What did hippies accomplish?

[Sirveri]

This is actually a serious question. I turn 31 in a couple of months but I recently saw a post that said people on this board hate hippies and that hippies accomplished stuff.

So for one I don't think the board engages in very much hippie punching, especially compared to mainstream America, but it led to this post.

I'm younger than most original hippies, and looking at the state of the world and country I'm left trying to figure out exactly what they accomplished. If my tone comes off disrespectful it's not meant as such, but I'm genuinely curious because from where I sit they appear to have accomplished little of any real value. Hippies wield no real political power, or social power, or economic power as far as I can see. And most of mainstream society seems to see fit to shit on hippies and degrade them whenever they find it amusing (aka hippie punching). So really what is there to learn here?

[NYC_SKP]

1. I don't think there will be very much consensus about this but...

[DrunkenBoat]

16. they were never hippies.

[snagglepuss]

22. In the sixties their image alone would suffice to mark them as hippies.

Some younger people in the sixties would have been more discriminating about who was or wasn't hip but the Clintons would have been certainly be seen by most people as hippies.

[DrunkenBoat]

29. i was there. no, it wouldn't. & i bet that photo is from the 70s.

I think *this* is what bill & hillary looked like in the *sixties*:




Bill was 21 in 1967, and hillary twenty.

On edit: they *met* in 1970.

[snagglepuss]

47. I was there as well. Anyone like myself who grew up in an extremely

conservative family would have heard people who dressed like the Clintons be referred to derivisely as hippies.

[DrunkenBoat]

48. Bill and Hillary didn't even *meet* until 1970. By the 1970s, *most* students had

"long" (not a buzzcut) hair. And a turtleneck & blazer is professorial, not "hippie".

Not to mention "hippie" isn't defined by hair & clothes alone. Bikers had long hair.

*Everybody* had long hair in the 70s. And that first picure is *late* 70s.

The fact that your conservative family called people dressed in turtlenecks & cordoroy blazers hippies was their own issue.

Hilary 1967



bill, 1968:

http://www.clintonlibrary.gov/assets/storage/education/H58-01%20%20Georgetown%20Grad,%20ca.%201968.jpg

hilary 1969



bill 1972



bill & hill, 1972 at Yale Law



bill, 1973 (teaching law)



wedding photo 1975

[snagglepuss]

You obviously have never moved into conservative circles. Furthermore

there was never an accepted definition of a hippie and there still isn't so your insistence that Clintons were not hippies is meaningless.

[DrunkenBoat]

71. So anything = hippie, right?

look at the long hair on that hippie! (kerry, 1971)



and these (1978) -- find bill gates and paul allen



the edwards, 1970s



this recently married couple (1970)



and this guy (1972)



and this one (1972):



and 1975:

?version=1291189135000


I guess *everybody* was a hippie in the 70s.

or else none of them were, & they were just following the fashion of the times.


did you notice the hippie from gates' computer team listening to kerry's vietnam testimony, btw?

i repeat: just because people in "conservative circles" labeled anything other than a buzzcut + suit & a dress + perm "hippie" doesn't mean the people they attached those labels to *were* hippies. By the 70s, most young men had longish hair & most young women wore pants routinely. it was the norm, even for conservative young people.

then in the 80s it changed again, & all the young ivy leaguers like the above started cutting their hair to distinguish themselves from the proles.

The people in these photos were the children of the ruling class or ruling class aspirants, not "hippies".

[Mr Deltoid]

79. 'Conservative circles' are not the real world

Your insistence that the Clintons were hippies is meaningless.

[snagglepuss]

88. What are you smoking? Where did I insist the Clintons were hippies. I said

my parents and relatives would have considered anyone who looked like them hippies. As for your assertion that conservative circles are not the real world that is just plain batty. You may not like them but they are real. And your adopting a simplistic view of the world won't do you any favors. My father was also a socialist, white and union man who fought even other unionists to break the color barrier on the railroad. He was real. What he and others accomplished was real but he was also a social conservative who hated people who didn't conform to his idea of how people ought to behave.

[Mr Deltoid]

90. The RW lives in an information bubble

They are not of this world. Pay them no mind, they know not what they do.

[JVS]

117. Why are you considering conservative circles an authority on classification of leftist subgroups?

[snagglepuss]

139. It is dumbfounding how people misinterprete the simplest text. Where did

I say that my parents were right about people who looked like the the Clintons looked in that photo?

[JVS]

142. Then why are you sharing your parents' thoughts with us when even you don't agree with them?

We shouldn't have to listen to what your parents said, they put no roof over our heads and no food in our bellies.

[snagglepuss]

151. Exaggerate much? Why are you on a message board if reading

a mere sentence puts you in a tizzy?

[JVS]

163. What kind of reading comprehension holocaust makes you think I'm in a tizzy?

[JVS]

143. Oh, and in this post here you use your parent's opinion as if it were a useful reference

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=2003357&mesg_id=2003467

[JVS]

144. And nice spelling since you like being pedantic.

[JVS]

116. Being derisively called something by a bunch of ignoramuses doesn't make it so. Hence Obama not...

being a Socialist.

[JVS]

115. Correct. Long hair was adopted even by most young squares by the mid 70s.

Anyone who became a Rhodes' Scholar is too invested in the system to be considered a hippy.

[ChillbertKChesterton]

100. They accomplished a self-centered ideology of "inner-truth" and boundless pleasure

which capitalism easily co-opted, making post-modern capitalism into the most effective ideological apparatus ever developed in history.

[Zorra]

138. Yeah, fuck truth and pleasure, huh?

Damn those hippies! Damn them, I say!

Responsible for corporatism, they are!
:eyes:

[Enthusiast]

184. Ridiculous right wing claptrap.

[bvar22]

152. I believe at that time....

...that Hillary was the chapter president of the Young Republicans at Wellesley College.

[NYC_SKP]

182. I think my reply above...

...was about as tongue in cheek as could be.

:P

[leftstreet]

2. They were a distraction for the M$M while the politicians moved the country hard right

They became the evil specter haunting the nightly news until the world was saved by Reagan, Thatcher and Mulroney!

[patrice]

3. Not only did we say women must have orgasms, we mandated multiple-orgasms for women. nt

[H2O Man]

21. This is a Good Thing.

Thank you!

[patrice]

25. Yeah, Think how we'd all be even more messed up now than we are if it weren't for that! nt

[RKP5637]

4. Here's some interesting history if you've not seen it before ...

http://www.coopertoons.com/merryhistory/hippies/hippies.html

[annabanana]

52. A VERY good essay. Anyone seriously interested in "the way it was"

back them can get a pretty good sense of it all here. . . . At least as I remember it.

As an NYU student down in Washington Square from 1967 - 72 I had a front row seat, as it were.

