Lifestyle and Revolution

I've seen many threads here about what it means to be a hippie, what is a hippie, and there was a thread(s) about 'When will the next hippie revolution be?', something to that effect.

I recently read this passage in a book I'm reading and I thought the author gave a really clear and concise summation of what exactly the hippies of the 1960s/1970s were trying to accomplish and what their motives were during that first attempt at revolution;


"During the 60's a large, and certainly the most spirited, part of the post-Second World War generation started to drop out of society. They dropped out of school, college, and steady jobs and lived off expedients in inner-city slums and threadbare country communes. While all were actively against the Vietnam War, their politics weren't so much focused on specific issues as on a gut-felt sense that society as a whole was bankrupt and that it could be meaningfully opposed only by living a different way of life here and now.

By the middle of the decade so many young people were dropping out that it looked as though "youth" was becoming a social class in its own right, one about to inherit the revolutionary dynamism Marx had ascribed to the industrial proletariat.

For between the two world wars, capitalism had cut a deal with the traditional working class. The worst of the exploitation would be relegated to the Third World, and workers in the West would be given a larger slice of the capitalist pie-providing they stayed in line. Over the following years, standoff had become status quo; more than that, the ever increasing consumption of goods by the updated, mid-twentieth-century working class had become and essential part of capitalist economy, one without which it couldn't continue to function...but the exclusion of the vast majority of people from any real control of their own lives remained untouched.

What the hippies were saying was that poverty and exploitation hadn't been done away with, they had merely been modernized.

The overcrowding, hunger, and disease of the nineteenth-century working class had been replaced by the loneliness, tension, and free-floating anxiety of its twentieth-century equivalent. Poverty had become psychological, and this at a time when there was logically no need for poverty at all. Technologically, humanity had reached the point where basic material survival could be assured with much less labor than ever before. In principle, at any rate, we stood on the verge of a new age of leisure.

"Workers of the world disperse," as one hippie graffito put it succinctly. That was the negative side of the '60s political program, the refusal to work, the embracing of a degree of voluntary poverty. The positive side lay in trying to prospect the values of the new Renaissance now possible. If consumer goods are a mockery of true human desires, then what exactly do we want? Most of the '60s experiments in creating a new lifestyle can be seen as an attempt to answer this question.”

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Although a large part of that time period is/was defined by the artistic and drug aspect of the culture, it was (for most who genuinely believed in the cause) based on real issues. The idea was freedom and well being for the individual. The government system doesn't see society as individuals, it sees it as a collection of working parts that collectively feed bank accounts. Those bank accounts are then used to exploit the individual and keep them starved so that they're dependent on the tit of those who operate those bank accounts. We're essentially caught in an endless chain of having our money taken from us, then working and begging to get part of it back, but at a bigger cost to ourselves each time.


Naturally it's easy to see how some wouldn't want this for themselves. At the time this system was really coming into itself and working out the kinks (out sourcing work to poor countries and having them make shit for a fraction of the cost) people started to speak out against it. Those people quickly became dissatisfied with this system and sought out other means of living.

As the author above wrote, it was essentially a couple years of backlash and rejection of a system that rejected individuality and freedom of choice, and exploited people, and was a time when other means of living were being experimented with.

The thing is when you reject the tit that feeds and shelters you, you have to feed and shelter yourself. And the owner of that tit you fed off for so long is going to try and do anything they can to stop you from doing so. Because if enough people did this, the owner of that tit would no longer have any power or control over anyone.

Living an “alternative” lifestyle is a great place to start benefiting yourself and your fellow man at the same time. Each and every single action has a reaction. If you quit buying say clothing that's made in some Third World country by children who get paid a few pennies a day, that's theoretically 13 less t-shirts those kids have to make a year. If ten people did this, that's 130 less t-shirts a year that those exploited people wouldn't have to make. Although this action would be taking money away from them, one can easily just turn around and perhaps donate a bit of money to a cause that helps those people, or perhaps even donate their time towards spreading awareness about their cause.

