32 Comments
User's avatar
Lew Truex's avatar

I played in a rock band in the 60’s. This is a song we played at frequent performances. What goes around, comes around!

Eve of Destruction

Barry McGuire

The Eastern world, it is explodin'

Violence flarin', bullets loadin'

You're old enough to kill but not for votin'

You don't believe in war, but what's that gun you're totin'?

And even the Jordan river has bodies floatin'

But you tell me over and over and over again my friend

Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction

Don't you understand what I'm trying to say?

Can't you feel the fear that I'm feeling today?

If the button is pushed, there's no running away

There'll be no one to save with the world in a grave

Take a look around you boy, it's bound to scare you, boy

But you tell me over and over and over again, my friend

Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction

Yeah, my blood's so mad, feels like coagulatin'

I'm sittin' here just contemplatin'

I can't twist the truth, it knows no regulation

Handful of Senators don't pass legislation

And marches alone can't bring integration

When human respect is disintegratin'

This whole crazy world is just too frustratin'

And you tell me over and over and over again my friend

Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction

Think of all the hate there is in Red China

Then take a look around to Selma, Alabama

Ah, you may leave here for four days in space

But when you return, it's the same old place

The poundin' of the drums, the pride and disgrace

You can bury your dead but don't leave a trace

Hate your next door neighbor but don't forget to say grace

And you tell me over and over and over and over again my friend

You don't believe we're on the eve of destruction

You don't believe we're on the eve of destruction

Expand full comment
Cindy Sheehan's avatar

Thanks, Lew

Expand full comment
Joanna Perry-Folino's avatar

i’m pretty convinced and I do not exclude myself from this group that just about everyone is emotionally ill at this point in time. And yet I see very few resources to help the population of this country in a very real way so are we on the eve of destruction? I don’t think we’ve ever really been off the eve of destruction. I think there were very few folks truly healthy and sound and aware of their own inner pain buried your after year day after day decade after decade in act outs of one sort or another This is probably less true of small populations of indigenous people hiding in forests so they don’t have to deal with the lunacy that the outside world parading as civilization will bring to them. Physician heal self.

Expand full comment
Cindy Sheehan's avatar

It's my opinion that the covid era has harmed all of us physically, emotionally, and mentally. It just depends on how strong a person was in March of 2020 as to how much damage was caused. xo

Expand full comment
Joanna Perry-Folino's avatar

I think it did certainly terrorize and push many people to extremes but as I am sure you and your followers know that "stuff" inside people they do anything to repress until it is smashed in their faces leaked its way out and was amplified by the fear they saw on the faces of fellow human beings and the Draconian "rules" aka as TERRORISM set on each of us, even those who knew it was bullshit. That's the problem with not dealing with childhood abuse, domestic abuse, birth traumas, adult fears etc. We have crappy mental health providers for the most part who don't want it to get too messy inside people because it might leak on them. If the next POTUS did nothing else but work on his or her own shit, we would see a change because mental health which leads to physical health would be a MAJOR priority. And that means worldwide, not only in this country. I have little hope that will happen since it has not in eons of civilization. Easier to just grab guns, knives, bombs and kill ourselves and each other. "Oh what fools these mortals be"...it ain't just Israel's army any more...although right now they win the award for MASS MURDER.

Expand full comment
Judith's avatar

Absolutely. Aside from the obvious death and injuries I think that the nighmaredemic just sucked the life out of life.

Expand full comment
Joanna Perry-Folino's avatar

Yes the Planned-emic certainly achieved its goal.

Expand full comment
John Orban's avatar

...four dead in Ohio.

Expand full comment
Ort's avatar

FWIW, ever since my high school Formative Years (c. 1970) I've had mixed feelings about CSNY and Neil Young. It's that mysterious middle ground of liking certain songs, but somehow not strongly enough to reach the threshold of full fanhood; in the past, I've expressed this by saying that I like X enough to get his/hers/their Greatest Hits CD.

