jazzplayer

For nearly my whole life (mid-50s born & mid-50s now), I have heard over and over from my parents' "Greatest Generation" how this or that and pretty much every social ill is the fault of "them damn hippies" and how their permissive values have ruined what would of course otherwise have been our perfect society. As somebody who just barely squeaked into the tail end of the hippie "movement" I have watched with some objectivity and hopefully learned a thing or two from my older hippie-aged siblings.

But now, here, even today, I find some old jerkoff moaning about how them damned hippies just messed everything up, again, and I feel compelled to finally call bullshit on that whole idea.

Yes, you guys did a fine job on Hitler and all, but are also the same morons that elected Nixon, Reagan and the Bushes, who were truly much more responsible for today's problems both fiscal and social than any marginal movement led by pop musicians could ever have been.

Yes, my parents are still alive, and my dad still asks me when am I going to cut my hair and quit playing rock and roll and get a real job. And I still either ignore him or tell him to bugger off. Some things never change...

(In case you couldn't tell, I, like others, find the Hog a convenient place to occasionally open the steam valve a bit... :wink: )

Danilo Loc: Las Vegas

I went through those times, also. I was too young to be a beatnik, so when the hippies came along, the time was ripe, and I jumped in. When I look back now I think, other than the weird clothes, I was just a young dumb person like everyone else.
I cut my hair a long time ago (it just wasn't as important as I thought). I still like music, but it doesn't rule my life. I'm actually less worried about what others think...and I'm definitely happier now than I've ever been.
So, I guess I'm not dead yet, either. Thank you for the interesting thread!

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

Those were the best days. We could use a few flowers in the hair today.

RMM Loc: Suburban New York

I remember walking through Haight-Ashbury with my boss. Lots of "Little Red Books" in evidence. I couldn't help thinking that you couldn't sustain much of an economy selling tie-dyed T-shirts, leather belts and bad poetry. Lots of people around the airport asking for money - those who couldn't get Mom or Dad to keep bankrolling them.

dixiemegapixel Loc: Salemburg, NC

Arriving at Seattle-Tacoma airport after two years in Viet Nam, I saw few hippies begging for money. One kid, about my age, had long blond hair and an earring. I didn't know if I wanted to hit him or make love to him.

After coming to my senses, a couple of us followed him iinto a rest room and made him take off the mutilated American Flag T shirt he wore.

twincreek

Just my opinion you see, but disrespect of you Dad is not good, to be proud of it is even worse. Hope you learn in time.

Robbie7 Loc: Northampton. England

"every social ill is the fault of "them damn hippies" WOW! if only it were that simple eh!. I was born in 1947 and the hippies or beatniks had no influence on me whatsoever. My family left London due to the heavy bombing, My father returned from the war and I was born, an accident so my mother told me..lol. The gap between the generations was enormous as we looked into the future,beyond a war we never knew, they still relived it day by day. They say some gave their today for out tomorrow. A tomorrow that they wanted, not us. I gave up listening to my parents at the age of 15, I would suggest you do the same. HAPPY NEW YEAR! :thumbup:

Timaloha Loc: Cape Cod, MA USA

So you fought for your country and Constitution (so did I), only to come home and immediately assault a civilian in order to deprive him of his First Amendment rights? Wow.

Timaloha Loc: Cape Cod, MA USA

This was addressed to Dixiemegapixel. I didn't make that clear at first. Sorry for the repost.

dixiemegapixel Loc: Salemburg, NC

Yeah, you had to be there. My thirty years of service kinda clouds my memory. Or maybe I was trying to keep it light. Facts were, it was the defacing of my country's flag to express his first amendment rights, and a little bit as a result of his groups' spitting and "babykiller" name calling when we refused to give him any money.

In retrospect, he may have been representative of a generation of righteous, self-important, unemployed, and entitlement-craving liberal zealots.

I fell into the hippie movement to a degree also, but, like many, considered it a fad, more than a lifestyle.

RichieC Loc: Adirondacks

Thanks for both your actions..... I would have watched the door for you.

jazzplayer

I've heard that before from others, and am still not sure what exactly is so "not good" about it (other than that it is claimed to be so in some best-selling books). But I have been waiting for that old f***er to kick for as long as I can remember. Not that I stand to inherit a dime from the nonexistent "estate" of a fairly smart but not-too-successful guy. And I am not proud of it, but would certainly have preferred to be born of somebody worth a damn instead. It's hard to respect anybody that I just plain don't like.

I have never understood why people think that a guy deserves some certain unspecified degree of "respect" as a father just because he happened to get his rocks off in a fertile place at the right time - big deal! And for many I've known, that's about all being a "father" entails anyway. meh.

The utter ambiguity of your comment, "Hope you learn in time." compels me to reply, "the feeling is mutual."

Happy shooting!

papayanirvana Loc: Kauai

yea the hippies were terrible...

ecology... ban the bomb... ban nuclear energy

they're trying to disrupt the American way of life

jazzplayer

I guess the banning nuclear energy part did really screw things up bigtime, huh? Now we have those stupid wind turbines all over the place...

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

An the hippies were correct on vietnam. The big insurgent of american troops was because of flying fish in gulf of tonkin hitting the hull of a u.s. Ship. If don't believe it go utube an watch robert macnameria admit it. An cost over ,, 50,000+ boys lives.