[RKP5637]

59. Yep, that's pretty much the way I remember it too. n/t

[Sirveri]

69. Finally finished reading this, it was a good read.

Not everyone will agree with it obviously, but I found it informative.

[RKP5637]

72. Good, glad it helped some. n/t

[gateley]

84. Very cool! Brings back memories -- thanks!! nt

[patrice]

5. We re-introduced organic and healthy foods.

[drokhole]

24. Honestly, one of the most important concepts of our time...

...and this is a book, along those lines, everyone should read:



Deep Nutrition

[bluestate10]

51. That is way too expensive for the average family to purchase for sustenance.

I love food economics and admire what food progressives have done. But then I look at the price for those items and watch what shoppers pick from selves. What good is God's sustenance if only a minute fraction of america can afford to eat it? So, there too, hippies accomplished little, if anything of practical importance.

[drokhole]

6. For what it's worth...

...a couple threads on the matter:

How The Hippies Saved Physics
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=228&topic_id=81966&mesg_id=81966

The hippies also can be thanked for modern computing
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=228&topic_id=81966&mesg_id=81971

They had it right with psychedelics
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=1978636&mesg_id=1985278

This is fun:
Dirty F@#*ing Hippies Were Right!

And I can't think of a better message to add to the zeitgeist than this:
Give Peace A Chance

[patrice]

7. We said kids didn't have to be like their parents or live the same lives, do the same work.

[drokhole]

10. And the message, I imagine, sounded something like this...

...Man is a Hoax (Part 1)

[roody]

8. We ended the Vietnam occupation and war.

[lifesbeautifulmagic]

57. yup. That is the big one

definitely for sure.

people can make jokes about hippies all they want, but they did end the war.

[Sirveri]

68. Did they actually end the war?

Or did the war just run long enough to start up rubber plantations in other locations, like Liberia, and once those operations were running full bore they decided to pull out because there was no longer any strategic value to holding the area?

[alfredo]

85. Tungsten was a big reason for the struggle over Vietnam

Tungsten is used in high speed cutting tools, and in penetrating rounds. Light bulbs use tungsten because it has a high melting point. Vietnam has a tungsten, we wanted it.

SE Asian Heroin made a lot of people rich.

[coalition_unwilling]

93. I wonder what General Giap might say were he asked. As I recall,

Tet of January 1968 may have had something to do with our leaving. Whether Tet '68 was more important than the rubber plantations, I'll leave for the historians to debate.

[Sirveri]

97. We didn't leave until '73, which is the same amount of time for a rubber tree to mature.

The tungsten is also a good reason that I hadn't heard. Tet might just have made them plant all those trees though.

[JVS]

121. Synthetic rubber has been better than the real things since the middle of WWII

Lack of access due to Japan finally spurned the US to invest in its synthetic rubber industry. Germany and Russia had been working with synthetics since the 20s.

[Romulox]

188. Psst! Three or Four wars going on RIGHT NOW, man!

:silly: :hi:

[patrice]

9. We said it's okay for adults to play. nt

[Le Taz Hot]

11. You're living those changes

and since they've always been a part of your life, you take those things for granted, never seeming to recognize that people fought and died for you to be able to enjoy those rights. Off the top of my head:

Women's Rights:
Women can now get birth control pills without the consent of her husband.
Women can now get safe, legal abortions.
Women can now get credit on their own, without a husband or father co-signing for them.
All jobs are open for women now whereas most jobs were closed to them.
A potential employer can no longer ask how old you are, if you have children, if you're married, if you're planning on getting married or if you plan on having children. All of those questions were asked of me in the late 1960's/early 1970's.


Civil Rights:
Education is now open to all Americans, regardless of ethnic background.
The abolition of Jim Crow Laws.
The abolition of Poll Taxes.
No more forced segregation (though the Supremes ruled on it in 1954, it took until the 1960's to enforce it in the South and other places)
Civil Rights Legislation making racial/sexual discrimination illegal.


Environmental Movement:
Love of nature and the Environmental Movement started large scale in the 60's and continued through the 1970's (abandoned by the Reagan Administration).

Challenging the mores of 1950's America where entire groups of Americans were disenfranchised (women, minorities, gays) and denied their Constitutional Rights. We questioned that. We challenged that and, with time, we changed that.

So sad that so many sacrificed so much, just to have it thrown back in our face in a "what-have-you-done-for-me-lately" sort of attitude. At least my generation has many things to point to with pride and say, "we did that." Oh yeah, and we're not done yet.

[RKP5637]

14. +1000 +++ n/t

[stevedeshazer]

26. Well said.

+1

[Sirveri]

35. I'm still reading replies, but this thread wasn't a what have you done for me lately thread.

I was genuinely curious to see what people thought on the subject. I'm still reading some of the links in the other replies, but I figure I should do a spot response to this now since it has captured my current attention.

Womens rights. Was that hippies, or was the womens rights groups like say NOW? Are they really the same thing?

Tangentially related to the women rights movement is the civil rights movement. But was LBJ a hippie, and wasn't he the one pushing the great society? Can the hippie movement really lay claim to that? One could also make the point that civil rights was a response to the mobilization of large numbers of African-Americans which frightened white America into loosening the reins in the hopes it would prevent possible future violence. One of the things I typically think of when I think of hippies is non-violence, but I'll talk a bit more about this later.

As for the environmental movement, if it was crushed then can you really claim it as a lasting achievement?

Like I said, I'm trying to figure out what the hippies accomplished, and how they accomplished it, and then see how that compares to the current time. Mainly I'm trying to figure out if non-violence can actually enact change. Right now I'm leaning towards no. Without causing pain nobody seems to get noticed. The union man must sometimes be asked to throw himself on the gears to stop the machine, to cause the bosses to have reason to listen to them, otherwise they'll only be ignored. I'm just wondering if the non-violence bent inherited from the 1960's is actually harming our potential for change. The difference between then and now is that the authority appears to have figured out how to deal with non-violence. I doubt we'll ever see a kent state again, coupled with a complicit media that will simply ignore the peaceful protests and marches. That's not to say I'm advocating violence, but if the marches would focus less on getting permits and marching in an orderly fashion, and instead chain themselves in front of buildings to prevent others from accessing them, or basically acting to attempt to shut down the rest of the working society, I'm not sure how we can really affect change under these conditions using non-violence.

[The Traveler]

49. These questions

about violent vs non-violent tactics remind me ... of my days as a hippie!! lol!

Yeah, we asked the same questions. And there were a wide range of opinions on the subject.

