Hippies, peaceniks, and the sands of time

[omni550]

A local Boomer meetup group hosted a movie night last night. (One gal has a home theater..with theater seating and a large screen. Very nice.) The the first move we watched was 'Hair'.

I had never seen it before, some others in the group had.

As I was watching, I was having flashbacks to that era.

It was funny to hear the comments from this group of Boomers, as we were enjoying pizza, wine, and beer during the "intermission," talking about our own "hippie" generation, through the eyes of adults 50 years senior.

Mind you...many in this group had traveled to D.C. as war protestors back in the day, claimed to have been hippies back then, still are quite liberal in their viewpoints, etc.

I was hearing comments like.."I used to think hippies were just cool peace-loving folk...now I see that they were panhandlers wearing dirty clothes rather than working to earn their keep"..."they were party crashers" (in the movie they attended a ritzy party uninvited and wouldn't leave until the cops came and arrested them)...."free love was them sleeping around, getting pregnant not knowing who the father was"..."heck, many going to the peace rallies were just looking to meet someone of the opposite sex", etc.

Were you a hippie? peacenik?

And, what are your thoughts, looking back through mature eyes?

Me? I was working (20 hrs/wk during school, 40 hrs/wk over holidays/vacations) while putting myself through engineering school while living at home with very domineering parents. So, no, I wasn't a hippie. Heck, I couldn't even dress like a hippie or college student, since my office job required wearing office attire (which was skirts/dresses). I did have waist-length hair...which as it's naturally straight did not need to be ironed, like some others had to do to get the desired straight hair of the era.

omni

 

[athena53]

I was a weird hybrid. Against the Vietnam war but not involved in protesting; my parents paid for my college education and I was serious about learning, both because that was what I was there for and because I wanted to get a career that would let me live on my own. I was also an early feminist in a major that wasn't traditionally female (Math, with no intent to teach it, and fascinated with computers).

I was a gleeful participant in the sexual revolution and, though diligence and some luck, never got pregnant or had an STD. I don't regret those days but I wouldn't repeat them at my current age and with the STDs out there now.

When I graduated, I ended up in Corporate America in traditional business dress but that had always been the plan. There's still a little part of the 70s in my brain, though, and I hope it never leaves. I'll be the one rocking to Led Zeppelin in the nursing home.

Edited to add: Oh, yeah- I inhaled a few times. Never anything more powerful than Mary Jane- I was always wary of long-term damage and not really into altering my mind, since I kind of liked it the way it was.

 

[Nemo2]

Seemed to me, for the most part, only those receiving regular stipends from well to do parents could afford to reject 'materialistic benefits'.

 

[grasshopper]

Yes, I was going to stop the war, end poverty, love my brothers and sisters.

 

[Moemg]

I was not a hippie in fact my room mates at the time tried to convince me to go to Woodstock and I declined because I hate camping .They returned grumbling about all the mud and lack of food , etc. no talk about how awesome it was.I did have some hippie clothes .

 

[braumeister]

Depends on the cohort.
I was in the early part of the Boomer generation, and I suspect my perspective is very different from those toward the end.

Baby boomer is a descriptive term for a person who was born between 1946 and 1964. The baby boomer generation makes up a substantial portion of the world's population, especially in developed nations: it represents nearly 20% of the American public. As the largest generational group in U.S. history (until the millennial generation slightly surpassed them), baby boomers have had, and continue to have a significant impact on the economy. As a result, they are often the focus of marketing campaigns and business plans.

 

[athena53]

Seemed to me, for the most part, only those receiving regular stipends from well to do parents could afford to reject 'materialistic benefits'.

My mother wryly observed that my then-boyfriend, who deplored materialism, had a better sound system than she and my Dad had.

 

[Walt34]

Nope, no one would have ever thought I was a hippie. I always kept my hair short, I shaved daily, and dressed neatly. If not working full time I was in school full time and worked part time. My occupational goal was that of a police officer so I was careful to stay well away from any of those "scumbags" dealing or using drugs or any other activity that had even the remotest possibility of me getting arrested.

 

[braumeister]

I have one small confession to make.

I only learned about Woodstock a few days before the event. It sounded like a great time, and as it happened I needed to drive nearby on Sunday, the last (scheduled) day of the festival. I had been visiting my parents in Brooklyn and needed to get back to work in Syracuse.

It was raining that day, which dampened (no pun intended) my spirits a bit, but I really wanted to see what was going on. I drove as close as I could, got to roughly the vicinity in mid-afternoon, parked the car on the side of the road, and started hiking in. By the time I got to the fringes, I could see that it was more or less complete chaos, and decided it wasn't worth it to keep going.

