TY - BOOK AU - Jenkins,Philip TI - Decade of nightmares: the end of the sixties and the making of eighties America SN - 9780195178661 AV - 002 E 839 J52d 2006 U1 - 973.92 PY - 2006/// CY - New York PB - Oxford University Press KW - Social problems KW - United States KW - History KW - 20th century KW - Culture conflict KW - Conservatism KW - Political culture KW - Cultura popular KW - Estados Unidos KW - 1969- KW - 1961-1969 KW - Politics and government KW - 1945-1989 KW - Social conditions KW - 1945- KW - Historia KW - Política y gobierno KW - Condiciones sociales N1 - Includes index; Mainstreaming the sixties -- Going too far : Bicentennial America -- Against the grain -- The politics of children : 1977 -- Predators -- Captive America : 1980 -- Into the Reagan era -- Evil empires -- Dark victories -- The abuse epidemic -- Wars without end N2 - Drawing on a wide array of sources--including tabloid journalism, popular fiction, movies, and television shows--Philip Jenkins argues that a remarkable confluence of panics, scares, and a few genuine threats created a climate of fear that led to the conservative reaction. He identifies 1975 to 1986 as the watershed years. During this time, he says, there was a sharp increase in perceived threats to our security at home and abroad. At home, America seemed to be threatened by monstrous criminals--serial killers, child abusers, Satanic cults, and predatory drug dealers, to name just a few. On the international scene, we were confronted by the Soviet Union and its evil empire, by OPEC with its stranglehold on global oil, by the Ayatollahs who made hostages of our diplomats in Iran. Increasingly, these dangers began to be described in terms of moral evil. Rejecting the radicalism of the '60s, which many saw as the source of the crisis, Americans adopted a more pessimistic interpretation of human behavior, which harked back to much older themes in American culture. This simpler but darker vision ultimately brought us Ronald Reagan and the ascendancy of the political Right, which more than two decades later shows no sign of loosening its grip UR - http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ecip0516/2005020159.html ER -