At What age did you have your politcal awakening?

[SilasSoule]

I'm currently 45 and I myself was a late bloomer as far as liberal activism went. Throughout my life I always considerd myself a democrat and even liberal, but it was a passive and almost apathetic type of political involvement.

It wasn't until selection 2000 that happened on the heels of a B.S. impeachment where I had my own political epiphany and awakened to true nefariousness of the right wing. This awakening solidified and strengthend my long held beliefs and motivated me into activism. I found many like minded people on the Internet like here on DU and the zeal for my activism increased exponentially.

I do not believe that I am the only one that this has happend to during the regime of this fruadministration. I thank you George W. Bush for busting me out of my shell.

[Guaranteed]

1. It actually wasn't too long ago.

I'd always liked history, but during the Clinton years (the "race to the middle years") politics seemed boring and unimportant. It wasn't until Bush started talking about invading Iraq that I started really paying attention to what was going on.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

2. 9 years old accompanying my father to visit striking farmworkers

in Delano, California and seeing the conditions in which they lived..on another visit..sitting in the truck with my dad watching the farmers set up the workers to work for free by calling the INS on payday and clearing out the fields when the green trucks arrived....thereby allowing the farmers to screw the workers...I got a DEEP sense of social justice back then and it followed me forever.

[NMDemDist2]

3. i remember being 13 years old in 1968

watching the Democratic National Convention on TV and seeing the police beat the war protesters and crying. My ex Marine step father telling me they were stinking traitors and if I didn't quit crying for a bunch of hippie freaks he'd REALLY give me something to cry about.

I starting taking the bus to Berkley the next year and getting gassed in the streets, and marching with Cesar Chavez etc etc etc

I must admit other than voting at every election, I never before have been active in Party politics, but this year I joined my local party and got elected as precinct committee person and the rest is history :)

[mike_c]

6. I remember 1968 too....

I was also 13. I too had a screaming, self-defining fight with my father as we watched the Chicago storm troopers running amok. I ws already a leftist, I just didn't know what that meant.

Nonetheless, I think my political personality was formed during the last Nixon adiministration. I'm a Watergate liberal-- cynical as the night is long.

[Zookeeper]

30. Something about 1968....

I was 12 when Martin Luther King was assassinated. I heard someone say, "Good! I'm glad they got that N*****!" I was so shocked! My sense of justice was already developing, but overhearing that horrible comment pushed me suddenly into a more adult view of the world. And then, I knew for sure, which side I was on.

Edited for spelling.

[BillZBubb]

4. My father was solid Repug, my mother a closet liberal

I was basically liberal but not overtly so until college. LBJ and Vietnam kept me away from the Democratic party for many years.

[sendero]

5. I was....

... a Reagan Republican. Around 1986, I realized that 99% of the criticisms coming from the left were quite valid. I got fed up.

Now, I wonder what the hell I was thinking. But on the other hand, having been a "freeper" I kindof know where they are coming from.

That doesn't mean I agree with them at all, I'm waiting for all of them to have their own 1986. :)

[JanMichael]

7. I've had three. I was 11 and watched Somoza's troops shoot a reporter...

...(Bill Stewart)in the head on the nightly news. I had been playing Nicaraguan "war" and usually had the gummint troops win. Then I saw that barbarity and started reading about our pet devil Somoza. I switched sides. So I then hated Reagan. Then when I was in college I literally was an Anarchist, I wanted to pull everything apart, Republicans, the FBI, the CIA, the Banks, the Plutocracy in general, everything including the Dems. Then Clinton got elected and I went off to Poland for a few years and basically chilled, until the impeachment which sent me over the edge. Then butterfly ballots, purged voters in FL, the sElection, neocons, Asscroft, wars of aggression...and I've now flown so far Left that I'm thinking about painting my truck Red.