Hippies were not monolithic in terms of tactics or objectives. Hippies certainly supported all the causes of women's rights, civil rights, and environmental rights, etc. ... but not all hippies invested equally in all those causes. There was no single "hippie creed". You had anarchists and communists and socialists and even libertarian hippies. Certainly, we achieved by various pressures various changes. But there was never a concise, coherent, universally accepted "hippie manifesto". Still, some really good things were accomplished.

And if some ground has been lost since those initial victories ... don't blame the people who went to the picket lines to win them. Rather, blame those who did not appreciate the progress earned enough to defend it.

[Le Taz Hot]

55. It's interesting that you see these as all disparate

movements when, in fact, they were all integrally interrelated. The hippies questioned the status quo, particularly in terms of social order. The Civil Rights Movement, Women's Rights Movement, Student Rights Movement, exiting Viet Nam, demanding full, HONEST disclosure from our government all were a part of that zietgeist and provided the momentum for everything that followed.

No, LBJ wasn't a hippie (:eyes:) but he was committed to the Civil Rights movement and understood perfectly the political ramifications of pushing the Civil Rights Amendments through. And he was right, of course, the Democrats DID lose the South because of it. The FACT is that Civil Rights occurred because millions got out and worked for it, fought for it, and died for it. Interesting piece of revisionist history that Civil Rights "was a response to the mobilization of large numbers of African-Americans which frightened white America into loosening the reins in the hopes it would prevent possible future violence." Uh huh. Nobody got out and marched. Nobody was killed or beaten up. Rosa Parks or Medgar Evars or Malcom X or Martin Luther King . . . any of these names mean anything to you? At all?

Now, if you want to disavow Civil Disobedience and throw yourself on the pyre for your cause, I say go for it (or did you just want OTHERS to sacrifice themselves?). Personally, I prefer to look to Ghandi and MLK -- they showed us the way.

[Sirveri]

94. I think you might have misinterpreted what I said.

When I said mobilization, I was talking about the marches and the sit in's. As for civil disobedience, I'm simply raising the question of what that really means. Is it really being disobedient if you're taking out a permit and walking silently with candles at night? Is it disobedient if you're not getting arrested, stomped, or shot at? I'm either one of the oldest members of the lost generation of the youngest of the gen X'ers. If people want to know why we're not doing anything it's probably because we don't think it will do any good. Oh look, an unemployed burnout with depression issues killed himself, I'd be lucky to get an entry in the local newspaper, and if I did that's all it would say.

So I light myself on fire. That might work in Tunisia, but here all that will happen is for the masses to laugh at me and insult me, if I get any coverage at all. Part of that is the media, and the corprotacracy, but the other is the society itself. Or perhaps it's better to say lack of society. Why are the white kids in the suburbs so angry? They don't know why either. Perhaps it's because we're social animals yet we've been sold that everyone should go it alone, be a cowboy, a rugged individualist, pull themselves up by their boot straps, that one person can make a difference. None of that is true, one person can't make a difference unless he reaches others, yet we constantly strive to isolate ourselves. Work from home so we can insulate ourselves in a bubble. Home school out of fear that our children might learn something we don't like. Don't take the bus, it's full of dirty unwashed people, instead you should drive yourself alone miles upon miles. Don't rely on the Chinese laundry, buy yourself a washer because then you can stay home and do laundry at 1AM in the nude. Be as loud as you want, screw your neighbors there is no need to respect them. Ask what society can do for you, and if they don't like it screw them. Hate the teabaggers, hate the liberals, hate your neighbor, hate the rich, hate the poor, hate the immigrant.

What good is my sacrifice if it causes no change, if it is disrespected and spat on, if no one notices and no one cares. Everyone too afraid to take the first step, and those that do, well they might get lucky and get a clip on the daily show for those who still have a job to giggle at before they go to bed for the night. Is the society we have really worth fighting for?

[Electric Monk]

110. This is a very interesting post. You raise a lot of valid issues. That said, I need sleep, it's 2am.

I'm another 'near the end of the curve' GenXer, and you strike me as more GenX than GenY (or whatever they're calling themselves now).

I wish that "getting it" paid by the hour ;-)

[EffieBlack]

58. Civil rights was partly a response to protests that frightened and enlightened whites

But it was also largely the result of carefully constructed, brilliant and innovative legal, legislative and organizational strategy.

Unfortunately, lots of that has gotten lost, forgotten or purposefully overlooked - it seems easier for some folks (not you) to pretend that this was all about brute force that shamed or intimidated whites into doing the right thing. But, while that was part of it, it certainly wasn't the full story of the civil rights movement.

[Zoeisright]

38. Plus a billion.

Please post this as a separate thread so I can rec it.

[OneGrassRoot]

45. Beautiful. :) n/t

[EffieBlack]

53. Hippies were responsible for the civil rights gains?

Really?

Many of them supported and were involved in the Civil Rights movement, but they didn't lead it and they weren't in the forefront of it - and I certainly don't think they were primarily responsible for its successes. And most of the gains you cited came BEFORE the advent of "hippies."

Roy Wilkins, Charles Hamilton Houston, Thurgood Marshall, Jack Greenberg, Dorothy Height, Martin Luther King, Medgar Evers, John Siegenthaler, John Lewis, Joseph Lowery, Dorothy Cotton, Bernard Lafayette, Clarence Mitchell, and many others were FAR more responsible for the progress we made on civil rights than hippies were.

I'm not mad at hippies and believe that they did have an important role in many things that happened in the 60s, but I also don't think that they should be given credit for EVERYTHING that happened in the 1960s, especially things in which they played only a peripheral role.

[Le Taz Hot]

56. See reply 55

I clarify it a little better.

[Number23]

98. I just asked that exact same question

That literally made me almost fall out of my chair.

[elleng]

63. +1000

:thumbsup:

[SfromCanada]

80. Very good points. nt

[ohheckyeah]

95. Got the 18 year old vote...

which may not have been a good thing but is a fair thing.

[Number23]

96. Are you suggesting that hippies ended Jim Crow and segregation?

[Le Taz Hot]

146. No, see post 55

Sometimes I hit "post" a little too early when sometimes I really need to take time and clarify my points further.

[999998th word]

A list of everything the baggers want to take away. Sad.

[laylah]

118. +++ a gazillion!

[yellerpup]

174. Nice list...

Another thing we did was teach the drug manufacturers that mood elevating drugs were a big profit-potential for them. Everyone is still getting high, but now the drug companies are cut in on the profits. People are so much more controllable when they are high, which the CIA, et. al., knew at the time. Now instead of passing out free LSD at protests, no one protests because they have Xanax, etc., by prescription.

[grasswire]

12. they said "question authority"

...and mocked the notion of a "permanent record."

[MagickMuffin]

34. and the 2nd part of Question Authority is THINK FOR YOURSELF ;=O

The 2nd half usually gets lost in translation or something. But it is a very important part. Don't ya Think :think:

[DoBotherMe]

13. You haven't been drafted

To serve in the military have you? Dana ; )

[Sirveri]

102. may as well have been with the economic conditions that have arisen.

