SDS), and participated in the Columbia University takeover of 1968:the revolutionary idealism of the 60s was made possible, for these young people, by the fact that they had all received classical educations in the 50s; ... in a fascinating way - even though they were about to destroy many of the fundamental institutions and values of their childhood, it was the most conservative and traditional educational values of the 50s that had created such literate, aware, and courageous young people, unafraid of change, disgusted by injustice, who were going to be so successful in destroying the system that created them.
My colleague described this as "a complicated train of thought," which sounds about right. I think he means to commend both radicalism and traditional educational rigor as a means to it, but the language of creating and destroying seems to point in another direction, though I can't say I quite understand what it is.