[Design8edGrouch]

8. Two early memories

My parents say I would have been too young, but I have a very clear memory of thinking Joseph McCarthy being a very scary man. But in all honesty, I really didn't have a context for his scariness.
Second memory, 9 or 10 years old, rural Indiana seeing a barn with "Get the USA out of the UN and the UN out of the USA". I had just "trick or treated for UNICEF" and thought any organization that wanted to provide food and medicine and clean water for children had to be a good thing. And I also thought that the owner of the barn (who ever he was) was the meanest most selfish man in the world accept of course for that Joseph McCarthy person that had been scaring me since I was 3 or 4 years old.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

9. I was 11-12. Dad told me that...

...despite what the Civics book from school said, Brazil was NOT a democracy (it was the mid-70's), and went on to explain why. I was genuinely shocked.

[Virginian]

10. 1962 - I discovered "Camelot"

I was still in grade school, but the White House social scene was always in the Washington Star. I poured over the society pages the way other girls would read Snow White or Cinderella. I was quite a Kennedy geek.

Now I know it wasn't real, it was only an image, but I've always wanted to see a return to Camelot.

[liarliartieonfire]

11. I was 10 yrs old - Nov 22 1963 - the murder of John F Kennedy

My parents were active members of the Democratic NPL in our State.

I watched our b&w TV with them from coverage of the asassination in Dallas, to the casket lying in State in the Rotunda in D.C. We watched the funeral procession: the flag draped casket on a small carriage, drawn by the black riderless horse, black riding boots in the stirrups backwards, denoting a fallen rider.

I remember every detail and recall my mom in tears along with an entire Nation.
I also recall my parents talking about Oswald and Jack Ruby and the doubt they had that Oswald was the true assassin.
I believe it was at that time I began to doubt our government.
Not believing everything I was told.

Fast forward to the Vietnam War..when I realized the seriousness of this conflict.
My mom and brother searching the local newspaper for my brother's draft number. Where was he on "the list".
His # was high, in the 300's. he was not called.
But I recall our neighbors, also searching the papers that day, for the fate of their sons.
My mom later crying with her friend, whose son had learned the bad news. His number was low. He would go to Vietnam.

The draft was a horror of horrors. 18 yr old kids left American Pie for a world of absolute hell many would not return from.

I recall the 1971, My freshman yr in college. Vietnam soldiers were returning home. The Vietnam Vets Club was a leaning tree for all. Dazed and confused, drunk and high, Born to Be Wild, and House of the Rising Sun. Questioning their future place in this world wasn't even a thought they entertained. They had had enough of life already.
Some faired well, some did not. It changed everyone in some way.Thats the reality of war.

That's it. My awarness began at an innocent age 10 and 8 years later I was a full fledged activist.
Cause and effect I guess. Kennedy's death, War, and the horror of the draft for a war with an uncertain meaning.

Thanks

[cally]

12. I was about 9 and we had to write a report on a famous

person. The teacher passed out a list of all white men. I asked if I could write about a woman. A black girl asked if she could write about Martin Luther King. We both got permission but that got me thinking about all the people that we were not learning about.

I started paying more attention to the news and following the issues. By the time I was 13, I defined myself as a liberal.

[ulTRAX]

13. 1968

It was spring. It was hearing about the sit-ins at Columbia.

[Lindacooks]

14. I met my future husband and we talked politics all the time.

And I started thinking about it, and realized that all of my beliefs and convictions were represented by the Democratic party. I had been a Republican (SHUDDER) up to that point just because that was the way I was raised.

Now I'm more to the left than my dh.

[Redneck Socialist]

15. Chanting "Down with Nixon! Up with Congress!"

got me punched in the stomach by a young freeper in training in elementary school. I really didn't know what I was going on about, but this well trained, little lefty who I thought was cool got a bunch of us going. Sadly my political indoctrination didn't stick and it wasn't until later on, post college really, that I became active.

My political evolution can be summarized thusly: I started out pretty freeperish, because I like my guns and didn't much give a rats ass about the rest of the world. I moved toward Libertarianism because I really liked dope and both the republicans and the Democrats wanted to put me in jail because of that. Finally, at long last, I became a Democrat because of environmental issues. Ahhh, home at last.

