authority through support for recreational drugs, sexual liberation, and feminism, and through these actions, connect the 70s youth movements to socialist ideology. Specifically, we focus on the youth’s self-expression and utilization of music to convey political ideologies, as they spread awareness about desired political and social change to other generations. Specific songs and artists are also explored from the 1970s that were popular for invoking a change in political ideology, demonstrating how the rise of socialism created a generational, political, and social divide between the youth at the time and older generations (the Greatest Generation and the Silent Generation). We offer the University of Maryland campus as a sample of how college campuses, students, and youth across the country were creating and reacting to social change.
Timeline
This timeline of influential music of the late 1960s through the 1970s examines the main themes of protest, sexual liberation, and drug use to explore the relationship between these cultural forces and the music that emerged in response to them. By examining musical styles, lyrical content, and the broader cultural context, we can understand how artists utilized sound and performance as tools of social critique and personal liberation. Music genres such as funk, soul, rock, disco, and punk were intertwined with the era’s exploration of new forms of consciousness, sexuality, and political defiance, while also serving as means for the evolving dialogue surrounding socialist ideals and systemic change.
Collective Organization
resource.rockarch.org
In the 1970s, there was a rise of socialism on the University of Maryland campus, specifically among student organizations. Socialism is the means of societal contribution and distribution being the responsibility and ownership of everyone in society, instead of relying on a system that functions at the hands of private organizations. Socialists believe that all wealth, property, and means of production should be placed in the hands of the public, creating a society without social classes. Socialism is also in opposition to capitalism and believes that major corporations and monopolies should not rely on private companies or investors, and instead would be a function of the public. Socialism is often confused with communism. Communism encourages the power of wealth, property, and means of production to be given to the government, with the intention that the government will give the power equally to the people. 1
The explosion of self-expression among the youth allowed them to create power and agency for themselves in an authoritative society while advocating for their right to bodily autonomy. A large-scale example of this was Roe v. Wade in 1973, which legalized abortion as a fundamental right. Recreational drugs were also used as a form of self-expression among the youth. Counterculture groups, such as punks and hippies, were associated with using drugs as a way to create community and expand their perceptions of reality. In a time when authority criminalized all drug use during the War on Drugs, the youth rebelled by using drugs to express socialist and anti-authoritative beliefs, directly taking power away from the state and placing power in the hands of the people. Political protests were another vital way that youth regained power. To invoke change, the youth created self-governed organizations and utilized large numbers of people brought together to spread awareness for these important political causes.
We explored four different campus organizations, all of which demonstrate anti-authoritarian behaviors and were run by UMD students in the 1970s:
- Food Collective (otherwise known as the Co-Op, a community-oriented group that sponsored music-related events and protests)
- Argus (a satirical student-run magazine)
- Students for Democratic Society (SDS; a national student activist organization that had a highly operative branch at UMD)
- WMUC (the campus radio station)
Map of the Central Locations to the Campus Organizations:
The Food Collective, or Co-Op, depended on the principles of socialism. The Co-Op was a democratically run, non-profit organization led by students that used University space to provide inexpensive food and nutritional education to other students. They helped nearly a thousand students every day and sought to help all UMD students. The UMD administration was strongly against the food Co-Op, for reasons that we could not find in our research, yet this was likely backed by an underlying fear of individual power. They sought to shut down the Co-Op, which led to a rally in front of the administration building. 2 At this rally, the students involved in the Co-Op offered the administration fruit as a token of peace. Leading up to this rally, the Co-Op asked the student body to sign a petition to show their support. The minutes log is a collection of interview questions and various notes jotted down concerning the occurrences of staff meetings. 3 Amongst them were notes of “Fuck corporate bastards” and “We must respect the collective vote.” Although not explicitly admitting their socialist tendencies, the messages coming across are ones supporting a concept of self-governance. The Co-Op created a non-profit on the foundation of helping people of their community with goods funded by the students of the university, therefore the authority and government within the community were not responsible for funding or governing this organization. When the Co-Op was under unwarranted investigation, they demanded a meeting with four different administration staff members at UMD before deciding that a peaceful protest was the best way to show their peaceful intentions and mission to serve their community. Additionally, these organizations were extremely empowering to the student body. The students on campus knew that the administration did not support the Co-Op or other socialist organizations; therefore, buying food from the Co-Op or participating in protests or community events was an act of protest in itself.
