Woodstock commentary by Jenna Johnson
Although some may view rock music as “the incarnation of resistance, revolution, debauchery, sexuality, dissent, violence, mayhem, anarchism, and more,� I believe that rock music and its followers have multiple times proven to be otherwise. As Tipper Gore puts it in the Schowalter article, “the essential character of rock music posits it as a great harm to its auditors and that this condition can only worsen.� Woodstock was one example that contradicted this. We saw in the film a crowd that was using drugs, without clothing, and many other things, but that was the great opposite of violent anarchy in nature. The same article goes on to describe that Max Yasgur “was eloquent in congratulating the well-behaved crowd� that had taken over his farm property. He was not the least bit angry in his speech, and in fact was happy to see such a large group behaving peacefully. This was indeed a bit surprising, considering the physical toll taken by his farmland.
Michael Wadleigh’s film also captured one of the bigger themes of the era, which was, as the Walley article states, that the “sixties in its purest form was a shining historical moment that was supposed to raise consciousness… It was not meant to be brokered by goods, fashion, or style, which weakened its total effect.� In other words, Woodstock, taken as a piece of the sixties, represented the initiative by many people to raise awareness of what was going on in the world, and lessen the focus from usual daily obligations to things that really mattered politically and socially. In itself, Woodstock could be considered one of the greatest peace demonstrations of the time.