[neverborn]

16. Age 15-16

Age 15 I was hearing the drum-beat for Iraq war... and I remember my grandfather telling me -- "War is very... very ... very rarely needed. War is hell. Never forget that." So I decided to look into why Iraq was being invaded. I was shocked and horrified. What... bullshit!

I then began identifying myself as a liberal. I saw Bowling for Columbine. I researched stuff, began reading political blogs. Got VERY emotional over the I/P conflict when I heard about Rachel Corrie. (This is still a very sensitive issue for me -- the thought of it still can bring me to tears. I don't know why.)

I was still politically apathetic. I wanted change, but I didn't think one person could affect anything. I knew I wanted Bush* out, but what was I? I couldn't even vote.

Then... I saw a speech. "You have the power!"

I was intrigued. Someone says they want to take America back... I'm in for the ride.

That's how it all started, with Iraq and Gov. Dean.

I'm now a far-left liberal. I've worked on two political campaigns. I'm a member of a bunch of PACs/Activist groups. I've taken part in two protests. I've changed my major to Political Science. I wanted to take back America, and there's no stopping me now.

[KittyWampus]

17. While A Little Girl, I Used To Imagine Ideal States

and looked at what was happening and found a very large gap.

Also, my uncle worked in Secret Service and went to Soviet Union often.

He told us then (early 70's) that the SU was poor and NOT the threat it was made out to be.

[hang a left]

18. Late Bloomer myself. The Clinton hearings and then the

selection 2000. I was about 38.

[OnionPatch]

19. I was 14

and my mother had left my abusive, alcoholic (Republican) father. She had followed all the rules of her day....married a good man (he seemed so before turning alcoholic) stayed home, took care of the kids. When he became alcoholic she had to raise us on her own but had no college education. She worked full-time in a factory for minimum wage but we still had to live in subsidized housing and get food stamps. I'll never forget the way people looked at us in line at the grocery store and scrutinized every item in our cart. I'll never forget the way the other kids at school treated us when they found out we got on the bus at the "projects." My mom would come home tired and dirty then I would hear her crying in bed at night because she couldn't afford to buy Christmas presents and things like that. She told me the Republicans wouldn't raise minimum wage and were fighting against the unionization of her job. I heard Republicans say horrible things about people who received govt. assistance like we did. I have to admit that I'm a Democrat mostly because I hate Republicans and their mean, shriveled little hearts.

[SilasSoule]

28. Welcome to DU OnionPatch

:hi:

[chelsea0011]

20. Kent State to Ronnie RayGun

It is all a cycle. Stick around. The SH*T is about to hit the fan. Again.

[CalebHayes]

21. 9

[LearnedHand]

39. GREAT photo, cq! eom

[MrPrax]

22. No Red Diapers here?

come on...you can admit it?

est facile...

[nomatrix]

36. What is a red diaper?

No really, what the hell is that? I don't want savage b.s. I want to know what you think.


From the looks of the survey, most were inspired during the kennedy/king days. Who wouldn't be? These were people who took tremendous risks. Paid for it with their lives.

There is something to be said about "sounding" like you graduated from Yale/Harvard. Not talking down to people, like you are explaining it to a child. Of course he could just be parroting how he was told.

[bigbillhaywood]

38. Red diapers are people who's parents were 60s radicals. n/t

[starroute]

40. No, red diapers are people whose parents were Communists

They had a very hard time of it growing up in the 1950's, and many of them share a distinctive form of alienation from American society. They also don't talk about it much.

[Blasphemer]

23. Different levels at different times...

As a kid, I was a staunch Democrat and I absolutely hated and distrusted Reagan. I wrote a little anti-Reagan ditty in the 4th grade for a newspaper clipping assignment. By the first gulf war ( I was about 15), I had become more moderate on some issues, and I couldn't comprehend claims of an "oil war" as I wore my yellow ribbon and wrote letters to the troops. Of course, I still didn't support the GOP and was glad to see the end of GHWB a year and a half later. Around this time, I also become more actively involved in issue like abortion - went to rallys, escorted at clinics, etc. I also became more aware of women's issues in general. However, this period led to my becoming very radical in the sense that I was anti-establishment, "no difference between the two parties", etc. It wasn't until the selection 2000 that I become re-engaged in the existing political system and re-embracing the Democratic party. * is a real uniter alright!