Next, we looked at UMD’s Argus magazine. The organization’s values are revealed on the title page of the magazine issue, the ‘Special Non-Pornographic Issue,’ which depicts a picture of a naked woman. 4 Taboo material like this is likely included in other issues but we only were able to look at the one that features an expression of socialist-adjacent beliefs: “Argus is the student feature magazine of the University of Maryland. It is intended for students, not parents or legislators or others whose moral or political sensibilities render them incapable of granting First Amendment rights to everyone.” 5 The writers of Argus blatantly defined a barrier between generations. The youth in Argus are one collaborative group, working for change and encouraging speaking their minds. The older generation, their parents or grandparents, are those who are easily offended and cannot accept the revolution. This statement sets forward the precedent for the definition of youth as represented at UMD, and the actions of their alternative group.
- The Food Co-Op and WMUC worked together to organize an incentive to get students and UMD community members to volunteer at the Co-Op. This was a promotional flyer that they used to advertise on campus.
WMUC was and is a fully student-run organization, in and of itself, against involvement with a higher campus authority. Today, WMUC provides a space for people to bond over the common interest of music, specifically rave culture, punk, country, and other subcultures. It also provides a safe space for queer people, as many people involved in the radio station identify as queer and bond over queer music. In the 1970s, visual art, such as posters, event advisement, and musical artworks, was hung in academic buildings, dorms, dining halls, and many other places on campus to attract people to WMUC and spread awareness for values and political conversations. Many of their advertisements called for a gathering of students to appreciate a specific music group as a way to form a community within these subgroups of young students. 6 Through the 1970s, the radio station collaborated with other campus organizations that valued the same democratic operating system and perspectives while additionally holding their own events. Part of this can be seen in their heavy involvement with what seems to be very different organizations on campus. For example, WMUC advertised the Food Collective in a poster, “Feed your body at the Co-Op; Feed your ears at WMUC.” 7 Brought together by a connection of socialist policies such as self-governance and creative freedom, organizations developed interconnectedness, strengthening their principles of defiance.
- This WMUC flyer promotes a DJ show (held by Ken Hanki) from the 1970s. It uses psychedelic-inspired art.
- This WMUC flyer uses a spin-off of Timothy Leary’s famous quote “Turn on, Tune in, Drop out.” Leary was known for his advocacy for hallucinogenics, specifically LSD.
WMUC Records, SCUA
The Students for a Democratic Society at UMD also had an important role in creating a youth community. In 1966, members of UMD’s SDS began publishing a newsletter titled SPARK, inspired by Soviet socialist Vladimir Lenin’s ISKRA (искра), a newspaper with the same title. In this publication, students posted various articles and notes highlighting campus occurrences and heavily criticized University leadership. In November 1967, after around a year of monthly postings of the newsletter, University president Dr. Wilson Elkins attempted to censor SPARK. This was both because SDS had not gotten the newsletter approved before publication and the inclusion of what the University administration described as “vulgar content.” 8 SDS explained the situation in SPARK 2.2 with mockery: “…Elkins found out that those arch-villains, the bomb-toting anarchists of Students for a Democratic Society, had the nerve to think they could put out a newsletter! Without permission! And it had a naughty word in it! FREAK OUT!!!” 9 This statement is a clear expression of SDS’s opposition to authority
On a larger scale than UMD, SDS was viewed with contempt on a national level. An article published in the U.S. News and World Report, “Goal of the ‘New Left’- Down with Everything,” writes about the “attack on the establishment” by the “New Left,” which the article defined as the SDS. 10 The article framed this group as a communist group, and therefore an enemy of the United States. This is an example of the frequent confusion or ignorance about the differences between communism and socialism. Communism was and continues to be widely stigmatized in the United States due to its correlation with anti-government and anarchy. These ideas tarnish the standing of socialism in the country. The critical article quotes a publication of an SDS chapter, in which the student author claims, “What’s needed is a generation of people who are freaky, crazy, irrational, sexy, angry, irreligious, childish and mad; people who burn high-school and college degrees; people who say ‘To hell with your goals;’ people who lure youth with music, pot and acid; people who break with the status-role-title-consumer game; people who have nothing material to lose but their flesh.” 11 Any authority, specifically the UMD and greater United States authority, would see this quote from the article as a threat to democracy by the usage of anarchy. At face value, that is what the quote sounds like, but after considering that SDS is an organization of opposition that uses protest in the form of music and drugs, then it is better understood that SDS intended to grab attention in the most drastic way possible. The leaders and editors of SDS did not want to burn high schools or give acid to children; they wanted to create wide-scale political change by grabbing the attention of their leaders and highlighting the flaws and oppression of the people in the 1970s political climate. They were young people who were willing to revolt against the norm in every possible way to achieve their goal of true democracy: power localized in the people.