When the choice is between joining the service and starving to death on the streets I know which one I would pick.

I joined the Navy, if I didn't I'd likely not be able to post on this board right now.

[UTUSN]

15. HEY!1 bottom line we were/ARE against FRIED FOOD!1 n/t

[H2O Man]

17. They studied history.

[patrice]

18. Right! We made being an "intellectual", or at least a quasi- one, cool. nt

[H2O Man]

19. Right.

Therefore, hippies asked important questions .... of themselves, and others.

Not every generation does that. Some want to be spoon-fed.

[patrice]

20. We said you don't need a partner in order to dance. nt

[Le Taz Hot]

31. LOL!

Ain't it the truth? I can't tell you how many times I've embarrassed the hell out of some of my younger companions at concerts. If the music moves ya . . . ya just gotta get up and move with it, damnit! How the HELL you can keep your seat when someone's playing some bad-ass funk or R & B, I'll never know.

[patrice]

43. Impossible to NOT to dance! My "rebel" yell is still pretty good too, have embarrassed the

kids with that a time or two too, until they came to me later and said they had learned how important it is to participate in the music, and not just be a zombie.

[livetohike]

39. Good one!

:toast:

[no_hypocrisy]

23. Change in the culture. Peace. Love. Harmony. Internationalism.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ib-Qiyklq-Q

Question authority.

Do your own thing instead of what your parents expected you.

Make love, not war.

Celebrate and protect The Earth.

[patrice]

28. Authentic respect for other religions. nt

[no_hypocrisy]

42. + 1, And honest respect for other cultures.

Not important for U.S. to be #1 in the world.

[RKP5637]

27. IMO it's all going to repeat in one form or another, people wanting to dump "The Establishment."

[patrice]

30. You beat me to it. I was just thinking that. These wars, like Viet Nam, are really going to re-arran

ge some people's heads, especially some soldiers'.

[patrice]

33. But they won't let themselves be called hippies.

[RKP5637]

44. A new name will emerge, haven't seen/heard it yet, but it will. So many people

have so many issues, but they have one thing in common, "The Establishment" ain't working for them.

[DrunkenBoat]

32. not much imo. The civil rights movement accomplished, the antiwar/student

movement accomplished, and there was some overlap --

but imo, when the "hippies" entered the picture, the 60s were almost over.

The media's hippies were a manufactured event.

Hippies = alternative consumerism; more manipulated than self-directed. Lab rats for the ruling class.

[Lex]

36. Rock n roll, buying local food, organic food, women's rights, solar power, religious diversity,

basically ANYthing that's NOT mainstream straight-jacketed thinking.

[RedCloud]

37. HIPPIES CREATED THE PERSONAL COMPUTERS!

They helped stopped that monstrous war in Indochina. War bastards can NEVER forgive them for that. And hence the non-stop denigration.

This has actually been well researched...

[Name removed]

40. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Warpy]

41. We got the smarter people out there thinking about a few things

such as the difference between needs and wants and how we might construct a sustainable country since the path we were on at the time was anything but sustainable.

Events have proven us correct since all the bills are coming due, the jobs have gone, we don't make anything any more here, and people with college degrees are now grateful to be driving cabs if it pays the bills, and the climate is definitely starting to change.

If we have any lasting effect, it will probably be that a few of the smarter people out there will be kicking themselves for not listening to us sooner because we were really onto something, even if we weren't pretty and didn't express it all that clearly.

[ZombieHorde]

46. They changed American culture for the better.

Progressive attitudes toward sex, gender roles, art, religion, marijuana, etc., were greatly benefited by the hippie culture.

[RKP5637]

62. Yep, and also got rid of some of the uptightness of the nation pre-60's IMO. n/t

[toddaa]

50. Plagarized the Beatniks

:hide:

[madrchsod]

67. "beatniks are out to make it rich,oh no, must be the season of the witch"

[Fire Walk With Me]

54. Enough that they can be the subject of a conversation such as this.

I'm nowhere nearly old enough to have actually been one, but from what I see, the 1950s were a farking hideous hide-your-head-in-the-sand reaction to the horrors of World War II. Correct me where I'm wrong, but it looks so horribly conservative...it DEMANDED to be destroyed. From there to Jimi Hendrix in how many years? There is your timeline.

[RKP5637]

73. I remember the 50's as very uptight, straight laced and conservative. n/t

[Fire Walk With Me]

77. I have no idea how one should react to something like WWII, but the 50s...nah.

Sorry for your time there, thank you for the insight :hi:

[elleng]

60. Opened MANY peoples' eyes + minds, if only later.

Resulted in MUCH social and political progress.

[Brother Buzz]

61. Well, we shut down the construction of an unsafe nuclear reactor

We started a movement to abolish above ground nuclear weapons tests which ultimately led to the 'Limited Test Ban Treaty'. We raised concerns and awareness about environmental issues before the EPA was even invented. We raised concerns about our involvement in Vietnam before we even committed conventional troops.

And that was even before the mainstream media labeled us Hippies.

A ton of brilliant ideas were fermented in the progressive/alternative lifestyle communities that slowly spread to mainstream. If you are right, and work at it long and hard enough, you can achieve many things, but it takes brave committed people to make those changes.

[SheilaT]

64. they profoundly altered the notion of what

it meant to be an adult. They lived a prolonged youth, remained in a sort of pre-adult state for years and years longer than those even ten years older than they had done.

They openly experimented with drugs and "alternative" life styles, made living together without being married open and respectable. In an indirect way they made it possible for gays and lesbians to be openly gay and lesbian.

[madrchsod]

65. we kept society" keep on truck`n down the road" and if we were true we...

taught our children well....

[A-Schwarzenegger]

66. They laughed real hard.

:*

[madrchsod]

70. i wonder why....

:smoke:

[A-Schwarzenegger]

75. They just saw things as very funny sometimes for some strange reason.

Or so I heard. :*

[-..__...]

74. IS THAT FREEDOM ROCK!!!

"Well, turn it up man"...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eGWW8KOQio

Then they all grew up, (possibly), found gainful employment (on Wall St. for some), raised a family and lived happily ever after reminiscing on DU.

[demosincebirth]

76. Hippies are the off spring of the Beatniks from the Bay Area. and North Beach.

They accomplished getting high and having lots of sex.

[county worker]

78. I can never understand how someone can take today's issues and try to

use them to frame the past.

Hippies did not try to accomplish things as you would say so you are right they didn't accomplish much by your paradigm. Now what have you accomplished and why should hippies be different from you?

