The censors we despised in my youth were the older generation. Enshrined in a black duffel coat that I slept and smelt in, I co-edited a student newspaper which fumed against the prim grey elders who protected New Zealand from free speech.
I'd have popped my callow pimples if told that by 2016 there'd be a Brave New World - no, a Scared New World - where free expression's enemies weren't the old fogeys, but the young ones.
A week ago, on this page, the American columnist Gina Barreca wrote that she'd give up teaching if her university insisted she precede lectures with ‘‘trigger warnings'', should they be infected by knowledge which might alarm a delicate mind.
In England the novelist Ian McEwan made a speech about the "strange sense of victimhood'' in American universities.
Someone lobbed him a bomb question on transsexuality, to which he replied: "Call me old-fashioned, but I tend to think of people with penises as men.''
Tut-tut.
By day's end the righteous were online calling McEwan a "hater'', "denier'', and "phobe''.
The gay rights group Stonewall demanded an apology from the writer who expected men to have penises.
Poor McEwan didn't actually recant - how could he? - but drenched in vitriol, he published a predictable "clarification'', where he said he deplored discrimination, and uttered calmingly correct words like "selfhood'' and "diversity''.
I'm tired of strident, censorious, "victim'' groups, and their ridiculous apology demands for imagined micro offences.
I long for the day when a public figure responds to these venomous twits with a simple: "Get stuffed.''
But why is this new age of censorship led by the young?
I grasp for reasons and find little that adds up.
The truth must lurk there somewhere, perhaps hidden twixt the terrors of Facebook, and the fear of riding to school on a bike.
Perhaps you should feel relieved if your kids are bold enough to enjoy an old-fashioned keg and couch-fire party?
Our student newspaper fought the baby-boomer causes of Vietnam, racism, and freedom of expression.
While the Indecent Publications Tribunal held its nose and argued over the dreadful F words in D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover, we quoted one of their debated sentences, and were promptly dumped by our printer.
(Wilson and Horton, publisher of the '60s bastion of free speech, The New Zealand Herald).
We also fought for the freedom to offend.
During the '60s and '70s the young were mad keen to cause offence.
Loudly kicking down fences was a generational industry.
Much was done just for the devilment, and the general targets were our elders.
Today's offence-takers would be appalled that these sad ancients didn't know they could establish victim groups in safe places, where they could shield their ears from the likes of Bob Dylan.
The musical Hair followed Lady Chatterley as a '60s cause celebre, because many local authorities tried to shut down its nude scene.
The resulting verbal punch-ups took no prisoners.
In Germany, the burghers of Munich were told they had no logical reason to ban Hair because public nudity was a common sight.
Just up the road, naked people - Jews in their thousands - had been regularly marched through the streets to Dachau.
Cruel but true.
However, today's discussions are being pushed towards vanilla custard.
Harvard professors were asked to stop teaching rape law because hearing about it may upset trainee lawyers who'd had a sexual trauma.
School principals attending a California training day were given a list of "micro-aggression'' phrases to be avoided, because they might hurt victim groups.
Micro-aggression is a new offence against the victim classes.
Among the micro-aggs the teachers were warned against are: "America is the land of opportunity'' and "I believe the best person should get the job''.
Telling an Asian student "You should be good at maths'' was another no-no.
I don't know if the teachers thought this was craziness, but you can bet the suggestions were pinned sternly to staff notice boards. In Australia, the Victorian government decided to set up a programme to reduce bullying in schools.
Very sensible.
But somehow, what emerged was a LGBT curriculum teaching sexual diversity.
The Labour Victorian Premier, rightly scared of vicious blowback, has kept his mouth shut.
On those battlefields the victim groups choose, they win with a strategy of thin-skinned whining, and vindictive protectiveness.
It's an old adage that the bullied become the worst bullies.
Yes, we're being thrashed by the crybabies.
- John Lapsley is an Arrowtown writer.