The existence of all the organizations on campus was naturally anti-authoritative. Not only were they all student-run and targeted students as their main audience, but they demanded the attention of authority on campus to progress change and spread socialist ideologies. Each of these examples demonstrates the youth’s ability to form their communities of self-governance, and the direct practice of doing so at UMD while focusing on serving their community and changing the political climate.
Sexual Revolution
Sky Gilbert, buddiesinbadtimes.com
Students not only used their voices to directly protest, but also relied on tools of physical and promiscuous action. The youth tended to combat what was previously “off-limits” or “taboo” for older generations, such as the physical act of sex, or even the mention of sex in popular media. Before WWI, the idea of marriage and sexuality was a means of financial stability and convenience for women. Women would seek a husband, not because of love or attraction, but as a way to conform to societal expectations. After WWI, sexuality became a means of commercialism and capitalism in the mainstream media. People began to “sell” bodies, using magazines and television as tools to spread mainstream sex appeal to the general public. This change was also due to the lack of men at home as they fought in WWII, forcing women to take on many jobs that were normally designated for men to uphold the functions of the economy. 12 From the 1920s to the 1960s, women slowly began to demand a voice and change in national government. The birth control bill was released in the 1960s, which allowed women bodily autonomy and dictatorship over their lives. In 1973, the Supreme Court decision of Roe v. Wade allowed access to legally protect abortion, further progressing feminism liberation and sexual freedom in the United States.
The UMD student community during the 1970s was empowered to outwardly support these political groups that advocated for civil rights and sexual conversations to be included in the mainstream. The UMD was strongly against the Argus magazine and tried to censor the magazine multiple times. The university also received multiple angry letters from Maryland citizens and state officials regarding the contents of the Argus magazine. 13 In September of 1970, the university lost a court case to control censorship over student affairs; therefore, they were forced to turn censorship over to the Maryland State General Attorney, Francis B. Burch. This shows how determined the school was to disband the Argus magazine and suggests their fear of individual power that the youth movement was creating within political change. Regardless of the authoritative attempt at censorship, the Prince George’s County attorney, Arthur A. Marshall, did not find the magazine as “obscene” as Burch, allowing the magazine to continue publication. Argus sold nearly 12,000 copies of their May 1971 issue. After receiving backlash for their “pornographic competition,” Argus specially released an issue that was advertised to not feature pornographic content.
Continuing to publish in their satirical style, Argus: The Special Non-Pornographic Issue, was just as inflammatory and gives yet another example of youth rebellion. 14 The magazine cover featured an eye-catching image of a topless woman, and inside, they published the first, second, and third-place winners of the smut competition that was ordered to be shut down and never published. Among the many explicit features included in the issue, was an advertisement for an electric vibrator, graphic illustrations of a turnip with a penis (a supplement to the first-place winner of the creative pornography contest), and full-frontal photographs. Argus was the radical representation of what the youth wanted: a normalized representation of sex in the media, and even more, the normalization of the act of sex itself. Many of the so-called “pornographic” material in Argus depict people posed in a nonsexual, uninteresting way. The 1970s sparked the emergence of anti-sexualization of people’s bodies, meaning that a naked human body is not perceived as sexual, but instead seen as what it is: a naked body that is not much different from the one that holds the eyes of the audience. This idea allows people to have autonomy over their bodies, instead of being subjects of sexualization, and bonds humanity with the concept that every human body is alike in form. The authors of Argus highlight how the sexualization of humans is a social construct and that a body is not inherently sexual, urging the public to reflect on why they think a naked body invokes sexual stimulation.
