This just in:  college freshmen do not get Dr. Strangelove.

It was going to be beautiful.  The exciting and intellectually stimulating discussion I had planned on the red scare was going so well, and my students seemed honestly excited and engaged, and this was all leading up to what I had pegged as a grand finale:  we would watch the clip from Dr. Strangelove about the commie plot to flouridate water, and everyone would laugh and it would crystallize everything we’d been talking about and we would have a really fun time talking about nefarious communist plots before I sent them home for  the weekend.  Instead, they watched the Strangelove clip and promptly shut down.  They sat there.  They stared at me.  Nobody said anything.  The half hour of really great discussion that had preceded this silence was but a distant memory, vanished, like the fart of a hummingbird on a windy day.  I vamped for a few minutes.  I dismissed them five minutes early.

So, dear students who do not understand why Dr. Strangelove is so funny, I dedicate this post to you.  Most importantly, though, I dedicate this song, sung by Miss Vera Lynn, the Forces’ Sweetheart, and set to a delightful scenic montage by Mr. Stanley Kubrick,  to you:

Fun fact that I learned from wikipedia that is therefore undeniably true:  The BBC included this song in a package of recordings that they made especially for listening to in your fallout shelter, to keep those nuclear winter blues away.

And maybe next time we have a class about communists, I will wear this dress to really get the point about the red scare across:  for it is certainly red, and at a mere $450, the price manages to be pretty scary:

(from Timeless Vixen Vintage)

Or there’s always this red atomic number; truly a McCarthian delight:

(from Sydney’s Vintage.   Also, you should totally click through on the above photo and check out the back of that dress!)