An open letter to young hippies

I'm not sure how it works in the United States. But here in Canada, the police are the ones watching the police. For example, they tassered a mentallly ill man to death in Vancouver. All that came out of it was in inquiry and barely a slap on the wrists.

Another good example is Manitoba and the problems the native north american indians are having. In Manitoba the indians are 90% of the prison population but less than 1/3 of the population of Manitoba. Indians caught outside after dark in Winnipeg (the city) are regularly stripped of their winter clothes and driven to the outskirts of town. And there have been deaths. Manitoba can be extremly cold in the winter. (-32 happens regularly)

And all of this is under the watchful eye of Big Brother.

There can never be justice in this world as long as cops are the ones investigating cops.

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As for what I do to make this world a better place.

In Québec, the official language is french. I volunter my time to teach french to anyone that needs it. Because it doesn't matter how good you are in your native toungue, when you can't speak the offical language... You're an iliterate.

 

I appreciate what you are saying it is the same here. There is a big trial that is about to go into sentanceing where a Bay Area Rapid Transit cop shot a handcuffed Black man who was laying on his stomach. The thing is there were more cameras on him shooting this guy than there are on a professional movie set. There are 2 problems that I have though. One is the cop was obviously guilty they are calling it Manslaughter I can go for that because I seriously doubt he planned on killing anybody that day but his lawyers are pushing for a retrial. The other problem that I have with it is since the crime there have been 3 riots in Oakland. I feel sad for the families of everyone involved but I also feel pissed off at the assholes who showed up and used it as excuse to break windows and loot.

Look to me the Police are like Sanitation Workers. They are 2 groups of people that society needs and have jobs that I don't want. Oakland Police to me are like the guys who pick up medical debris. Not only does the job suck but you can get stuck with a needle.

As for the Indians they have it pretty shitty in this country too. There isn't enough room on this site for me to go off about that. Just see "Thunderheart" and "Incident at Oglala."

Or just watch this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqcM5lVoteQ&feature=related"]YouTube - rage against the machine - freedom

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

Rev. JC, I saw several videos on that incident. Man-1? Nah, I have to say Murder-3. Just because he has a badge doesn't mean he should get off easy. What happened to his better-than-the-common-Joe firearm handgun training? NEVER pull a gun unless you are going to use it. Can't tell the difference between a tazer and a gun? Find another job.

A man is dead. I cannot accept that.

Rev., bro, dig. I knew a fella, though not very well, and he was also ordained. Ok, he had a drug problem and was homeless. Well, be that as it may, Rev. MArvin Booker NEVER deserved to be murdered by the Denver Nazi Patrol (in charge of the jail). They tazed him and choked him. I don't care how bad a person is, they have as much right to live as the best people on Earth.

Doesn't matter if it's Marvin or if it's the guy the subway pigs off'd.

 

^I understand what you are saying. To be honest BART cops are just armed security. I in no way feel like what they did was right. The cop should've been better trained to keep his head when under pressure. And I agree that he should never have been doing the job in the first place. The fact of the matter is that transit cops are the ones that passed with a C-. I hold the people who trained the cop just as responsible if not more responsible than the cop who pulled the trigger. They need to have a better screening system in place and better training as to what to do in high pressure situations. But it doesn't change the fact that there are assholes that have and will use this incident as an excuse to burn and loot just because they want to burn and loot. Then they turn around and put Oscar Grant's (the one who got shot) picture on pop art with the caption "Riots Work". I'm sure that is what the family wants and what the victim himself would've wanted. That was sarcasm. My sympathy goes out to all of the families in the middle of this tragedy. All of the mothers that won't be able to hug their children again. All of the children who won't get the solid contact they need with their fathers to have a strong stable upbringing.

I'm sorry about your friend. What happened? I hate to sound cold but I like to know the facts before committing to an opinion. If I read a headline about the police shooting someone I want to know what the situation was. For example there was a guy in Oakland who got stopped by the police for speeding. He shot 6 people including 2 officers before the cops shot him. you know if you only read the headline "Police shoot man after traffic stop," there is alot of info left out.

Yes all life is precious. And all life needs to be respected. And we all need to take accountability. But also the fact of the matter is that the Oakland Police Department is laying off people is not a good thing. It's like laying off garbage men when the trash is piled 3 story's high.

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

Just as insane as letting Wall street CEO,s investigate the misdeeds of thier own- - - justice shouldn't be a game, that only the well connected or wealthy can win

 

The best source right now is Google. The stuff they said about him is something he could do, but then some of it I don't think so. But again, as I said (I think), the fella I knew may be totally different than the fella they picked up, even though it was the same guy. Know what I mean?

I don't blame you at all. I prefer knowing the facts as well.

 

I think when people say they wished they lived in the 60's they mean that they want to be part of a generation that gave a damn.It wasn't perfect, but can you think of another time in history when social conciousness was THE hip thing?

 

They can always be the atart of a generation that gives a damn by giving a damn themselves. One can only start a journey by taking the first step.

 

I think it's a misunderstanding to believe alot more people were conscious back then than today. Over the years the message just became old. Just like not everyone of todays generation is ignorant, the 60's generation weren't all 'turned on' to social consciousness. It's not so black and white (as usual).

 

I certainly don't wish i was alive in the 60's. They were a very turbulent time, extremely similar to today but also extremely different. I do wish i was part of a generation that actually gave a damn though, because every time I try to start something, nobody joins in. People don't care anymore because they're too busy telling everybody on facebook what they're doing every 10 seconds or seeing a terrible injustice and pretending they don't know about it. So for now, I have to be the change I wish to see in the world... At least until people my age start being interested in politics

 

At least law enforcement and government learned something from the 60's. If regular people had been paying attention, we might still have a fighting chance but concepts like national security and economic progress have been used to sell out our freedoms and the practice of keeping up with what the folks we elect are doing has become lost as the ever indulgent consumer economy offers a gaudy array of fun gadgets and gizmos that are a more fun diversion to occupy what little free time we have.

 

Do you honestly believe the whole generation gave a damn. Hardly. There were people from that generation who gladly ate all of the shit that they were handed by the powers that be. Not everybody who went to Vietnam were drafted. Some of the bigots that were killing hippies were actually from the same generation. During the Trancendentalist movement Social Conciousness was the hip thing.

There seems to be a mistaken belief of people that wish they were alive in the sixties that the Hippies were the majority. That everybody was a hippie and that life was better for them then. Truth be told it wasn't

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

Yes but at the same time you honestly think that the hippies at that time had it easy getting people on board. They weren't the majority. It fell apart because a lot of the people "Gave a Damn" for the wrong reason. It wasn't "Lets fix things because they are fucked up" it was "Let's fix things so that people will think we are great". And when you say you "Try to start something" I honestly want to question your motives. The point you are at in your development is a very ego based one. Fuck it you can't fix or change anyone else when you are fucked up. I also can't force your development. It's your path to walk. At least this time you aren't walking into a gun barrel.

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

Really you wish you were there for the Dope. Thanks for proving my point. Hangovers suck.

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

I think you meant to say "if you grew up in the 60,s- not born in the 60,s

I was born in 1950- -a teenager of 17/18 in1967 "the summer of love"- -and by the way> life doesn't suck now

just trying to figure your message,
jack

And don't wanna debate ya- but it wasnt all about the drugs. man that is very stereotypical shit-:banghead: -Stronger drugs are out on the streets now, than there were in my time- - people have had many years to perfect these drugs - for instance>The weed today is much stronger than anything you could find in the 60,s-
I don't do drugs anymore, except prescribed methadone (from that better and unfortunately purer Heroin )- - -but no life doesn't suck for most of us that lived,loved,and learned in the 60,s- -it just changed and we got older.

 

I also want to tack on to Jacks thought. Sometime during the 60's or 70's I cannot remember which Albert Hoffman and Bear Owlsley met. They sat down and discussed LSD and how to make it how big a dose was etc. Hoffman warned Owlsley that the doses they were taking were about 5 times what Hoffman considered a "Safe" dose. Perhaps that is why Skip Spence, Rocky Erickson, Syd Barrett, Peter Green, and numerous others went on trips that they never came back from. At that time of experimentation when "the Drugs were better" people had no idea how to take them safely and responsibly.

As a result there was the great Republican backlash. The "Just say No" movement started up and both sex and drug education became "abstainance only". Granted that they always were but the stakes got raised. In the sixties the only risks were pregnancy or an infection that penicillin would get rid of. After AIDS it seems that safe sex education finally hit from somewhere. Drug education hasn't caught up.

The fact is that for example what constitutes a "dose" is different around the world. Alot of English kids overdose on Ecstacy at American raves because the doses here are bigger. We have kids overdosing on Meth because they do rails like it's Coke not Bumps. I don't condone drug use especially heavy drug use but it can be done safely and sanely. We know that now but they didn't know that then.

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

I never really thought that hippies had it easy, because history repeats itself. Hippies were a minority then and are a minority now. I always kinda thought they had a hard time getting people on board. I don't "give a damn" for the wrong reason. I truly, from the bottom of my heart (excuse the cliche), want to fix the world because it's a fucked up place. Every day I see kids who don't care about anything but looks and social status and it upsets me.

 

Some young fools back then didn't even think "responsible!" They would pop a pill given to them by some other long-haired freek who called him brother - not even knowing what it was much less "dosage."

So, I ended up taking STP once. Great Trip after I realized that I would eventually come down. And I took the pill that some tripping head handed me on Haight St. as he was feeling he needed to share sacrament with the world. That one was alright, just normal LSD.

Sometimes I realize just how lucky I was not to get srsly burned.

 

Let's face the facts that this is a social networking site in and of itself. If you come on here and check your user CP and go out and buy tie-dyed or vintage clothing and make statements like "I wish I was around in the sixties" you are just as bad as they are. It also perpetuates a negative stereotype of Hippies being out of touch and stuck in the past. Let's just put it this way if Barack Obama went on TV in Blackface while eating Chicken and watermelon the black community would have been set back about 50 years in terms of perception.

Be thankful that you are here now. One of the things that we can all learn from the last presidential election is that thanks to the internet we can get information more Quickly and efficiently. If we have ideas we can share them and find more like minded individuals more quickly.

Here's another old hippie anthem:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfhztkVTTdA"]YouTube - Bob Dylan - The Times Are A-Changin

The one thing he was saying is don't look back. Keep moving ahead.

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

I agree with you on that. But the thing is I don't do that. I wear tie dye but it's home made and only because I like colors. Actually, I just wear clothes that I think look good and they might look "vintage" but I don't care. I'm glad I'm in an era where I can find things faster and find like minded people. I really don't wish I was in the 60's. By the way, I've always liked that song