Argus: The Special Non-Pornographic Issue, 6, no. 6 (May, 1971). Series S36.032: Argus, The Special Non-Pornographic Issue. University Publications. SCUA.
SDS was another campus organization that publicly supported sexual liberation. In their SPARK newsletter, one article titled “Sex and Student Power,” explicitly begins with the line, “Sex is here to stay!” 15 Further along, the author writes, “…the time has come for the older members of our society to wake and realize that sex will never [original emphasis] be a thing of the past,” summarizing the youth movement to a tee. 16 SDS represents the goal of young Americans across the country: combatting the beliefs that once were, put simply, the conformist and non-expressive ways of the preceding generations.
The youth of the 1970s were not afraid of censorship or negative attention that may follow taboo topics. This is seen through the students ‘reaction to authority’s censorship and regulations, instead of capitulating, the students creating Argus responded with satirical comics and further profanity. This demonstrates the youth’s emphasis on their freedom of speech, self-expression, and their feelings of empowerment caused by their demonstration of self-expression. The older generations were taught that conversations and thoughts about sex were shameful and dirty. When these generations rose to power, they enforced these ideals that they were socialized to believe. Student organizations utilized individual and community power and pleaded with the university’s administration to change policies and provide funding for student-led political organizations on campus, showing how these organizations truly favored supporting the general public. They were self-governing organizations, which indirectly created communities of socialist like-minded individuals within the university’s student body. The student body was also influenced by and an advocate in the sexual revolution of the 1970s. This is where the concept of sex and sexualized topics were a form of self-expression, which went against perceived societal norms structured by previous generations.
Much of this social movement was expressed through music. The music of the 1970s made more direct references to the act of sex than the decades that came before. Male and female artists alike created musical works that highlighted their desire for physical love and attraction, showing how men and women alike stood together to invoke progressive change for women’s rights. Additionally, the increasing visibility of non-heterosexuality within the decade contributed to sexual liberation. The end of the 1960s marked a radical shift in LGBT+ history with the 1969 Stonewall Uprising. The next year, the country celebrated its first pride parade in memory of the first anniversary of Stonewall. A few years later in 1973, homosexuality was officially removed from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders as a mental illness diagnosis. Queer people used music as a way to express their desire for public self-expression and sexual liberation, and queer popular music artists helped to normalize their identities in mainstream society.
Disco was a prominent musical movement of the 70s and allowed for the radical exposure of queer individuals. Disco spread through the general public and in nightclubs as the queer civil rights movement spread across the country. 17 Queer-specific nightclubs became more normalized, and increased the visibility of the queer community in public spaces, allowing those individuals to easily “come out” by dressing in flamboyant clothing or the act of dancing with the same sex. Expressing gay identities and political activism worked hand in hand. Many of the same political groups that fought for gay rights advocated for other socialist causes, such as feminism, anti-war causes in Vietnam, racial equality, and the legalization of drugs like birth control and marijuana.
In this instance, the youth used sex as a form of self-expression to rise against the socialization of authority and destigmatize the formally taboo topic of sex. This caused the youth to gain the power that the authorities attempted to strip from them. The music in the 1970s reflects these ideas. “Let’s Get It On” and “Love to Love You Baby” all showcase mainstream artists trying to bring sex into the societal conversation, allowing sex to be viewed as a rightful part of the human experience and a normalized, vital action for human existence. 18 This also segwayed to allow social space for the topic of LGBTQ+ rights and the conversation of other politically deviant topics to occur. This adds humanity to society, instead of the expectations that authority was setting to live through society-wide impression management.
