Talk:Hippie

Summary work still needed for 1968

It was mentioned here a long time ago that the events of the year 1968, which represent the apex of hippie activism, are something like a mysterious black hole in the history section of this article. It was also agreed that this should be rectified, but to date it has not. The relevant subarticle, History of the hippie movement is somewhat more comprehensive in this regard, so what we need, is someone who can do a good "summary style" from that page, for the year 1968, onto this article. All we would need for this article is a simple, short recap of the basic points and events that took place that year, if that is not too much. Thanks, Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 14:10, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

A couple points: I mentioned above that the jipitecas should be moved into that section. This also implies referring to the Tlatelolco massacre. Both of these items are sourced to Zolov 1999, and he discusses Mexican hippie culture in detail. But, that's just one item. The history article you refer to above has a completely unsourced section on 1968, and we really don't need more unsourced content at this point. The section above this one is an attempt to get the GA review back on track. Instead of adding a summary of unsourced original research, it would be much better if editors like yourself simply make a list here on the talk page of details that should appear in this article, and editors like myself (and hopefully others) will attempt to add them with sources. Or, switch that around; I would be happy to make a list if you (or anyone else) would add them to the article with sources. I don't care who does what, as long as it gets done. So why don't we start making a list of what's missing? If you want to take the lead in organizing this effort, that would be great. Viriditas (talk) 14:28, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Need to add/expand

• Yippies formed
• Fillmore East opens
• Martin Luther King, Jr. assassination
• Resurrection City
• Hair (musical) opens
• May 1968 in France
• 1968 Democratic National Convention
  • Appears linked in politics section, but should be duplicated in 1968 section
• Jipitecas, Tlatelolco massacre, Mexico
• Movement out of cities and into rural communes in America (NoCal, Taos, etc.) Est. 200,000 (Small 2002)
• Persecution of hippies around the world (Europe, Asia, South America, etc.)

Great start, These type of things shouldn't be hard to verify. Someone, I think it was NPR radio, did a dedicated series to events of '68, for the 40th anniversary, that could even be a good source. I don't see why we (wikipedia) can't be a little more competitive resource here...;) Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 14:42, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

So much happened in 1968, it would make sense to supplement this section with a sidebar timeline that lists the most important events and dates. Viriditas (talk) 14:55, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Just to followup, the 2008 NPR audio series dedicated to the events and trends of 1968, was called "Echoes of 1968" and it can be accessed here. We might be able to comb it for more ideas. Note that this page gives the most recent installments; the link at the bottom reading "More in this series" has the rest, 50 in all. I caught some of them on my car radio as they were being broadcast last year, and they sounded well-researched and like they could well be on-topic here. Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 19:26, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

More emphasis in Britain and famous people

Britain was an important hippie scene. I think the UK scene deserves a special section. Probably i don't know but it seems in the US they didn't suffered those attacks as in UK. Somebody or the creator of the article referred to skinhead, teddyboys and mod revivals as the attackers, but i never learnt about it in the US case.

Another special mention is the group of hippies later to be famous. In the US I understand there were Cher or Janis Joplin (although she was famous at the time, i think), and in the UK, the counterculture or lifestyle featured many interesting cases: John Foxx (later a New Wave and synthpop pioneer), Derek Forbes (later to be bassist of the 1980's band Simple Minds), Gareth Jones (later synthpop bands Depeche Mode and Erasure producer), many of the members of Manchester post punk band The Durutti Column, and probably Joe Strummer of The Clash and Lemmy (later a heavy metal man in Motorhead). I think they should be mentioned in the article as famous hippies.Francodamned (talk) 22:25, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I think "famous hippies" would be a terribly hard section to manage. It would be filled with questionably categorized people, especially those who did NOT become famous during the sixties. And how famous is famous, and how much of a hippie qualifies? Iconic figures who DEFINED the hippie movement like Timothy Leary, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Ram Das, Wavy Gravy, and such might be able to be singled out, but adding all the "famous" musicians and celebrities would be a nightmare. How would you decide; by their dress? Public statements? Hair length? How would you separate Beat from Hippie when so many were both at one time or another, like Neal Cassidy? The list would be enormous, including members of the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Big Brother, Velvet Underground, The Beatles, The Byrds, The Animals, and dozens of other bands, and individuals like James Taylor, Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul & Mary, Joan Baez, Cat Stevens, Simon & Garfunkle, Arlo Guthrie, etc. Add actors like Jane Fonda, Goldie Hawn, and Dennis Hopper, models like Ultra Violet, artists like Andy Warhol, poets like Allen Ginsburg, etc etc. And how would you deal with folks that had a "hippie period"? Some were best known for that time, but would not call themselves hippies now; might even resent it.