[Sirveri]

101. How can I accomplish something if I don't know how to accomplish it?

That's basically what I was trying to figure out with this post. Try and learn from the past to see what I can gain from it. Of course I have the social and leadership skills of a raptor or some other solitary creature, so it's difficult for me to actually build anything that could make a difference.

Have you made a difference? Does it matter if you had? Are you suddenly unimportant if you haven't, if you don't know what to do?

[county worker]

176. The word hippie came from the word hip which means to be in the know.

Like Bob's Dylan's song says, "you know something is happening here but you don't know what it is, do you Mr Jones."

People back then, (I'm 65 now)were challenging the established code of ethics or questioning authority.

They were experimenting with drugs, free love, living free etc. It was never planned and it was not always good or not always bad.

But they did not try to accomplish any political goals that would pass down to people like you. They were trying to live a life that was different from their parents lives.

What they did pass down is the idea that you can and should challenge the status quo.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

81. What happened to that old hippie rareandfirsts whose OP likely spawned this funfest?

Was he smoked out? :*

[silverweb]

89. I'd like to know, too.

He was TS'd, but I have no clue why.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

92. Criswell predicted it

in the OOPS! thread.
He had that trying too hard to fit in fast vibe.

[silverweb]

103. That's it?

He didn't actually do anything? Isn't that sort of equivalent to banning someone for a "thought crime"?

[A-Schwarzenegger]

104. I'm not a mod.

I am not privy to the chamber of secrets.
I simply predicted it based on my Criswellian intuition.

[silverweb]

105. I do appreciate that.

And I appreciate your responses.

As hard as it is, I'll just have to accept that some mysteries are not meant to be solved. :D

[Sirveri]

99. That thread did encourage this one.

Likely we won't know what caused it. It's quite possible that they were a sockpuppet for a previously banned account. But I'm not upstairs anymore so I really shouldn't speculate.

[pitohui]

82. we'd still be in vietnam if not for those dirty hippies

if you doubt me, take a look at iraq

i guess if you want power, what is there to learn here? be a ditto head, sell out, be a racist pig, and you'll have a chance of being voted state congressman for the GOP and you can wield some "power"

hippies, the unwashed, the masses...we are never allowed to hold power and our accomplishments are painfully won and then shit on, that is the nature of not being a racist shithead scumbag out to sell real estate

if you're looking for glory on teevee or the history books, you are in the wrong place, if you're looking for inner awareness and common humanity...but if you were looking for those things you would have never asked the question, i don't think...

[johnaries]

83. Hippies affected every aspect of culture. They effected real

"change". They might have accomplished everything they wanted and the changes may have been more subtle than any expected, but the subtle changes are often the most insidious and the longest lasting. The US was a very, very different place in the '50's than it is now, and much of that is the result of seeds planted during the Hippy Movement.

PS, Google Stephen Gaskin and The Farm.

[Dan]

86. Well, I never met a hippie who would refuse to share

what they had, usually it wasn't much.

I never met a hippie that was intolerance, but I suspect that there were a few.

Thank God for the hippies, because without them, as we used to say - Nixon would have killed the Blacks.

For the most part, in my opinion and from my experiences, they were really a blessing to the nation - and supported what American claimed to be, rather than what she actually practiced.

Thank God for the hippies.

[Lint Head]

87. There were no hippies. It was a derogatory term created by the media and used

in the news and on shows like Dragnet to bigotedly refer to young people that preferred the bohemian lifestyle. Read 'On the Road' by Jack Kerouac.

[moondust]

91. Freedom itself.

Freedom to be different, not conform, express oneself, escape the stifling conventional molds, breathe, imagine no possessions, imagine...

:)

[WHEN CRABS ROAR]

106. We are a little, no, let me rephrase that, we are a lot older now

and we are still, (the ones that are left), we are all around you.
yes yes we are more experienced now.
We blazed many new trails and ideas.
But it was fun to dance in the stars.
Many back then were hippies in fashion only.
But hippies were just normal people who loved their freedom and still do.
Peace be with you.

[saras]

107. Three or four easy calls

They demonstrated that popular music could tell the truth, without secret codes.

They moved health food from religious kooks to the mainstream.

They moved the environmental movement into the mainstream.

They played a crucial and underrated role in the development of computers and the internet.

They took psychedelics away from the CIA and made a joyous sacrament of them.

In sum, they kept the fifties from moving directly into the Bush era without even a glimpse of something better in between.

And they taught me, personally, how to be a human being.

That's enough for me.

[Iggo]

148. ^^^ THIS ^^^

:fistbump:
:applause:

[Rex]

108. Nothing.

[bengalherder]

109. Well for one they created art, music and culture

which has survived and continued to influence and inform the present.

Even if all they had given were those contributions, it would still be proof that they created something lasting. Fortunately they also contributed to science, politics, alternative living/housing/farming, etc.

Hell, I was about thirteen in '78 when I stole Abbie's book. The hippies certainly informed my budding political awareness.

[SoDesuKa]

111. Hippies Cleared the Way for the Yuppies

Hippies were bad young people who smoked, drank and fucked a lot. They were in-your-face politically and they challenged the established order. Ironically, this created a space for "good" young people who were diligent about their careers, self-sacrificing, and posed no threat to the powers that be.

Janis Joplin led the way for women in pinstripe suits working their way to the top. She didn't give a shit about anything.



Janis in 1958 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Janis in 1969

[Zorra]

112. We accomplished a great deal, but our biggest failure was in maintaining improvements in education.

Particularly in the areas of reading, history, and social studies.

There are some so poorly educated (alas, again, as a hippie, I must take responsibility for failing to maintain national educational standards) that they can not even figure out how to use search engines such as google to research information that they seek. Instead, they sometimes lash out in bigoted ignorance, attacking the very people that can provide them with this information.

So sad.
:cry::
I somehow sense that your post actually came about due to the current occupation of Wall St., a correlation between the protest movements begun by radical hippie college students and the folks protesting control of our government and our lives by wealthy private interests.

You see, when people "shit on hippies", they are only projecting the constipated emptiness of their sad, meaningless lives, secretly wishing they could break down the insurmountable walls of their boxed in conservative consciousness, and be free. They look out from their own socially induced fear constructed mind prison at the hippies, and hate them for their freedom.

Kind of like poor Norwegian Blue Parrots, eternally pining for the fjords, without the wherewithal to recognize that they are dead.
:cry:
Which naturally leads us to the subject of bigots. People that hate hippies are bigots, plain and simple. Just like people that hate Jews, blacks, LGBT's, etc. And if someone feels some compelling need to trash hippies (or GLBT's, blacks, Mexicans, etc.), it's most often a pretty good indicator that they are a republican troll.