“Love to Love You Baby” is also a demonstration of how women were beginning to be a part of the sexual conversation and demanding feminine empowerment for themselves. 19 This song encapsulates the disco period’s spunk while painting an image of the promiscuous, angelic women emerging from feminist liberation. Other feminist songs include “The Pill” and “I Am Woman”. 20 Both of these songs are upbeat country songs, emphasizing the excitement that women felt to finally have access to birth control and be a part of the societal conversation for civil rights. These songs are also a part of the women’s music genre, which was a new genre of music that arose in the 1970s that covered feminist topics and empowered female artists and listeners alike to create a powerful community of women. 21
This change in mentality and political beliefs presented differently from older generations. In 1970, the American College Health Association conducted a survey that asked doctors at 251 public educational institutions about their policies and regulations regarding hormonal contraception. When asked if the doctors prescribe hormonal contraception, 52.99% of respondents answered yes, and 43.43% answered no. 22 When asked if contraception was prescribed to married persons, less than half of the respondents answered yes, and none of the respondents answered no, while more than half of the respondents chose not to answer that question. Interestingly, many doctors chose not to answer this question, implying that the idea of allowing premarital sex is a deviant and wrong topic. The doctors who filled out the survey were likely from older generations and were socialized to think that premarital sex was sinful and wrong. Additionally, many of the people who voiced concern over UMD allowing a pro-abortion advocate to speak on campus were civilians and parents from the Maryland area, not students or people from the younger generation. 23 This suggests an interesting fear of change across the older generation and a lack of self-expression amongst women from this older generation.
Drug Use
Rafaela Rigoni, rafaelarigoni.com
On June 17, 1971, President Richard Nixon coined the term “War on Drugs” and forever changed the agenda of how American society will treat recreational and illegal drugs. In the early 1970s, severe drug-related policies and regulations were instilled, and drugs were seen as America’s “public enemy number one.” These policies directly targeted specific groups of people, such as minority groups and people within the drug-correlated Counterculture, like the hippie, the punk, and the disco music scene. The youth made up a majority of these populations.
The Diamondback, a UMD student-run newspaper presents valuable information regarding the youth’s drug use and rebellion against authority. 24 In 1974, a political group from DC called the Youth International Party (or the Yippies) conducted two “Smoke-Ins” as a protest against the drug-related arrest of eight students and the employment conditions of teaching assistants. This involved youth and students in the college and DC area gathered together to smoke three pounds of marijuana on UMD property. Additionally, the Yippies organized a sleep-in and many pro-drug protests. Specifically, they organized a protest at the sundial on McKeldin Mall to demand a pay rise for TAs and a TA worker strike. During the protest, they painted the iconic statue of Testudo outside the library on the mall, which read “Fire [Chancellor] Day, not TAs.” During the Smoke-In, the police acted with unwarranted violence and arrested UMD students, mainly students who were part of the student-owned Home Free Drug clinic and food organization (the Co-Op). The student residents at Cecil Hall saw the second Smoke-In occur and the violent actions from the police, prompting them to create a petition to detest the police and support the students who were arrested.
Additionally, there were two student-run archival sources that we found particularly interesting due to their drug overlap with the youth counterculture. Argus discussed many taboo topics head-on and outwardly supported socialist ideals. Specifically, they encouraged the use of marijuana. This includes “Farton Hye’s Cannabis Concoctions,” which is a recipe guide to making marijuana-infused food, and “The Compleat Dope Farmer: a handy guide to everything you always wanted to know about growing marijuana,” which is a multiple-page guide that informs the public on all the best ways to reap and sow the marijuana plant. The campus radio station, WMUC, also expressed their favor of drug use but, they did so in a way that was more discreet than Argus. WMUC would use heavily influenced psychedelic art in their promotional flyers, along with a spin on Timothy Leary’s slogan “Turn on, Tune in, Drop out,” which instead read “tune in, tune on, drop dead.” 25
Students of Cecil Hall. Petition Against Police Brutality. May 4, 1977. Box 34, Folder 6: Student Affairs, January 1971–June 1976. Series 5: Subject Files, 1970–1978. Office of the Chancellor Records. SCUA.
