Counterculture
Hippies
“Massive black rebellions, constant strikes, gigantic anti-war demonstrations,
draft resistance,Vietnam, the rising of women, disobedience and
sabotage, communes & marijuana: amongst this chaos, there was a generation of
youths looking to set their own standard - to fight against the establishment,
which was oppressing them, and leave their mark on history”(Memoirs of an ex hippie – Seven Years in the Counterculture, Robert Roskind). These kids were
known as the hippies. There were many stereotypes concerning hippies; they were
thought of as being pot smoking, freeloaders, who were trying to save
the world. As this small group of teenage rebellion rose out of the suburbs,
inner cities, and countryside's, there was a feeling that the hippies
were dangerous and users of drugs, and rock music, but this idea could have never
been more wrong.
In a time where technology and machines were a must for everyday life, the people of the counter-culture believed in living just as they are. The Hippie Movement changed the politics and the culture in America in the 1960s. When the nineteen fifties turned into the nineteen sixties, not much had changed, people were extremely patriotic, and the youth of America did not have much to worry about, except for how fast their car went or what kind of outfit they should wear to the Prom. After 1963, things started to slowly change in how America viewed its politics, culture, and social beliefs, and the group that was in charge of this change seemed to be the youth of America. The Civil Rights Movement, President Kennedy’s death, new music, the birth control pill, the growing illegal drug market, and the Vietnam War seemed to blend together to form a new counterculture in America, the hippie.
Unlike the society before this movement, the hippie did not try to change America through violence, the hippie tried to change...
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