You seed, republicans universally hate hippies, because hippies are the direct opposite of republicans. Hippies never vote republican, another reason why republicans hate hippies. Hippies started a very un-republican like mass national anti-war consciousness, that just won't go away. Republicans just hate that.

(Check out a film called "Rude Awakening" sometime).

But I digress. For this reason, republican corporatists sometimes come to DU so they can diss hippies, thinking they are so clever with their thinly veiled derogatory posts.

But they don't fool anyone.

Since you are so obviously an intelligent young fellow, may I suggest you try using google to find some of the information you seek?

And:think:there are many informative books on the subject. If you have reasonably competent reading and comprehension skills, these books should provide you with the information you seek.

But an amazing thing is that the evidence of what the hippie movement accomplished is everywhere, in good things enculturated in society's consciousness, concern for the environment, questioning war, questioning authority, awareness of democracy it's all around you, every day, and you don't even see it, because you just take it for granted as a part of your life.

All you have to do is open your eyes.
peace
:hippie:

[me b zola]

113. They cleaned up the Hudson River

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudson_River_Sloop_Clearwater

[NNN0LHI]

114. Hint for any 30 year old who consider themselves a self described hippie

Your history is off by about 30 years. The movie Saturday Night Fever was not about "hippies." And Disco wasn't music any "hippies" ever listened to.

Those of us who were being called "hippies", during the actual time that word was being used didn't call ourselves "hippies", either. We called ourselves freaks. I still carry my freak flag high.

Don

Edit: If someone would like to view a period movie from that actual era I would highly recommend The Panic in Needle Park and another movie called Joe.

[laylah]

119. +10000000000000000000000000 :)

[JVS]

120. I'm approximately your age and what I have heard from older people and read is...

such that I think your question is fundamentally flawed. Asking what hippies accomplish is fundamentally wrong headed because the hippies were a dissident subculture. Dissidents don't focus on doing. They focus on not doing, on refusing. For this reason asking what they did is backwards. So let me tell you some things they didn't do. An important thing to remember is the hippie subculture both influenced more mainstream movements and also had offshoots. These influences and offshoots should not be mistaken for being representative of all or even most hippies. They are hippie-influenced, and to a large degree their involvement with trying to shape policy of the system stands at odds with the hippies' rejection of the system, which generally eschews involvement with the system. To oppose the war was hippie, to refuse to participate was hippie, to attend a peace rally was hippy, but to participate in organized political activism against the war was Yippie

From wiki on Hippies " The degree of political involvement varied widely among hippies, from those who were active in peace demonstrations to the more anti-authority street theater and demonstrations of the Yippies, the most politically active hippie sub-group.<83> Bobby Seale discussed the differences between Yippies and hippies with Jerry Rubin who told him that Yippies were the political wing of the hippie movement, as hippies have not "necessarily become political yet". Regarding the political activity of hippies, Rubin said, "They mostly prefer to be stoned, but most of them want peace, and they want an end to this stuff."<84> In addition to non-violent political demonstrations, hippie opposition to the Vietnam War included organizing political action groups to oppose the war, refusal to serve in the military and conducting "teach-ins" on college campuses that covered Vietnamese history and the larger political context of the war.<85>
Scott McKenzie's 1967 rendition of John Phillips' song "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)", which helped inspire the hippie Summer of Love, became a homecoming song for all Vietnam veterans arriving in San Francisco from 1967 on. McKenzie has dedicated every American performance of "San Francisco" to Vietnam veterans, and he sang at the 2002 20th anniversary of the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Hippie political expression often took the form of "dropping out" of society to implement the changes they sought. Politically motivated movements aided by hippies include the back to the land movement of the 1960s, cooperative business enterprises, alternative energy, the free press movement, and organic farming.<65><86>"

This "dropping out" feature is really the most important aspect of the hippies, because it allowed them to kill off or nearly kill off a lot of social practices between 1950 and 1980. So let's look at some of the things hippies didn't do.

They rejected conventional ideas of racial relations that had been taught to them while they were growing up.
They rejected the level of sexism considered normal by their predecessors.
They rejected drug laws.
They rejected warfare in general and the Vietnam war in particular.
They rejected conventional ideas about the timing and manner of child rearing
They rejected conventional ideas about sexuality (both heterosexuality and homosexuality)
They rejected the cold war hostility.
They rejecter consumer culture especially when it was detrimental to ecological well being.

Now, I'm not saying that they solved all these issues. All of these issues required plenty of work by activists. But they were very good at making it clear that the old mainstream consensus was over and that they weren't going along with it anymore. And seeing these people act against convention made a deep impression on mainstream citizens.

[NuttyFluffers]

178. now that's an excellent reply. they opened up dialog on world view.

and by opening up dialog on world view by rejecting perceived-harmful norms, they planted seeds of doubt and gave space for cultural questioning to flower.

so, directly they could not accomplish anything because they were not an empowered base of authority (and the time frame was too short to take credit for all these additional civil rights movements). however, they were a staging platform to question society, which indirectly leads to organizing and mobilizing for societal change. that's key: indirectly.

first you have to change your thinking to change the world. which explains why republican framing has been so diligent and forceful the past 30 years. if they let up for an instant, alternative messages will start to erode their power base.

now, considering avant garde artists have been doing this since about forever, with other modern versions notable especially with 1920s bohemians and 1950s beatniks, what does the hippy counterculture really do to stand out from that? well, outside of a mass media appeal (the visual aesthetics were absolutely captivating) that lead to a semi-popular groundswell, they aren't too terribly different. most surrounding people in any of these aesthetic/world view movements often just come to party and have a good time, not thinking too deeply of the ramifications. but it provides a necessary "vector point" to spread ideas through social consciousness. hippies just had the ear of pop culture a lot faster and readily than other movements before it, giving it a cache of movement credibility because so many people were becoming hip to the scene so fast.

the world is old, it's all been done before, nothing new under the sun... but it's fascinating how from such innocuous seeds flowers bear fruit.

[GliderGuider]

122. Looking back on it, underneath all the symbology was a deep yearning for authenticity.

We were looking for the right to be ourselves, wherever that might lead. The process of discovering who we really were took us to a lot of places, physically (India, Europe, Woodstock and San Francisco), psychologically (Fritz Perls, Carl Jung, Erich Fromm, Abraham Maslow) and spiritually (Zen, Sufi, Hinduism, and remember Bhagwan Sri Rajneesh?) As well as the freedom to choose, we treasured the ideas of close interconnection and interdependence wherever we found then - in ecology and the environment, in man's relationship to nature, and human social interactions.

The hippies were the first large social group to recognize the inherent alienation and inauthenticity of modern industrial society, and to try and do something about it. The resistance to social convention was of course part of the search for meaning and authenticity. There was a fundamental recognition that someone else's values can never fully be your own, and that we each have a right to decide on our own value system.