We also found four newspaper articles that depict how authority figures tried to censor and regulate the youth’s drug use at UMD. “Drug Drive is Launched at UMD” published in the Evening Star newspaper, describes a plan created by the advisor on student affairs at UMD that initiated a drug program to “curb the use of hard and soft drugs.” 26 This plan was initiated after a College Park blood drive, in which a shocking amount of students were turned away due to drug use. “Firm to Curb Laughing Gas,” an article in the Baltimore Sun, illustrates the rise of nitrous oxide (laughing gas) recreationally used amongst UMD students due to a supplier in a local restaurant. 27 This caused the Maryland Health Authority to restrict all nitrous oxide sales. “UM Issues Drug Warning,” published in the Baltimore Sun, tells a jarring story paralleling Nixon’s announcement of the “War on Drugs.” 28 The University of Maryland Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs wrote a letter to the campus outlining the severe penalty for drug-related crimes on campus. This letter was delivered to academic buildings, dining halls, and dorms across campus, causing The Diamondback to publish an article that explained the threat of potential drug raids and the arrest of students who unknowingly have roommates who own drugs. 29 In this case, the rise of socialist ideology caused a manifestation of increased regulations and censorship on youth self-expression projects while enforcing the older generations’ societal norms. These regulations were enforced by people from the older generations who believed that the youth should conform to authoritative social norms. The UMD was specifically a hotspot for marijuana. “Marijuana Usage at UM Held Heavy,” in the Baltimore Sun, explains that marijuana usage tripled from 1968 to 1971. 30 Over half of all sophomores, juniors, and seniors attending UMD during that period reported that they use or have used marijuana, mainly for anxiety and to combat boredom. This tremendous amount of drug use on campus caused health concerns among the students at UMD, demanding the need for specialized services to accommodate these increased rates.
In 1972, UMD established an on-campus drug clinic named “Home Free.” to address the reported heavy drug use on campus and an expressed need for a solution. The clinic progress report, written by Dr. Daniel Bratton, noted the “notable success” and “amazing” statistics that came from the first month of usage at the clinic. 31 From Bratton’s notes, Home Free handled almost 300 cases in that time, with 159 being serious, which they defined as “in need of urgent care.” Of the drugs mentioned, acid, speed (amphetamine), runaway (methamphetamine), psilocybin (mushrooms), downs (barbiturates), heroin, and cocaine were all significant. In the Student Affairs collection of the archives, we examined how tobacco was also used and eventually outlawed on campus. Before 1973, smoking tobacco in classrooms and on campus was acceptable; in August 1973, a law was passed that stated: “Smoking in classrooms is prohibited unless all students within the classroom agree to the contrary.” 32This caused many students to be in hot water, as smoking continued regularly on campus and in classrooms. The administration received many letters from non-smoker students and UMD community members about UMD’s lack of reinforcement of the new anti-smoking legislature, which caused the university to find new ways to enforce the legislation. The UMD administration utilized notable figures on campus and The Diamondback to spread the word about the new enforcement. Drug use was widely utilized by the younger generations as a mechanism to protest authority.
The 1970s genres of rock and roll, jazz, and the psychedelic rock scene, normalized drugs as a way for people to feel free from social norms and expand their consciousness. It was also a way to build community, as young people who were experiencing the same perception-altering influence as a way to break free from authority. Mainstream music that was popular at the time was The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, and The Grateful Dead, all of which used their music to convey the band’s experience with psychedelics, marijuana, cocaine, and other criminalized drugs. Tina Turner’s “Acid Queen” is also notable, featured in a radio interview by Cornelius Ivy on KBDY radio in June of 1976, which depicted young people who supported the use of Marijuana. 33 Mainstream artists heavily influenced youth and took matters into their own hands to utilize these musical tools and invoke change with their socialist values. The students were further empowered to share their ideology from their motivation to strongly combat authority with protest, sex, drug use, and community formation. This is also an example of how different levels of society influence each other when they go through change.