The point is that when we take away the money from these systems that want to exploit and extinct the individual, we take away their power. Without money, they're nothing. One can do this in two ways; either hoard your money and don't spend it on anything that isn't a necessity or essential to ones own well being and health, or just live as humbly as one can without money. Naturally one needs a bit of money; shelter and food are rare to come by without money, unless you live in a setting that enables you to grow what you eat. But by collectively showing that we don't want the useless shit they try to buy us with to keep us on the tit, we're taking away the power of these systems and showing that life can be lived and enjoyed without them.

Many people however seem unaware of the costs that come with this lifestyle. It certainly is no where near as glamourous as the media coverage of that time period will have us believe. Being an individual who rejects the current system means being poor, going without, sacrifices that one may not necessarily want to make. And this is exactly why there's never been another “hippie” (a term I use loosely) revolution since. There's always been people who dress like “hippies” and promote peace and love, there's certainly always been people who use drugs, but in Western society there's never really been a mass amount of people who made/make the sacrifices necessary in order to promote change like those of the 1960s did. The best tools for change we have at no real cost to ourselves are time and energy.

The '60s movement was an experiment and since then the system learned a valuable lesson; the media is the most effective tool to controlling society at large. We easily became slaves to the offerings of the media since the mid-late 1970s. Why? Because after the attempt of the hippies to change things, people became afraid to speak out after what they saw happen to the revolutionaries of the “hippie” movement, the civil rights movement, etc. They were usually dealt with in the form of assassination. Others were arrested, put in jail (often for drug use or violence) etc.

Most people are willing to voice their opinion about a cause, not many are willing to go hungry and without home for it, let alone potentially be murdered for it. The revolt then becomes quiet and people go back to minding their own business, on or off the tit, because no one wants to draw the heat. The tit (government) wants us this way, quiet and alone, because then we're most likely to give up and give in. Most simply don't want to bear the consequences of their beliefs.

Another contributing factor to the defeat of the movement was, in my opinion the ambiguous drug use. This simply opened the door for people who wanted to just get high and have a good time, not necessarily people who were using tools, such as LSD to expand their consciousness as a means of self improvement and to work with the realization that we're all one and should treat and care for each other in that way. A hammer can be used to build a house, it can also be used to kill. Unfortunately the misuse of drugs during that time was the hammer that dropped and shattered the cause. Those who were really trying to accomplish something got lost among the mess of those who were just trying to get high and freak out. When all was said and done, those who really tried were left without stable lives, while the others went on to cut their hair, put on a suit, and get cushy jobs.

At the root of the cause was the simple care for one's fellow man and the desire for what is right by them.

Some of these issues are still around today, perhaps stronger than ever. Although black people are treated better and homosexuals are starting to get some major rights, people are just as exploited and used. A general concern for one's fellow man can be done by giving one's time, energy, and perhaps a little bit of money. The biggest issue today though has got to be the spell society is under due to the media. Only once this spell is broken could maybe the idea/possibility of another revolution take place. But as long as people eat up the media and spend their time between work and shopping malls, it'll never happen.


I'd say that if one really does care about similar issues to those who really cared in the 1960s and '70s, start by changing your mind. The definitions of things that are most important to us; “my money, my time, my needs, my self, what about me?” have been conditioned in us from day one by a system who wants us to be concerned for ourselves only and be cut off from one another. Redefine these as; “our money, our time, our effort, our needs, what about us?” The reason LSD was so employed at the time wasn't necessarily just for the cool colours and picture show. It was/is an effective tool for drastically shaking one's mind out of the conditioned rut it's been stuck in and showing one the truth behind our collective human experience. But one doesn't need to get high to realize this. All it takes is the ability to look at something and ask, “why?” Why do we exploit others? Is that right? Why do we only serve ourselves? Does that really make life better? Why do I want that? Why can't I live for myself? The initial step of the change isn't an external one, it's an internal one. One mind changes, and when another sees that change is possible, it'll change too, then another will, and so on like a chain effect.

The smaller we make the gap between ourselves and our fellow man/woman by realizing that we're all one, and that collectively we have the power to change the things we don't like, our current living conditions, and perhaps the world, the better the odds that our energies will become a reality. The moment this change of mind takes place, it becomes reality.

 

I'm too drunk to read all that mate. Can you wrap it in a nut shell for me?

