hippies

PeakXV

'IndiaMike' was not contrived to attract old (and new) hippies but the very name is 60's hippish("I'm sure there was more than one hippie with an 'India Mike' moniker back in those hey days) and from the many threads, searches & queries on the subject here -appears to be a decent reconnnection center for that generation.

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Don't go to India ~ Pre-trip Warnings & Misconceptions?

grikoo

I have to disagree that today we still have a viable 'rebel' subculture. Long ago the media industry (and likely the government) figured out that it was easy to control the phenomena by selling rebellion to us in neatly packaged forms. Every legitimate cultural movement since the 60's has fallen prey to it. The hippies, punk rockers, the rave scene, all these were eventually turned into commodities and sold back to us as ways to be rebellious.

Want to be rebellious?- Choose any of a half dozen images to suit your taste! Only $69.99!

Currently, the remnants of all these subcultures still exist, but exist primarily as social clubs and ways of gaining acceptance and identity. None of them have the power they once had, the power and desire to test the boundaries of social convention, and nothing recently has come forward to take their place. It seems they now catch the new movements in their embryonic stages before they're able to multiply. Fairly easy, since all the youngsters are convinced they're rebelling already.

It takes more than a joint and some music to be a rebel. Being a true rebel is not accepting pre-made identities for yourself.

Identity is for those who don't know themselves.

machadinha

Sure. To testify otherwise, maybe check http://www.indymedia.org/en/ for starters, and of course there's a plethora of such sites (and more importantly the real-time activities that inform them, ranging from the so-called sub-cultural -- which to me at least isn't a "bad" word at all but rather fundamental instead; the ability and effort to create and maintain free spaces for one another where one can pursue activities outside of mainstream conditions and limitations if you will, as well as the worth and implications of that effort in and of itself at all, no matter what its so-called let alone long-term "success" -- to the rather more meaty and directly activist). Although this network -- see also their numerous international and mutually independent branches, presented on the left-hand side or sometimes the bottom of their pages -- certainly tends to serve something of a central function.

Just because some lost the spirit doesn't mean everyone has. Nostalgically reminiscing about a past that never was surely won't add to the present in any case. What amuses me is that much of the latter betrays precisely the lack of social engagement to many participants at the time & their consequent powerlessness to project and extend this into the present, not at all their rebellious let alone "revolutionary" outlook or engagement at the time. So -- little more than a fleeting and a-political subculture indeed, perhaps. But then to declare it all "dead" whereas others just continue working towards what they believe in today, just as many did back then, seems like a double deception. Playing along with the identity game as it's presented and sold to you, indeed -- as if arguing forever over what was the "real" rock-'n'-roll/hippie/punk rock/house etc. and other such pressing issues serves any other purpose than to keep us all distracted over nothing much in particular. Of course these were all simultaneously the emergence of a post-war youth movement and consciousness -- and the post-war discovery of "youth" as a category and an exploitable market, which was a novelty at the time... To the extent that today we have bands and all their gadgets and paraphernalia to appeal to three-year-olds. Anyway, there is (I believe) no real solution to this paradox and dilemma, in a way all that stuff has always been a commercial ploy. But then maybe there doesn't have to be a solution to it, and what's interesting is the human capacity to subvert even those images which are sold (back) to you. Maybe this is precisely the dialectic of such "youth" movements (itself a rather hollow phrase of course, since far from all the participants are now necessarily very youthful nor are they defined by it) and counter-cultures.

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grikoo

Very thoughtful comments. Thanks for that. I appreciate your willingness to step out on a limb and say something meaningful.

I agree that the situation is both 'unsolvable', and also that it probably doesn't need to be solved. While I'm all for freedom of thought, exploration, etc, everyone is simply not cut out for it. Perhaps what we saw with the original hippies was simply an unprecedented desire for freedom (in all its forms), isolated for a brief moment in time. Surely, and I am somewhat proof of this, not everyone falls into the identity game. There are plenty of us that went through all of that and came out the other side with a greater understanding of ourselves and the world around us. Still, it's tragic to me to see so many kids duped into seeking social acceptance under the call of non-conformity, and actually paying to do it.

I simply have to trust there are enough of us out there slowly nicking away at the predominant thoughts of the day, to keep the human race from becoming a mindless hoarde of automatons.