Anyway, "Ohio" became an instant favorite from the first time I heard it on the radio. And it is also the worm that came to ear as soon as I saw the Zionist pro-genocide contingent advocating for a return to the retro horror of sending National Guard troops onto university campuses to "establish" or "maintain" order.

It's inconceivable that the parties agitating for "law & order" police and military aggression-- er, intervention-- to counter generally peaceful protest never heard of, or have forgotten, the Kent State Massacre. My guess is that they would explain it away as, at worst, an irrelevant tragic one-off "mistakes were made" fluke. 😫 👂 🐛

Expand full comment
John Orban's avatar

Can you believe it's been FIFTY FREAKIN' YEARS?

Expand full comment
Gene Marx's avatar

With civilization just one false flag attack from being wiped out, at least we had great protest music, back in the day.

My current tune worm is "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield.

What a field day for the heat (Ooh ooh ooh)

A thousand people in the street (Ooh ooh ooh)....

...Paranoia strikes deep

Into your life it will creep

It starts when you're always afraid

Step out of line, the men come and take you away

Expand full comment
Marie Long's avatar

yep, we did have great music!....back in the day...

Expand full comment
Judith's avatar

The best.

Expand full comment
Judith's avatar

Love this song.

Expand full comment
Marie Long's avatar

when a society mutilates children and tells them lies which mess up their minds, you can believe that we are way way along the path to destruction.

Expand full comment
john smith's avatar

Check out his great performance on the Hullabaloo tv show on YouTube.

Expand full comment
Cheryl Rose's avatar

Coyote Dance the late Robbie Robertson

Expand full comment
todd smith's avatar

Aphrodite's Child is not for everyone, as their music gets kind of weird. By the way, listened to "Eve of Destruction" earlier, great song that I'd not listened to in many Moons, and actually had forgotten about. Great suggestion!

Expand full comment
polistra's avatar

In US/UK/EU, civilization is done We're dying too fast and not having enough kids.

In the sane parts of the world like Africa and Brazil and India and the Soviet Empire (maybe not Russia itself, I'm not sure) civilization is extremely alive. Christianity and Islam are living forces in the South, and Natural Law is functioning as it should.

The decay of US/UK/EU is also part of Natural Law. God's immune system is rejecting us like the pathogen we've become.

Expand full comment
Jon Olsen's avatar

Here is a series of very enlightening questions for rump supporters to ask him about his covid response: Very well done:

https://brownstone.org/articles/questions-for-trump-about-covid/?utm_medium=onesignal&utm_source=push

Expand full comment
Jon Olsen's avatar

Didn't actually mean to say "rump." LOL Oh well.

Expand full comment
todd smith's avatar

Aphrodite's Child, "666: the Number of the Beast." I think one of those most inspired rock albums ever, the dark side of the Age of Aquarius. What inspired those Greeks to compose that music is unknown (1971 or 1972). It's mystical, magical, dark and enchanting. I re-bought the album several years ago, even though I have it on CD; the price tag, ironically: $9.99. Whenever on display, I always turn it upside down. Vangelis, of "Chariots of Fire" minor fame, was one of the principal members of that band, which mainly did Beatles-sounding shit before launching this bizarre rock opera...

Expand full comment
Cindy Sheehan's avatar

never heard of it

Expand full comment
Judith's avatar

Oh boy, I can see me now walking along the street at about age 10 hearing this song on a transistor radio.

I have thought of this song so many many times over the years.

They just don't write them or sing them like they used to.

Is there such a thing as a "protest song" anymore?

Expand full comment
Charles leone's avatar

War is for big dummies like Lloyd Austin of the U.S. War Department.

Expand full comment
minecritter's avatar

I was thinking of this song too. I like the intense, carefully controlled rage. Even Jesus would never forgive what they do. Indeed.

Expand full comment
Charles leone's avatar

Push the Trade Unions to support the Student protesters Demands on College Campuses.

Do it Now!!! Shut down the Military Financial Complex!!!

Expand full comment
minecritter's avatar

I first heard the song Eve of Destruction on an episode of Greatest American Hero I think in the 80's. I can't remember the context, just that it played on a car radio. I think it was a warning from aliens.

Expand full comment