The beat generation of the 1950s was too quiet. Bongos, MAD Magazine, Kerouac and Ginsberg were too fringe at the time to threaten the American way of life. Max and his contemporaries were actually changing things. But the generation of freedom and “marching to one’s own drummer” also had a certain hipness that was an insistence of “being in.” If you weren’t “with it” you were a “square.” Fashions and causes change but people will always be people. With Max’s upbringing and art being his world of creativity and peace, I suspect it insulated him against growing up at a time when non-creatives committed unspeakable acts against humanity. His art was everything – his number one reason for being.