I hiked back to the car and went on my way. So I suppose I could claim to have technically been "at" Woodstock, but not really.

Great memories.

 

[aja8888]

I was fresh out of the military after 4 years, 2 combat, in college (paying for it myself) and wondering what all those spoiled brats were protesting against. I did like the music of the time, though.

 

[Ronstar]

Don't know if I was a hippie or not. I never considered myself as a hippie. So I looked up the definition:

"(especially in the 1960s) a person of unconventional appearance, typically having long hair and wearing beads, associated with a subculture involving a rejection of conventional values and the taking of hallucinogenic drugs."

Certainly not a hippie in the 60's. I don't think I had an unconventional appearance - in the 70's I looked like everyone else my age with long hair. I did reject conventional values. I took no hallucinogenic drugs - only pot.

So maybe I was 10-20% hippie.

 

[grasshopper]

Woodstock, my bud and I were on our way when we stopped at my grannies beach home on Long Island. At the time you could drink beer in NY at age 18. Well we bought some beer met a couple of hippie chicks, and Woodstock became a pipe dream.

 

[MRG]

When DW and I married I had to cut my hair so her's would be longer than mine.

Sadly there was a need for food to eat and bills to pay. I was too young for Woodstock. DW and three friends did make it to Watkins Glen.

 

[Marita40]

I think in late elementary/early highschool we had some aspirations to be hippie-like, but I was too young. Loved the music. Never bought into most of the message, and had no desire to get high in a muddy field or sleep around. About the extent of my rebellion was smoking some pot in college and wearing a Vietnam soldier's bracelet.


They do look kinda happy though:

 

[marko]

A classmate at the time opined that "Let them all be hippies, it'll thin out the competition for a good job". He's now CFO of a major tech firm.

But funny how the hippie generation turned out to be the greatest materialistic generation of all time, eh?

 

[CardsFan]

I was too young for Woodstock. DW and three friends did make it to Watkins Glen.

Now THAT brings back memories (well at least a hazy version of memories).

My 6 year older cousin and his wife went to Woodstock. By the time of Watkins Glen I was working for him part time in his landscaping business. We made the trek from south of Boston. We even had tickets! They were a whopping ten bucks! I'm pretty sure we enjoyed the music.

 

[timo2]

I like this cartoon.

 

[donheff]

Definitely a hippie and an anti-war protester. But I have an anecdote about the OP's mention of Hair. I was a psych major in college and in 1969 I worked for a year as a psych aide at the Illinois State Psychiatric Institute in Chicago. We occasionally took patients on field trips and one day we got matinee tickets to a performance of Hair. If anyone went to Hair you may remember that at times cast members come out into the audience and try to coax the uptight audience members out of their seats to sing and dance. After a brief excursion to our section of the theater I noticed that the cast had the sense to go elsewhere for their "volunteers." I guess they were a little more uptight than we were. All in all it was a fun field trip.

 

[HFWR]

Tail end of hippie era, as I didn’t go full on until after high school in ‘72.

It doesn’t serve us well to look upon that phenom, and those years, with the proverbial rose-colored glasses. The lifestyle of drugs and free love had obvious problems, though perhaps we are slightly better for having some mores and traditions challenged and changed.

In the end, we mostly got married, jumped on the career path, and spent like drunken sailors...

But damn, the music was good!

 

[CardsFan]

But damn, the music was good!

Every so often DW gets on a kick to watch "Big Chill". Great music, and a good take on the times.

"Who ever thought we would make so much bread?"

 

[audreyh1]

A classmate at the time opined that "Let them all be hippies, it'll thin out the competition for a good job". He's now CFO of a major tech firm.

But funny how the hippie generation turned out to be the greatest materialistic generation of all time, eh?

Yeah - real surprise. Also how conservative they became.

 

[Bamaman]

I was a Frat Rat in a big city state university. We were fairly clean cut on the outside, but derelicts behind closed doors. The Brothers were incredibly successful when they joined the real world in the early 70's.

But we did have a member from New Jersey that went to Woodstock. He moved to Hawaii in 1977 to surf and has never been back to the mainland. And he hasn't worn a pair of shoes since 1977. I visited him a couple of years ago.

 

[grasshopper]

"Meet the new boss same as the old boss" WHO

Press Release: The New Age Goes into Retirement - Arjuna Ardagh

 

[braumeister]

Yeah - real surprise. Also how conservative they became.

Nothing surprising about that. It's well documented that people become more conservative as they age.

For example:

Hard Evidence: do we become more conservative with age?

Why Are Older People More Conservative?

 

[harley]

And, what are your thoughts, looking back through mature eyes?

I'll let you know when I get some.