For many of us LSD was part of that voyage of discovery. George Carlin called acid a "values-changing drug" and he knew what he was talking about first-hand. The point of the trip wasn't the pretty patterns and colors, they just made it more fun. The important thing about acid, the thing that scared the shit out of the straights, was that acid tore away the veil and caused us to laugh hysterically at the sclerotic conventions that made up straight society. That was what prompted TPTB to introduce cocaine in large quantities though the CIA in the early and mid '70s. That decision short-circuited a dangerous revolutionary movement when it got everybody back working and dancing instead of sitting around thinking subversive thoughts about waking up and shaking off our chains (which is what Leary's "Turn on, tune in, drop out" was all about).

[lunatica]

123. Hippie's introduced a counter-culture which was so radical that Reagan had to stop it

Hippies envisioned a future of no wars and a respect for our planet. It was the GOP's worst nightmare. They soon elected Reagan who put a stop to such nonsense.

[GliderGuider]

124. It started before that, with Tricky Dick.

I think Nixon either overtly or tacitly authorized the CIA to flood of the USA with cocaine, as a way of pushing LSD offstage. LSD is an intrinsically counter-cultural dfrug, while coke is the quintessentially pro-cultural drug (you gotta have a job to afford it, and it makes you want to dance rather than think.)

[lunatica]

127. I thought of that but it was when Reagan whipped up the uber patriotism

with the Iran hostage situation that the Right overpowered the peaceful movement away from the public consciousness. The prototeabag types had their champion. Good old St. Ronnie saved their jingoism as the American ideal.

but yeah, Nixon had his Tricky Dick things going on too.

I think what may have actually put the death wound on the hippie ideals was the assassination of MLK Jr. and Robert Kennedy. What a difference there would have been if Robert Kennedy had been President instead of Nixon.

[ThomThom]

125. There are some pictures of people in this thread with hair over

their ears that was not long hair at the time. Long haired hippies had shoulder length or longer hair.

To address your question, hippies were right about many things. They opposed the war in Vietnam and demonstrated to end it. It was stopped. They thought that saving the environment was important, eventually clean air and water legislation was passed. Hippies believed in civil rights for minorities and also women. They believed the corporate world was evil and would destroy all, which also seems to be coming true. The country tried to marginalize hippies because they dared to raise questions about the direction of our country and some very real problems that still plague us today. The war on drugs was begun as an excuse to crack down on people that were messing up the idyllic world that the powers that rule our country wanted.
The only real hippies were the folks that gathered in San Francisco in the late 60's and "dropped out". It was a pretty short adventure and the ideals, the dress, the hair styles spread across the country during the next decade.
Most high school students smoked pot at least once, many participated in the anti-war movement, supported equal rights and wanted to save nature from destruction that did not make them hippies. Hippies where a very small group of young people that sympathized with the first group in California and carried on their thinking in cities across the county. Their numbers were never huge but their ideas are still around today and the right is still fighting them even though they have been totally proven correct.

[Vinca]

126. Ended the Vietnam war.

[MineralMan]

128. It depends on what you define as "hippies."

Your question is too broad, really. Define the time periods and stuff like that, and there are some answers.

[steve2470]

131. Excellent point ! nt

[MineralMan]

133. Thanks. I'm 66 years old now.

I pretty much joined the "counterculture" in 1964, when I dropped out of college and set off on a cross-country journey that lasted almost a year. I ended up in Selma and Birmingham, and listened to Dr. King speak after crossing the Edmund Pettus bridge. I smoked tons of dope and got involved in all sorts of civil rights and anti-war activities. Anyone looking at me would have called me a hippie, but I wasn't, really. I was a freak, certainly, and a politically active one. The "hippies" were something else, by my definition. They were the hanger's on, the dopers, and the folks who couldn't get out of their chairs to actually do anything useful.

They'd show up at protests, but were there for the social ambiance, the music, and to scrounge some weed. They added to the numbers, but not to the activism.

I ended up enlisting in the USAF when my draft notice showed up, spent four years doing that, then rejoined the movement in 1968 in DC, while still serving.

I still don't know what a hippie is. Don't care much, either. I do know who the people who were doing the work were. They weren't hippies.

[FailureToCommunicate]

155. Agreed. Welcomed at protests, but "hippies" weren't the organizing type.

Yet the media focused on the look and the "lifestyle" to sell stuff, scare adults into voting conservative, or just to distract from the important issues of the day...

[NNN0LHI]

132. I suspect when a lot of people think of "hippies" they envision ...

... what they fondly recall seeing in reruns of The Partridge Family.

Don

[MineralMan]

137. Yeah, I suppose so. It's funny to have a 31 year old

describe him/herself as being on the edge of the hippies. Not even close. Most of the folks who would have been classed as hippies are in their 60s now or certainly getting close to it. There seems to be a lot of mythology involved in people's concept of hippies.

[HopeHoops]

129. They perfected the bong.

[steve2470]

130. I'm only 53, so I can't claim to be a "hippie" but....

I remember reading an alternative newspaper in 1969 about Woodstock. I took it home, and my parents promptly found it and got rid of it x(

The "hippie vibe" was late in coming to my neck of the woods, but came it did. I would guess it lasted in my part of the world from 1969 to maybe 1973.

The one permanent change I think it's wrought in American culture is "do your own thing", you don't have to fit in exactly, you can lead your own life. Of course, the old school conservative ethos of doing as your parents say or as your "elders" recommend is still with us, but at least now there is a strong viable alternative.

I envy you older DU'ers that actually got to BE hippies. It wasn't really available to me in my limited thinking in 1976. I think hippies rock !

[GliderGuider]

153. No matter how cool you might have thought it was to be a hippie...

it was cooler than that.

Way cooler.

Sorry we used it all up.:hippie:

[MineralMan]

166. Right on, man....and all that free love, too.

I do, however, remember a case of the crabs from that, but they went away with some stuff.

But, it was, indeed, way cool...I'm just glad that old age affects short term memory more than long term memory. :rofl:

[LanternWaste]

134. If nothing else, social awareness.

"What did hippies accomplish?"

If nothing else, social awareness and new perspectives of collective responsibilities.

Which of course may or may not have a dollar sign placed on it vis-a-vis 'value', but to me, is certainly a great legacy and an even greater value.

[Ishoutandscream2]

135. The real "Greatest Generation"

Thank you for not only helping to end the war, but ending the draft as well. When I turned 18 in 1979, I did have to register, but there was no draft. Thank you guys for that.

And, of course, your work in the civil rights movement. Making sure those less fortunate would be helped. Thank you guys for making the world aware of that.

And the music! My God, the music!! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!

