Recently I've been reading a lot of books about the movement and watching a lot of documentaries about the good old times when the hippie movement originally started. Because I am completely fascinated with this movement and the original hippies that started it all, I want to know what it was like back in the day and how much being a part of it has changed your life. What was it about the movement that drew you to join? Do you think the media has shown accurate or completely false portrayals of hippies? What were the positive and negative aspects about being a hippie? Oh, and feel free to ad whatever you want to say even if I haven't asked about it. New information is always good!
Wow...that's kind of a hard question to answer. For me it started with the music. Right after the Beatles overtook Elvis and the Beachboys...I was still very young but it was the beginning of the revolution. Hearing all the new different music was liberating from the past and we wanted to be liberated too...it was about freedom of expression, experimentation and taking the time to appreciate the clouds in the sky. Then the war escalated and suddenly a lot of people were coming home in bodybags...neighbors...friend's big brothers...and the government didn't seem to care. It was a common cause that a lot of people rallied around. The hippie movement was portrayed in the press the way it was because the press was the establishment...and the establishment didnt know what to do with a bunch of long haired dope smoking jeans dragging the ground kids who were influencing their own kids. The hippie movement got broken off into different factions. For some it wasn't enough to protest...they wanted violence...those were called the yippies and they felt radical action was the only way to protest....somehow as the next few years went by, a lot of people either became disillusioned or moved on to some other lifestyle. Some died. Some stayed the same. Some got sucked in by the rat race.
No one really joined anything. It is just about the evolution of ideas and the changes in perception of a generation that rejected the party line after WWII.