[knight_of_the_star]

24. 3 1/2 years ago

And I'll be 19 in less than a month. That was when I found out that Bush hates Wiccans and it all went downhill from there.

[American Renaissance]

25. when I began to see the US from the outside,

I moved to Canada as a child with my dad, I was still pretty young, but I began to notice how the rest of the world saw the United States, and the more I saw of it, the more it disgusted me.

[FDRrocks]

26. around age 19

I became political. Around the current time, age 20, I realized that the two party system isn't worth the salary of a local dog catcher.

[starroute]

27. My childhood was a process of progressive disillusionment

Probably my first political memory is of singing, "Whistle while you work, Nixon is a jerk," on the school bus in 1952, when I was 5. But at that age I only knew that people like Nixon and Joe McCarthy were bad guys -- I didn't know why. (I didn't even know until a few months ago that my parents had been actively worrying about McCarthy getting a hold of the subscription list of a left-wing magazine with my mother's name on it.)

By the time 1956 rolled around, I was a big Stevenson fan, though I still didn't know why. But there is one thing I remember very clearly from that election. My father showed me an article in the magazine section of the Sunday paper and pointed out how, even though they might seem to give the same amount of coverage to Stevenson and Eisenhower, the photo of Eisenhower showed him smiling and happy among a crowd of supporters, while the photo of Stevenson was far less flattering. And he told me that they did that deliberately.

I found that terribly shocking and disillusioning. At the time, I didn't know why it bothered me quite so much. But I can see now that it was the same problem so many "ordinary Americans" are having today in accepting that the Republicans are a bunch of lying, greedy, incompetent bastards and that the media are covering for them. Once you lose your faith in the official line, you no longer know who you can rely on or what you can take as true, and that is a very uncomfortable situation to be in.

The final straw, however, was the U-2 incident in 1960. Before that, I could still believe that nothing worse was happening than a bit of cosmetic prettying by the newspapers. But after Eisenhower lied about the spy planes, I knew that not even the president could be counted on to tell the truth, not even in a matter of national honor. And any hopes I had that Kennedy would be fundamentally different were dashed by the Bay of Pigs.

So by the time I was 14 I had learned that although some politicians might be preferable to others, none of them could be counted on to do the right thing when it really mattered and none of them were completely honest. And I have seen no reason to change my mind about that at any time since.

[ACK]

29. Mondale/Raygun

I kind of kept track a bit before but I knew after that where I stood.

I was in my teens.

+

[Chovexani]

31. Change the age, and my situation is exactly the same

I've always been a Democrat, I was raised by Democrats, and always had the importance of it drilled into me from childhood (yep, my grandma had pics of Jesus, MLK and JFK in our house), that people died for my rights etc. I felt strongly about issues on a kind of primal level (civil rights, the environment, etc) but I never really knew the whys or hows behind issues. I just knew Republicans were for rich white people and I'm neither and that's why mom voted straight D and why, when I was old enough, I should too.

The 2000 selection was my awakening too. I was 19 at the time and it was my first presidential election. I registered to vote on my 18th birthday and I was so excited about being able to vote for pres, etc. That my vote was stolen was just infuriating. I was livid. I found the political web during the recount fiasco and was outraged by the stuff I saw going on, and felt powerless. I found DU from an email list I got on at the time (it was just after the inauguration, DU had just started I think) and that's when my education REALLY began. :)

Really, it hasn't stopped. :)

[fujiyama]

32. Hmm

Let's see, in 6th grade, I remember the '92 Election pretty clearly. I remember not really liking Bush, because he seemed like an old, boring guy. Clinton seemed young and cool (I remember seeing him on Arsenio, either live or on a news program).

Anyways, Clinton won and I generally didn't care about politics for a while. I was apathetic for a while, not really liking Clinton, because I was somewhat immature (I wouldn't know how much I'd miss him). Though, I remember always absolutely despising the religious right.