The youth’s drug use affects different levels of society and how these levels of society function as a whole. 34 This illustrates how the youth had larger political influences from their public demonstrations of self-expression, specifically among the university’s youth. These instances of student drug use, such as smoking on the UMD campus and publishing drug-supporting magazine material, were an outward rebellion against the authority figures, policies, regulations, and censorship that was enforced upon young people in the 1970s. This behavior is also a form of self-expression, allowing the students to stand together for a cause they believe in, performing actions that make them feel calm, peaceful, and united. The War on Drugs only caused students to become more outwardly spoken and passionate about the decriminalization of drugs, creating a never-ending loop of authority lashing out and the youth rebelling further. The youth’s actions influenced authority and vice versa, allowing subcultures of society to influence each other’s behaviors and leaving a much wider social influence.
Political Protest
Associated Press, nytimes.com
The ways in which UMD students engaged with collective organizations, the sexual revolution, and drug use were all forms of protest. Functionalism is a critical theory that illustrates how society is structured to have multiple subgroups that influence each other. This social theory illustrates how the youth had larger political influences from their public demonstrations of self-expression, specifically among the university’s youth. These different subgroups each have a unique role in society, which allows society to function as one progressing unit. Altogether, these aspects of protest can be seen as a larger manifestation of socialism.
Protests have been used as an act of defiance and advocacy for individuals throughout history, supported by the U.S. Constitution as a profound expression of one’s independence and freedom. For the youth, protest became a way to gain respect, as well as support for their progressive ideas. In addition to the physical acts of protest, such as strikes, rallies, marches, and demonstrations, sex and drugs were used as functions of protest within the young communities.
A crucial piece of context for the occurrences of political protest at UMD is the Kent State Massacre. On May 4, 1970, 4 students were killed and 9 injured after the Ohio National Guard fired shots into a crowd of demonstrators at Kent State. The students who had gathered were protesting the Vietnam War, specifically the expansion of the war into Cambodia, hauntingly similar to the acts of UMD students and other college students across the nation. In response to the tragedy, musical artists such as Crosby, Stills, Nash, Neil Young, Marvin Gaye, and The Beach Boys released songs of protest and distress.
Throughout the 1970s, political protests were occurring on UMD’s campus, specifically connected to the Vietnam War and its expansion into Cambodia, as well as the Kent State Massacre. Much of our information gathered on the topic came from the History of the University [of Maryland]- Campus Unrest records, which contain the source, “One Students Memories,” a scrapbook-style documentation of campus unrest. 35 The scrapbook was assembled by an undergraduate student, Doris Plumer, who made collages of flyers, journal entries, photographs, and song lyrics together into a book that ties general national unrest to specific events of protest on campus. Many of the flyers contain messages of opposition to the “system,” or the US government, and the overarching oppression within society. One was a poster for an on-campus “March against Death and Tyranny,” and another was a Rally on McKeldin Mall pushing to “END repression in the Black Community and of the Black Panthers. Free all political prisoners!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! US out of South East Asia NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” 36
Plumer, Doris. “One Student’s Memories” Scrapbook. 1969–1971. Box 1, Folder 1. History of the University of Maryland Campus Unrest Records. SCUA.
One of Plumer’s personal journal entries included in the source opens with the line, “The revolution has begun,” further noting the dedication of the youth, and implementing a sense of awareness within that same community that they know of the change they are making. This source also brings forth a strong tie to the music of the era. Music was used as a function of protest, a means of using creative liberty to work towards a greater societal goal, and a way to express opposition and disillusionment disguised as a form of art. 37 Plumer makes this visible with the inclusion of lyrics such as The Byrds’ “In the end you will surely know I wasn’t born to follow,” an overt statement of resistance. 38 In addition, single pages are used solely for displaying music. One page is dedicated to the lyrics of Neil Young’s “Ohio,” while another page is built around Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind”, both notable songs of protest. 39 “Ohio” was a response to the Kent State Massacre, and “Blowin’ in the Wind” was an antiwar anthem contextualized by Vietnam.