 

I'd rather people take from it whatever they want and have their own opinions of it, but essentially all I was saying is that if you're someone who wants a better world, a happier one, and you feel that mankind should treat each other with love and prosper by leading lives as happy individuals (such as what the hippies of the 1960's were going for) then change your mind and devote your time, energy and perhaps money.

Quit feeding a fucked up criminal (government) system.


If you're not one of these people and you couldn't care less, then do nothing.

 

I see. Well the world is how it is. We're going to die regardless. I guess the real question is, what are you going to do with the time you have left?

 

An efficient way of leading a revolutionary life is to drink plenty of water and refuse to pay any bill.

 

I mean absolutely no offense and I'm not saying this about you personally but "Well the world is how it is," is simply a catch phrase for apathetic selfishness (in my opinion). It's just a way of shifting any and all credibility from oneself, onto those who we think are responsible for the way things are (i.e.-the government, a leader, etc.)

If people were to take responsibility and stop voting for idiots and stop allowing themselves to be turned into robots, things would get better and the term, "Well the world is how it is," would be used instead to describe the state of being happy with the world due to the effort it took to transform it, rather than being used as passing commentary on the shitty state it's currently in.

Yes, the world is the way it is; shit. But only because we allow it to be because most feel that it's someone else's responsibilty to fix it, not ours collectively. We didn't fuck it up, so why should we fix it? That type of thinking is self defeating.

Instead we wait and elect leaders who flash shiny things before our eyes and sooth us with cleverly written speeches of promise and prosperity if we vote for them. Then when they get in office and don't follow through, we just think, "well, hopefully the next guy's better."

 

Sounds nice, but how realistic is it? Realistically people will always have bills. Our needs as human are such that we can't always provide them for ourselves (thus free of charge) and therefore have to have someone else do it for a fee.

Yes, the less bills you pay the closer you are to personal freedom. But realistically a person who refuses to pay bills is often forced into a state of severe poverty. This would be one of the consequences I was speaking about in the original post. If the person felt that poverty was worth freedom from bills, good on them. But there'll likely always be bills. Reducing them as much as possible is more realistic.

 

"We" is the key word here. Can "we" fix it? Who are you refering to when you state "we"? A winner trading on Wall St? A bum feeding off scraps?

Like I said, it boils down to what you intend to do with your own dying days

 

I use "we" in the collective sense. Everyone, or at least those who wants change.

Those who are after nothing more than money in life would likely never have any desire to change things. Money rules the world. They want it that way.

I suppose. Life is transitory though, a good world would benefit everyone, now and later. My own personal life is only a small piece of the equation.

Which is why most opt for creating the life they want for themselves. Which is fine, but again, in the end it only really ever benefits themselves.

If we're all one in the same, one life, then what good does only benefiting one individual self, one miniscule piece of it? Living by way of benefiting the whole would be much more practical in the end.

 

What I mean by paying bills is incurring debt. If everyone simply refused to pay their credit card bills what could be done? Money loaned at interest is robbery.
A non violent way of taking down the current system is to run up every credit limit you are offered and refuse to pay. How realistic is it? As real as anyone would have it be.

 

Oh what the heck, this should be interesting.

Want to know the New ultimate hippie?

They are the criminals of conscience. They are walking away from the USA and at one date in just a few years they are going to cut the money flow.

No more of our tax money going to build missiles or bombs. We are not going to underwrite supporting corrupt governments with power hungry ambitions.

The party ends real soon.

Love light to you all.

The Capitalist hippie.

 

That's a good idea. Good concept anyways.


They couldn't put everyone in jail. The thing is everyone would go out and buy useless shit with their credit cards;

1) Where would everyone store all that stuff

2) The economy would completely crash and we'd likely be taken over by China or another country would would bail us out at the price of complete financial enslavement for the next 200 years

3) If number 2 happened we'd then likely be forced to operate under their legal system, or least their influence over our legal system, due to their power over us. God knows what kind of laws we'd be forced to live by or be imprisoned for

 

A debate that I used to get into alot in the sixties was "are you the problem or are you the solution?" A lot of people believed that if they were not the problem, then they were part of the solution. It's one of those 'yes and no' answers. My response to those people was that you are part of the problem not part of the solution - all you really are is being apathetic. You really have to go out and try to change things..... even if it is not much. You still have to try to make this world a better place, not just for yourself but for everybody. One of the truest hippie statements I ever saw was 'there's no them: there's only us'. Maybe this just makes sense to me: but that's how I see things.