"Later to be famous" is just as bad, IMO. And present hippies vs former hippies complicates it all. Rosencomet (talk) 01:53, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Counterculture of the 1960s is working on a sourced section about famous countercultural icons right now. Viriditas (talk) 03:19, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Will to live

The main motive for becoming a hippie in the 1960s was to avoid being drafted and sent to Viet Nam, where there was a high probability of being killed.Lestrade (talk) 14:30, 15 October 2009 (UTC)Lestrade

Well, not exactly. Being a hippy did not by itself exempt anyone from the draft. And there was a lot more to it than that. For many people it was a principled way of branding oneself in order to show resistance to the war. For others it was simply a great party, and one wanted to dress, and act, appropriately. Obviously any attempt to simplify "motive" to just one issue is likely to be prone to error.Apostle12 (talk) 14:59, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Hah! Would that it were so easy to avoid the draft!Rosencomet (talk) 21:31, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Oops, sorry! Got a little overzealous thinking I was reverting vandalism, and somehow missed that the above material (Rosencomet's) was in a talk page. I reverted Rosencomet, than reverted myself. Taquito1 (talk) 01:42, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Being a hippie in no way exempted people from the draft. If hippies wanted to avoid the draft, they had to avoid it the same way everyone else did. It is a mistake to assume that draft evader = hippie. Dick Cheney, certainly no hippie, avoided the draft by getting deferments.--RLent (talk) 21:09, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

..and, of course, there were hippies in many places outside the US, and where the draft issue did not apply. Ghmyrtle (talk) 21:16, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

In any case, Lestrade raises an interesting point which we are seeing a lot more these days with the help of evolutionary psychology, etc. I think it might be interesting to pursue this with good sources. Viriditas (talk) 04:47, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

It might be useful to bear in mind that in the 60s anyone who called him/herself a "hippie" probably wasn't. Good old Donovan Bess helped to give the word currency among the naive. If you were "in the life" in Frisco or other west coast locations, or involved in London underground culture "hippie" was used in ways that ranged from derogatory to satirical and regarded as a straight media label more than anything else. It was adopted more earnestly by late comers to the party, late 60s and 70s and those that employed it in marketing to young people. And the draft tried to chase you down wherever you went, which is one reason I left behind the delights of the Haight Ashbury and moved to the UK and later on to Canada. Altcult101 (talk) 09:50, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Iron Butterfly

I notice that Iron Butterfly is listed as among the bands that played at the Red Dog Saloon during the summer of 1965. Do we have a source for that? I seem to remember that the band formed after the Red Dog era. Apostle12 (talk) 06:36, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Travel section

Still requires sources. Viriditas (talk) 22:27, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for this comment in the View History" page, "Welcome back Mombas, and thanks for continuing to promote Nambassa. However, this material is unsourced and challenged as original research. It requires sources" Perhaps you would like to suggest what sources you might require given I only posted a relevant photo which is contained in the main Housetrucker article which incidentally did make it to the front page. However it good to see you still dragging the chain. Mombas (talk) 04:08, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

The "Wal-Mart hippie"

Columnist David Brooks has written eloquently about a concept he calls the "Wal-Mart hippie" [1]:

Today, another social movement has arisen. The people we loosely call the Tea Partiers also want to destroy the establishment. They also want to take on The Man, return power to the people, upend the elites and lead a revolution.

...

But the Tea Partiers are closer to the New Left. They don’t seek to form a counter-establishment because they don’t believe in establishments or in authority structures. They believe in the spontaneous uprising of participatory democracy. They believe in mass action and the politics of barricades, not in structure and organization.

I'm at a loss as to where to incorporate this into the current article; I don't think old-style hippies and "Wal-Mart hippies" would get along so well.--NeantHumain (talk) 01:09, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

I would say it has no relation to Hippies whatsoever and best added to its own category. I don't know how left you can pretend to be especially with Palin as guest speaker at the Tea Party Conv. After all, the KKK and Neo Nazis were anti-establishment too and I certainly wouldn't call them hippies!Mombas (talk) 04:04, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

It's clear the "Wal-Mart hippies" are hippies of the right, not of the left. Maybe the concept of the hippie needs to be revised to accommodate both the classic-style hippies of the New Left and the right-wing hippies of the Tea Party. Obviously classic-style concepts like free love, free expression, and drug use aren't shared between the two; so what we're left with is a core of rowdy, anti-establishment protesting as Mr. Brooks describes. Perhaps this article should be split into Hippies of the Left and Hippies of the Right.--NeantHumain (talk) 19:33, 9 March 2010 (UTC)