Something unexpected popped into my head while reading some recent eloquent commentary on SFWA’s current culture war. (To which I won’t be adding an essay of my own, because others have been expressing what’s in my heart and on my mind much better than I ever could, so I’ll just say that I’m all set to enlist in John and Mary‘s Insect Army and leave it at that.)

The memory that showed up to surprise me was of this artifact from one of the most divisive moments in science fiction history, this ad—two ads really—from the June 1968 issue of Galaxy Science Fiction. (I’ve smirched the image from Marooned.)

In the ad, opposing camps of SF writers either “believe the United States must remain in Vietnam to fulfill its responsibilities to the people of that country” or “oppose the participation of the United States in the War in Vietnam.” Yes, I was only 13 when these ads was published, a fan not yet a pro privy to the inner workings of the field, and no, this was not officially related to SFWA, but rather a project generated by Kate Wilhelm and Judith Merril that only coincidentally overlapped with the names of many SFWA members, but still, the contentiousness created by the public choosing of sides seems familiar.

And even though it was painful at the time for the participants to live through, you’ll forgive me if I say that from this distance, colored by time and perhaps my naiveté, these two lists of names and the statements to which they’re appended seem quaint and reserved, especially when compared to the incendiary language of Dave Truesdale’s recent petition (to which, interestingly, a few of the same writers have appended their names).

I don’t think any of us will look back with nostalgia 46 years from now at the current culture war the way I do now for 1968’s. But maybe, by then, if we work really, really hard, and we’re really, really lucky, we won’t still be fighting this one.