We also noticed a common theme of peace in Plumer’s notes. These uprisings were meant to be peaceful, at least for the majority of the young advocates involved. One protest sign had the bold heading, “KEEP CALM, BE PEACEFUL”, and we continued to observe recurring motifs of peace in other sources as well, whether it’s the symbol drawn into the dot of the letter ‘i’, or a photograph of a hand displaying the sign of peace. 40 This emphasizes the socialist belief in peace and cooperation, even during the revolution. The youth did not plan for violence, and avoided conflict with the state, as displayed in another quote of a flyer: “Violence will only bring the police to campus. We don’t want the police.” 41
Argus supports a more extreme movement of opposition to authority. In a Readers Digest article, a popular publication circulated worldwide, the author pointed out the actions of Argus: “Each copy of the February [1971] issue […] contained an American flag decal and a book of matches with which to burn it.” 42 For those students involved with Argus, vivid imagery and intense opposition to the nation as a whole represented their resistance to the system, now being recognized internationally by Readers Digest consumers everywhere.
Rebellion could also be easily incorporated into everyday college life. In one instance during the decade, a member of Students for a Democratic Society hung up anti-war posters with the heading: “Are you Against the War in Vietnam?” on the walls of academic buildings. In an included letter from an individual signed Dick, likely a faculty or staff member, he writes about his experience with this member of SDS. After telling the girl to limit her poster placement to bulletin board surfaces, she continued to post them on the walls of the building, which caused him to complain, “THEN SHE DOES WHAT THE HELL SHE CARED TO…” 43 Although a trivial occurrence, this shows that youth members of such organizations displayed daily rebellious behavior so often that the behavior was considered commonplace.
Political protests were one of the most influential ways for youth to spread awareness and support for their ideologies and social movements, all of which were self-governed and created a sense of a united community. One widely known example is the hippies, a group of young people in the 1960s and 1970s, known for spreading universal peace and love across the United States at a time when there were high rates of political unrest. They conveyed their ideologies through music, in songs like “Peace Train” by Cat Stevens. This sound is upbeat and has extremely uplifting, joyful, and hopeful tones. It also has multiple voices on the chorus, indicating the community that is calling for peace. This song was written in response to the Vietnam War and calling for peace, as many politically charged songs were during this time.
One of the main reasons that political protests worked was their large number of supporters. Youth activism in the 1970s influenced an entire generation and made thousands of people want to take part in spreading socialist ideologies. Walkouts and strikes are one way that youth were able to create massive disruption in society and gain a lot of social attention from authority. It is interesting to note that the violence that came from these protests was always caused by the overreaction and over-involvement of police forces and authoritative officials. This created a stigma that protesters, socialist advocates, and the act of protesting were violent. In reality, all protests remained peaceful as well as their advertisement for their congregations. This is ironic because the authoritative actions pursued by the state were met to contain the youth activist movement, not further increase their rage and demand for change.
Conclusion
The youth of the 1970s UMD was nothing short of a deeply passionate, expressive, and inspiring community, specifically the students at the University of Maryland. This group of young people and students is only a sample of a much larger political change happening across the nation during the 1970s. Young people invoked waves of change that were felt through generations of the 1970s and still affect the political and social climate today. For instance, Roe v. Wade is still a conversation that many states continue to have on their ballot, whether to lean towards the socialist or the conservative route for change in our country.
The 1970s music connected to these values has also not been forgotten. Much like disco was the nightclub dance scene of the 1970s, Electronic Dance Music (known as EDM) and house music are the music of popular club scenes now. If someone was to go to a nightclub in the 1970s they would have heard disco music. Nowadays, if someone were to attend a nightclub, they would hear EDM and house music, which model the Counterculture music scenes (disco, punk, and hippie) of the 1970s. Disco, EDM, and house all directly reference sex, drugs, political unrest, and feminist and queer liberation, while attracting many people who believe in these causes and strongly express themselves against the status quo. All three of these genres have steady beats and strong bass lines, allowing them to be easily danceable. EDM and house music also sample disco music from the 1970s in many of their songs, showing how disco still has a heavy influence over modern music. As music scenes progress, the themes that bring community and youth together do as well, while building on the political change that was structurally laid down in the past. There is no doubt that the 1970s paved a path for future generations and youth to feel empowered and in control over their society, allowing them a voice against authority.
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