Just a note on revolution- Rebellion and revolution are not interchangable ideas. Revolution implies taking down an existing system in lieu of putting up another. Rebellion is asystematic, and only implies a fight against the status quo. It seems to me that true rebellion is a fight against systemization itself, and isn't so interested in what comes after. If anything, it simply seeks to insure the survival of human diversity. We need more rebels, not more revolutionaries.

machadinha

(Intermezzo): Some favorite reading material -- I'm never sure if this informed me, or rather affirmed what I already "knew" anyway:

Steal This Book -- Subversive "hippie" classic by Abbie Hoffman, 1971.

Not Bored! -- Fantastic collection of Lettrist and Situationist material of the 1950's and '60's. Esp. the latter movement, a continuation of the former, and albeit both of them fairly obscure at least to the "mainstream" eye, was instrumental in inspiring the 1968 events in Paris and elsewhere across the world, and greatly influenced both (factions of) the hippie "movement" and, later, the punk rock one, not least and at least initially through Malcolm McLaren who aside from being a sly businessman was much inspired by them.

The Last Of The Hippies - An Hysterical Romance -- 1982 Essay by Penny Rimbaud of highly influential British DIY punk band, Crass.

The writings of Jerry Rubin, one of the "founders" of the Yippies (rather more militant manifestation of "hippie" ideals) together with Hoffman among others, are also recommended. I'm not aware of these being readily available online as such, but some searching around should yield something. Try this for starters: http://artofhacking.com/tap/index.htm

TAZ -- The Temporary Autonomous Zone -- Hakim Bey, 1990.

ps

Yes, of course, but inasmuch as rebellion implies a non-acceptance of existing conditions, there will always be a natural overlap between the two.

grikoo

Yes, I'm very fond of Bey and the Situationists as well. Good reading.

Minnesota

The real problem with the romantic ideal of "rebellion" is that it is usually defined in terms of consumption, in terms of buying. Thus it is itself a market oriented phenomenon, part of what it claims to oppose.

The idea that shopping at certain places -- however well intentioned -- makes one a rebel is simply perpetuating the situation.

As Fugazi sang: "You are not what you own."

There is a great article on this from "This" magazine:
http://www.thismagazine.ca/issues/2002/11/rebelsell.php

(The book version of the argument ("Nation of Rebels") is great, too!)

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kullukid

[quote=grikoo;503642] Long ago the media industry (and likely the government) figured out that it was easy to control the phenomena by selling rebellion to us in neatly packaged forms. Every legitimate cultural movement since the 60's has fallen prey to it. The hippies, punk rockers, the rave scene, all these were eventually turned into commodities and sold back to us as ways to be rebellious.
QUOTE]

PUNK IS DEAD!

Yes that's right, punk is dead,
It's just another cheap product for the consumers head.
Bubblegum rock on plastic transistors,
Schoolboy sedition backed by big time promoters.
CBS promote the Clash,
But it ain't for revolution, it's just for cash.
Punk became a fashion just like hippy used to be
And it ain't got a thing to do with you or me.

Movements are systems and systems kill.
Movements are expressions of the public will.
Punk became a movement cos we all felt lost,
But the leaders sold out and now we all pay the cost.
Punk narcissism was social napalm,
Steve Jones started doing real harm.
Preaching revolution, anarchy and change
As he sucked from the system that had given him his name.

Well I'm tired of staring through shit stained glass,
Tired of staring up a superstars arse,
I've got an arse and crap and a name,
I'm just waiting for my fifteen minutes fame.
Steve Jones you're napalm,
If you're so pretty (vacant) why do you swarm?
Patti Smith you're napalm,
You write with your hand but it's Rimbaud's arm.

And me, yes I, do I want to burn?
Is there something I can learn?
Do I need a business man to promote my angle?
Can I resist the carrots that fame and fortune dangle?
I see the velvet zippies in their bondage gear,
The social elite with safety-pins in their ear,
I watch and understand that it don't mean a thing,
The scorpions might attack, but the systems stole the sting.

PUNK IS DEAD. PUNK IS DEAD. PUNK IS DEAD.
PUNK IS DEAD. PUNK IS DEAD. PUNK IS DEAD.
PUNK IS DEAD. PUNK IS DEAD. PUNK IS DEAD.

By Crass

grikoo

What's so funny (and as I said- somewhat tragic), is to see youngsters actually listening to this same music, all the while sporting the same punk fashion from decades ago, that they paid so dearly for. It's just ridiculous.

I did it too though.....and while I'm wont to think that it still 'meant something' back when I was there, it was a move based on social acceptance none the less.....the anti-social socialites. Sooooo silly looking back on it.

Most of those guys are either dead- or became accountants, computer programmers, junkies, etc.

Very few of us made it out intact....and fewer still actually benefitted from the experience.