I think it was just fashionable theory to them (the bo-bos in the 1970s). But you are quite right that their grandchildren, possibly literally my childhood neighbors' grandchildren, are out putting theory into practice as we speak.
I've seen it in my own family: the poseur liberalism of the elders gets magnified through the generations until the youngest put it into action in the most horrifying way.
Perhaps my children will one day recognize what their father's black-sheep turn to the right saved them from? Not taking any bets.
The fashionability allowed for recruitment. You're right, most of those people who bought that stuff were too cowardly to do anything, but it allowed those ideas into their homes and "normalized" it so that communists could get to the most favorable recruits easier and radicalize them.
The bohemian-bourgeois neighbors of my childhood had it on the shelf next to ... what was it ... "The Collected Works of Saul Alinsky" perhaps?
Reading how to subvert The Establishment rhetorically? Right On!
Actually going out and Molotov Cocktailing something? Whoa man!
Their grandchildren are currently firebombing Teslas and burned down cities in 2020. I don't think they were bluffing.
I think it was just fashionable theory to them (the bo-bos in the 1970s). But you are quite right that their grandchildren, possibly literally my childhood neighbors' grandchildren, are out putting theory into practice as we speak.
I've seen it in my own family: the poseur liberalism of the elders gets magnified through the generations until the youngest put it into action in the most horrifying way.
Perhaps my children will one day recognize what their father's black-sheep turn to the right saved them from? Not taking any bets.
The fashionability allowed for recruitment. You're right, most of those people who bought that stuff were too cowardly to do anything, but it allowed those ideas into their homes and "normalized" it so that communists could get to the most favorable recruits easier and radicalize them.
Perhaps MaoтАЩs Little Red Book.