totally cribbed

“Everybody’s for love. Everybody’s against war. You’ve got to say something that goes deep enough into man’s nature to make him feel the brotherhood of man. Don’t just say the word “brotherhood.” That’s easy to do. You’ve got to establish between people a oneness, a brotherhood. Establish it. Don’t use the word a lot. This idea of the uninformed young person of today who is saying, “Ban the bomb and let’s have peace and clasp hands. Are you for peace? Yes, I am. Let’s talk about flowers.” They talk about doves and nobody knows a damn thing that’s going on. You ask somebody who’s the ambassador to Russia, they don’t know. You ask them what’s going on in Congress, they don’t know. All they know is peace. Scream the word out. You can’t jell the word and cut it up into fudge or something. You can’t make a concrete block out of it and climb up on it and be out of range of the bomb with it. They’re more interested in banning the bomb. I think they’re more interested in marching all together and singing folksongs and drinking hot chocolate. I think that’s what they’re really interested in.”

~Shel Silverstein, interviewed in 1963.