[polly7]

136. I was a bit late for the hippie generation and remember feeling so cheated.

The music was brilliant and the fact that so many of their songs are still being used world-wide in quests for peace, equality, tolerance says more than anything. When I think of 'hippie', I think of peace. They changed the world. imo.

[ohheckyeah]

141. I can't disagree with the music.

That's about all of the music I listen to on a regular basis.

[Romulox]

149. LOL at "greatest generation"!

:rofl:

[Ishoutandscream2]

160. Let me guess -GEN X

Another suffering, jealous, boomer hater, perhaps? What has your generation done, per se?

[Romulox]

161. Well, one thing we *didn't* do is transform the US into a distopian hellhole of inequality,

militarism, and corporate rule, all the while complementing ourselves on what a fine job we had done.

'Cause that was you guys. :hi:

[LanternWaste]

168. The second half of the nineteenth centur

The second half of the nineteenth century and the era of the robber barons certainly never had a hand in crafting laws on either the local or the national stage...

However, I do realize that we often attempt to fit all the sins currently enjoyed onto the generation preceding us. Pliny attributed it to human nature. I concur.

[Romulox]

171. If you want to take *credit* for the macro trends, be prepared to accept the *blame* as well.

It's two sides of the same coin.

[Ishoutandscream2]

177. I'm not one, dumbass

Showing again the utter stupidity and whining of a generation who has done NOTHING. When you have proof of your assessment, then please show us.

It didn't take me any time to realize that you were a sniveling, whining, pouting Xer. Always pointing fingers, and no answers. What a pathetic person you are - a prime example of your souless, clueless generation.

[Romulox]

185. Your response speaks for itself. Your number--I got it! nt

[Romulox]

186. Yeah, you are. Baby Boomers were born between 1946 and 1964, according to US Census Bureau

I guess you spent some much time practicing your insults that "Google" has passed you by? :silly:

[MineralMan]

167. Ah, there are many things to LOL at.

Yes, indeed, there are:

[Romulox]

170. LOL. I see we've learned how "Google" works.

I used a similar picture for a year, when I had a star. Nevertheless, I am scandalized! :silly:

[Romulox]

172. Nice crappy ad hom from a guy with a picture of a cat-butt as an avatar, btw!

:eyes:

[MineralMan]

173. No ad hominem. Just a joke.

Everyone has something that can be laughed at. I have many things. Laugh away!

But, if you're going to mess with Fat Freddy's Cat, don't forget to check your shoes before putting them on. :rofl:

[ensho]

140. they took the corners off of the square

and danced

[Skidmore]

145. I take it that you are of a younger generation.

I was born in the 50s and much has changed since I was a child. Lots of it has to do with technology and even more has to do with the social change. Many of the changes that occurred for women and children and minorities came about as the result of those "hippies" who took to the streets and demanded change. What I see now is the wealthy trying to strip us of those accomplishments.

"Hippies" wielded a power more potent than the traditional venues you delineated. That power came from their willingness to be openminded to the needs and cultures of others and to translate that into a persuasive worldview. This worldview shook the political, social, and economic pillars of the nation and the world.

[Romulox]

147. The Boomer generation remade America in its own image. That includes the negative stuff.

:shrug:

[Broderick]

150. Someone say hippie?

[G_j]

154. “When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.”

(Jimi Hendrix)

it was never our goal to amass power and weath...

[Desertrose]

159. Ahhhh....Jimi....so true.

:hi::loveya:
DR

[bvar22]

156. What did hippies accomplish?

We asked questions and changed perceptions.



Less is More

2nd Hand is Better

Build it yourself

Grow your own

Respect your Mother (Earth)

Simple is better

Think for Yourself & Question Authority

The only way to WIN (the rat race) is not to play

Share

RICH does NOT equal GOOD

If you want peace, love, & respect, you have to give it away

We certainly weren't the first to think those thoughts.
Some of those are as old as Man,
but as a generation that grew up being taught that the BeaverCleaver Household was the American Dream,
the rejection of those "Uniquely American" values,
and the search for something more meaningful WAS a radical Paradigm Shift.

Plus, being a "Hippie" in the late 60's was FUN!
It was a GREAT time to be young & alive.


bvar22 & Starkraven
Living Well on a Low Taxable Income & Stuff we learned in the 60s
:hippie:

[rms013]

157. It brought fear to the establishment and resulted in :

The Gutting of our Bill of Rights
The Police State
The War on drugs
The Extreme Right Wing
The Crumbling Education System
The All Volunteer Army
The Right Wing Media
The increase in corporate power
The Regan Administration
The Clinton Administration
The Bush I and II administration
The Prison industrial Complex
The Christian Right

and these are just a few of our accomplishments.

All because the "establishment" realized that an informed populace, an educated populace a populace that questioned authority was a threat to their power. It wasn't the drugs or the sex it was the ideology of what we believed this democracy should and could be. The antithesis of which was the template for destruction of democracy and the building blocks for fascism.

[loyalsister]

158. The 80s?

I never saw hippies as a group with goals. They were part of a counterculture culture. They were rebelling against the structure of the 50s and the wars that grew out of that time. In some ways they might have been conforming to the flux of the 60s. I think there were idealists and those who were more angry and anything in between. I think they had a cultural impact that influences how we think about "rebellion." As a countercultural group, I think there is a positive interpretation of nonconformity that endures because eventually the more idealistic hippies became academics.

Many others eventually became yuppies. (even Ann Coulter was a Dead Head). By the time, many were in their late 20s and 30s they disowned the label and "overcorrected." They then brought us the materialism of the 80s. It was cocaine, BMWs, and suburbs instead of pot, VW busses, and communal farms.

[jberryhill]

165. +1

[steve2470]

162. kick for afternoon crowd nt

[jberryhill]

164. The Name Of A Large Corporate Clothing Retailer

"The Gap" started out selling blue jeans, and the name is based on the "generation gap" which was the putative source of conflict between younger folks and older folks.

Today, it is one of the giants of retail which enslaves countless third world garment makers.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

169. Why don't you just come out once and scream it.

[Sirveri]

183. What would I be screaming? The word "it"?

I always found it humorous that a board dedicated to a supposed shared ideology would have so many people think others were playing their cards so close to the chest.

I simply desire to expand my horizons, as I always have and always will. No fear or hatred needed on my journey, though I do witness it several times in the oddest of places.

[Name removed]

175. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Taverner]

179. Most of the "hippies" who accomplished things were one decade older than them

Although if you consider Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Garcia, Hunter S Thompson, The Beatles, etc having accomplished anything then they did quite well...

[DCBob]

180. they made it cool to try to save the world.

[cujet]

181. Some incredible music!

[Romulox]

187. Jimi was born in 1942, John Lennon, 1940, Dylan, 1941. None of them are Boomers!

:shrug: