The 60's seem like such an interesting time to have been alive. I would've loved to join a commune and expand my mind. Help me under that magical mystery trip. Peace
Sorry for bumping a 6 year old thread: http://www.hipforums.com/forum/topic/386073-an-open-letter-to-young-hippies/?hl=%2Bopen+%2Bletter+%2Byoung+%2Bhippies I hate that born in the wrong era bullshit. C/S, Rev J
Thanks for the article. And maybe I should have titled this thread 'Help Me Understand'; because I feel I can identify more with that Era then the one we're in now. So. Taking that identity into the now, and just being.
Everything was black and white. Then somewhere in about the early 60's some young kids started rubbing their genitals together and pretty soon they both started to feel real good. Then a little color started to appear in the world, then pretty soon more and more did it, and now everyting's in color. Some say that there were people doing this sex thing before that but that they were just keeping it repressed and in secret. There were rumors that kids in the country side would do it in barns and hidden places. But its only hearsay----no one talks about it... (Then again-----that might have just been the premise for a movie...)
All aboard for the magical mystery tour of the 60's! First stop---a sense of helplesness in a world governed by a government overstepping its bounds. You are a male and just turned 18 (or you're a girl and your older brother who you've looked up to all your life just turned 18). Amazingly your chances of winning the lottery are pretty good. Unfortunately this lottery will send you to a fairly certain death in a jungle on the other side of the world. It isn't like the war of your father's generation where he was actually saving the world from an evil empire. This time you are just being sent to support a US puppet government that is oppressing a peasant class of farmers who were already raped and stolen from by the French. If given the chance you would support them, but instead you will be sent to hold a gun in a bona fide hell on earth where those very peasants whose cause you would like to support will kill you... The fact that a neighbor down the street just had their son come home in a body bag doesn't help you with that feeling. Look to your left and see the lies the US Government tells---'plans to lessen troop involvement,' 'peace talks,' 'there will be no escalation of military operations, including accross borders into neighboring countries.' Next stop---Chicago Police shoot and kill a Black Panther leader. They claim they responded to a gunfight. A blood stained and bullet riddled mattress validates what the people in the apartment said---that he was murdered in cold blood as he lay asleep. Now we'll turn down assasination alley, with the shocking murder of a young President Kennedy still fresh in everyone's mind, now everyone's being assasinated---Martin Luther King--a beloved black leader who preaches peaceful change, Kennedy's brother----will the killing ever stop? Moving on, here is Nixon talking about war against the youth of America. But surely he is just talking figuratively. I mean, there was all that protesting at the Democratic Convention---the whole world got to watch as American police tear gassed and beat senseless youthful protestors, but that was a convention after all, and... ...Oh my GOD! The National Guard fires on students at Kent State in Michigan and kills 4 of them!!!! What is happening to this country? Have we truly lost our soul? Will we ever know peace and social harmony again? Now we will turn down the cul de sac of moral dilema brought on by a helpless situation in an unjust war. Joe Public and his wife seem to think that if you turn off the TV before the evening news and spend your evenings at cocktail parties, Wednesday night prayer service, and Thursday night pinochle, that everything is fine with the world-----and we just keep sending our youth to die in jungles and have no concern for the oppressed South Vietnamese peasants. Well----we may just have to bring that war home so that they understand what is really happening there. We have to start blowing up ROTC Buildings and government installations. (But our little Sally would never do anything like that. She is such a sweet Christian girl. She always went to church with us. She's at college right now---says she wants to help people and make a difference and... What do you mean the FBI is at the door asking questions...?) Now we are passing through economy lane. Sometimes everything seems really nice. But other times it seems pretty crappy. And if you are on the lower end of the spectrum, it is downright scary---will you have a job that will continue to feed your family? It seems like only Wall Street makes money. Don't worry though---if you get a job making bombs, missiles, and other weapons you should do ok. In fact, its a great time to be an atom bomb scientist. We don't want to forget this street----notice the Civil Defense symbols----they are fallout shelters. But don't worry---we just have to keep building more bombs, and more powerful bombs than the Soviets who are trying to do more than we are. It's safe really---because if we build more than they do, which we think we are, then the Soviets will never attack us, because even after we have destroyed each other---completely---we can still send a few more there way. It makes sense right? And it will work unless something crazy happens and one of us pushes a button. But don't worry---that's why we have the Civil Defense shelters-----and once inside, you will have plenty of time to realize that a nuclear death is certain anyway, and that now it will probably be a bit longer and more painful than if you had stayed in the open and were vaporized instantly. And now we come to the end of our tour----yes it is the 1960's----undoubtedly the last years of this great nation of ours. Will we even survive another decade? The outlook is very grim. And we may not only collapse as a nation but destroy the whole world in the process. Ohhhh if only I was born in the 20's when everyone was having fun, and those flapper girls looked so cute... Now be sure and get on the Crashing Down from the Long Strange Trip Tour of the 1970's bus. Actually, now that you've done the 60's ride, the 70's one is obligatory. You will get to lose all shred of respect for the government, and feel that it is completely undermined as a valid institution as we start down into the Watergate valley. And boy, if you thought the economic problems of the 60's are bad----wait till you see them in the 70's. Did you know we only have a few years left of oil supply? ...welcome aboard.
I'll admit i'm one of those people who would love to travel back to experience and different time and place. Although i'm a believer of enjoying life in the now it would be interesting to experience the 60's as a teenager. I work in a bong shop and i love the chats i have with the older fellows about the concerts and such they experienced. Just today i talked to this gentlemen about his experience watching jimi hendrix. Blew my mind.
that sounds like the 60s i grew up in. joined the air force to keep the army from getting me. made it by 3 days. there were sit ins and protests, but it certainly wasn't all beatles, woodstock and summer of love. there was awareness among our generation. and there were more of us, then any other age group. computers furst becoming capable of simulating social complexities, but they were still something only governments, and corporations could afford. corporations gave them to universities to train computer jocks for the corporations. but of course, students invented ways to play games on them. it wasn't easier to be counter culture then, it was just, there was more of us then anyone else. but you'd never know it listening to the evening news.
I joined the counterculture back then, had a lot of fun, but keep in mind the counterculture grows when the culture becomes intolerable. Many dropped out of society due to frustration with the Vietnam War, the Cold War, the abuse of protesters and Wall Street profiteers. People talk about the "good old days" but forget that every age had its problems, and the 1960s certainly had more than its fair share.
I see a lot of the problems of the 60s echoed today, and have been wondering (and hoping) if we'll see a rise in counterculture. I think it is happening, but it's slow and not as sweeping as it was back then. It seems as though there are too many distractions and too much propaganda keeping the masses down. I think it keeps the younger generation from being too cohesive to really get something going.
If Trump beats all his charges and gets re-elected President then you'll damn sure see a rise in the counterculture!
I definitely agree, and I'll be beside myself if he holds office again. But I think a rise in counterculture is needed regardless.
