I grew up in the late 60’s and 70’s. Even the 80’ got a bit of the splash over! We were about free love and thumbing authority. We might add tolerance and peace on earth. (OK, some of us . . . not all!)
I remember the songs of that age. “Let there be peace on earth” was a great favourite. Our community choir just sang a song called “Hand in Hand”. From the early 80’s, this song could have as easily been written a decade earlier.
The idea of peace, of loving one another, of full acceptance are all there in the song. As well as joining hands so that we won’t fall (or be overtaken by sinister forces).
And my mind went off on one of it’s weird tangents. I remember singing the song, “Onward Christian Soldiers” as a kid. We were all about being a group together, joining the “happy song”, and blending our voices. Then the song went out of fashion because it was too “militaristic and violent.” After all, we were all about peace and love!
“Hand in Hand” was the more politically correct way to approach life. Be a group together, join in happy signing, blend our voices.
Although . . . somehow this seems like a militaristic theme as well. Join the army of the peaceniks. What was revealed in the next decades was a new type of non-violent violence and intolerance that mingled with the lofty words.
Perhaps we were just singing the words backwards?