When the impeachment came around I bought the hype that it was a big deal and that Clinton deserved it...but at the same time I really didn't like the republicans because they seemed like a bunch of hypocrites.

As the election approached I paid more and more attention, finally realizing as I watched the republican primary debates that the party was filled with lunatics, with the exception of McCain. I remember thinking from the first debate that Bush was an absolute, complete moron. I supported McCain and Bradley for the democratic nomination. I found both of them to be decent and honest, though I never really had any problems with Gore either.

After the primries, I became somewhat cynical, but eventually realizing that it was pretty clear that Gore was the only real choice. I remember waking up the morning after Gore conceded the election. It was a horrible feeling, knowing that in a few months, that incompetant right wing fool be the president.

[bigbillhaywood]

33. 1998-1999. Never liked "activists" in college.

Considered them spoiled brats with too much time on their hands because they had rich parents and didn't have to work (still think that describes some, especially the PETA types). Spending more time in the working world really started to change my views on things. Union activism played a big role too. Suddenly those whacky Reds weren't seeming so whacky anymore-- maybe they had a point about worker democracy.

[SarahB]

34. As far back as I can remember

There's pictures of me as an infant with my dad reading the newspaper to me on his lap. I think the big thing though was all throughout my early years, my parents were very active in disability rights issues (my brother has multiple disabilities and my dad's an attorney and my mom a pediatric nurse, so they were a good team for that anyway) and I sat through so many school board meetings, other meetings, and met so many local political type folks. Life (i.e. young children) makes me not as active as I'd like currently, but it's something ingrained in me nonetheless.

[kodi]

35. 1968/age 14, when uncle died in viet nam

why? to this day our family asks, why?

[LearnedHand]

37. I was always politically aware...

...but, due to some extremely unfortunate circumstances of my earlier life, I used to vote otherwise. Not for long, though. That side climbed into bed with the religious right, and I flew the coop (to mix a few metaphors).

[ieoeja]

41. Neighbor wouldn't let his kids play with us.

We were the only Catholics** in the immediate farm area. My sister, the eldest sibling, made a best friend in 1st grade. She lost her new best friend when her friend's father forbade her to play with my sister. My dad went to visit him, pointed out how cooperative our two families had been with building fences ... and dealing with the consequences when those fences failed (destroyed crops; misbred cattle, etc), and convinced him to let the children be friends.


Years later my uncle married his eldest daughter. A few years after that my uncle accidentally shot off the father's leg.

Biding our time. Heh-heh-heh.

Just kidding. It really was an accident (as far as I know). The Conservation Officer, however, was an amazing jerk. He showed up with no boots (why would a man responsible primarily for catching poachers NOT wear boots?) and refused to go into the woods after him. So they made a dash for our house to pickup my father to help carry him out of the woods.


** My best friend from high school became a staunch rightwinger as he got older. I used to challenge his position pointing out how much the rightwing hates Roman Catholics. He recently put an end to that argument. He converted.

[JohnOneillsMemory]

42. Age 6 in 1967. Saw photos of Nazi camp victims. Fascism watcher since.

Realized Vietnam was more of the same.
Chicago 1968 was more of the same.
Kent State was more of the same.
Pentagon Papers was more of the same.
Watergate was more of the same.
Funding mujahadeen was more of the same.
Reagan was more of the same.
Bush 41 was more of the same.
Iran Contra was more of the same.
Gulf War I was more of the same.
Sanctions against Iraqi people, more of the same.
Black box voting was more of the same.
US Coup of 2000 was more of the same.
Denouncing the Inter'l Criminal Court, more of the same.
9/11 was more of the same.
Enron was more of the same.
Patriot Act was more of the same.
Afghan invasion was more of the same.
Iraq invasion was more of the same.
Gov. Schwarzenegger was more of the same.
Haiti coup was more of the same.
Fallujah was more of the same.
US coup of 2004 will be more of the same.

[DemExpat]

43. Age 4 first "eye-opener" time.....age 49 last time election 2000....

:kick:

(4 year old in mid 1950s sensing the racial injustices/inequalities in southeast Texas...)

DemEx