PAX

 

The crux of the current system is the dog eat dog aspect of it. If that was eliminated that'd be a huge blow to it.

If instead people realized that there's enough to go around for everybody and that it's only being withheld from us like a carrot on a stick so that we'll compete for it, and wanted to change this, things could start to get better pretty quick.

 

Yes. I can make my life into whatever I want it to be. People can all go live off the grid on some land they own and have a good life, which is great, I'd love to do that. But that would only benefit themselves. The problems of society would continue on.

I suppose it's just angst mixed in with a bit of delusional daydreaming, but I hardly see the point in living a life that only benefits myself. I can lock myself away in my good little world, but the one outside still continues to be shit.

I'd rather live in a world that everyone benefits from.

 

I was not referring to you- what I was trying to say was that that is a very common argument that people try to make: that if they are not the problem then they have to be the solution. In my opinion, these are the people who only care about themselves in their own little world. As long as things are ok in their own little world, they don't care how things are going for other people.

When I was fourteen yrs old, I saw a person on tv who belonged to population zero. I tried to find that group on the internet but I couldn't find them anywhere- maybe they no longer exist . This was back in '64 and he believed at that time that there were too many people on this planet and that the planet could not really sustain that many people. He believed that we should be decreasing the population rather than increasing it or keeping it at the status quo. It rang really true to me. I believe that if we had a smaller population, we would be able to deal with our problems more efficiently. How can we give everybody a decent life ? There are just too many people who want and there is only so much to give. We are depleting this planet and we are taking from whoever we can. Greed is overtaking our existence. It's getting to the point where humanity is starting to have a price. I can rant and rave about this forever but all it does is just saddens my heart. All people want to do is be a part of the rich and fuck the poor.

PAX

 

I know what you were saying. I agreed with you and then went off about something else.


I agree that the population is too big. But as thedope once said, "I don't see people advocating that we lower the population lining up to leave."

I'm not ready to commit to it in that sense

Yes the population is too big and we should work on decreasing it, but the fact is is that we are all here now. We could wait until the population is lower and then enjoy a stable economy and all the leg room, but we're here now.

What we do now affects later. We could at least be trying to start something that will pay off later, perhaps not in our lifetimes, but that's irrelevant.

 

One of the things that I did was I got a vasectomy. It took an awful long time to find a doctor who would perform the surgery. The common reason was "you're too young and you are only having it so that you won't get girls knocked up". Well, I finally found a doctor when I was in my mid twenties who would perform the procedure. I haven't regretted it since. I also believe that what we should do is treat everyone with respect and don't let our emotions run wild. All that is going to do is cause alot of anger and hatred. Like the Youngbloods said, smile on your brother and let's get together and love one another right now. You'll probably get alot of abuse- both physically and emotionally but if you don't start doing it NOW, if you think the world is fucked now- wait until you see what will happen in the future. Whatever you do, it is going to be alot of hard work. Nothing comes easy. Like that old hippie saying, " why is free love so expensive?" It amazes me how many homeless people we have in comparison to the sixties. It's got nothing to do with they don't want to work. The work just isn't there. There will be more and more homeless people- it's just going to snowball. The rich just keep getting richer and the poor just keep getting poorer. Until you start caring for your brother and sister things won't get any better.

PAX

 

One little thing that I should add:

When I lived in the city, and when I cooked a meal I would always cook more than what I needed and then I would place what was left over in take out containers and I would add a napkin and a plastic spoon and I would give it to people who were begging for food. I know it's not much- but at least it was something. I also volunteered at food banks and soup kitchens.

PAX

 

Maybe better if everyone just cancelled their credit cards and never used one again ?

I've never had one, I've always been a cash economy person, and will remain so for as long as I possibly can.

I think there used to be an advert for a credit card along the lines of: "It says more about you than cash ever could..."

I always figured that was true - it says how much you spent, where you spent it, what on, when, at what time... you leave an electronic trail and who knows who might have access to it or what they might do with the infomation.