By SJ Otto
A few days ago I found this article which is called, “How to Be a Modern Hippie,” by Colleen. I found it interesting because I was somewhat of a Hippie starting in my high school days and in my early 20s. In some ways, I still am today. I found this article in with another Hippie story, “What Are Hippies Called Today?” Hippies were a big thing in the 1960s. By the 1970s we were calling ourselves Freaks.[1] We were a little different from the Hippies, but we were really pretty similar. By the 1970s we had to have out own identity that differentiated us from the Hippies. We couldn’t just imitate people from ten years past.
Today, there is no “Freak scene.” The Hippies today are not the same as those that were visible in
He has long hair. Both of us probably considered ourselves to be Hippies in our high school days and fallowing. Originally much of that was a cultural thing. We were counter-culture people along with many of our friends were. We all had long hair, smoked pot, took LSD at times and we listened to rock and roll of that time period. Colleen’s article mentioned Led Zeppelin and Jefferson Airplane. Tom always liked Led Zeppelin and I always liked Jefferson Airplane. Today, Tom listens mostly to Led Zeppelin. I still like Jefferson Airplane but I also like punk rock, such as Die Toten Hosen.
Much of what I have written about, so far, has been cultural things such as music, hair styles and drug use.
My politics have evolved since I was in high school. As with the Freaks, I was an anarchist, in those days. Today I am a socialist. I began to read and follow Salvador Allende, the Marxist and socialist president of
Colleen writes about Hippies caring about animals. I’ve always liked animals. I studied Hinduism in high school. I never became a Hindu. But I did adopt some of those beliefs. One of them is that animal life has value. I won’t kill an animal, not even an insect, unless it is necessary. I avoid any practice that causes pain to animals. I try to respect them. I am not a vegetarian, but I believe in respecting those animals that we eat. I avoid anything the causes such animals any pain, such as boiling lobsters or eating veal which is a tortured animal. I only kill insects that are a nuisance, such as roaches and mosquitoes. I don’t kill spiders in my house or insects that cause no harm.
But back to the Hippie article, Colleen discusses the rejection of traditional mainstream values:
“Their rejection of mainstream values was surprising because they were the very people who were in position to gain the most—in jobs,
political access, and money—from the existing system. That these young people chose to drop out from lives in which they had clear advantages was a sign to many that perhaps something really was wrong with the system.
The civil rights movement was attracting national attention by the mid-1950s, and the New Left became a factor in American politics in 1962
following the release of its “Port Huron Statement,” a stirring announcement of youthful political idealism.”
Again, here is something I have in common with the Hippies. I definitely feel outside the mainstream. I definitely have little interest in the pursuit of money and I don’t aspire to be wealthy as I am supposed to, according to the system and its supporters.
Colleen wrote about some of the theoreticians of the Hippies. Some such as Timothy Leary and Allen Ginsberg were not that political. Others, such as Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin were very political. Rubin turned to the right after the Hippies and Yippies[3] began to die out. Hippies were a strange movement that included some leftists and some cultural figures who had no interest in politics at all. Others such as Rubin, ended up as political conservatives.
I suppose there are some young Hippies around today. For many Hippies, as my self, we are in our 60s, 70s and older. We are a dying bread. But we are still Hippies. Some young Marxists I have seen, commenting on line, have said they see Hippies as being conservative, right-wing, reactionary. I don’t know how they formed these opinions but I don’t agree at all. In the 60s and 70s we defied the status quo. We challenged the system on many levels. We challenged the culture and the politics. We were often met with opposition and it was not always pleasant or benevolent. Any one who wants to see examples of that opposition can see the move Easy Rider. The Hippies were often treated badly and it can be seen in that movie.
The Hippies today are small in number compared to those of the 1960s and 1970s. Many of those early hippies cut their hair, put on a suit and got a high paying job. They lost all their early values. Some of us have retained at least some of those values. I’m proud to be one of those.
This article is condensed from the article I originally wrote for Artsy Fartsy. For the entire article click here.
Here I sit in a counter-culture bar, Kirby's, with my wife, Cam Gentry.
The above picture ^ is Tom Saad.
[1] Steve Otto, War on Drugs/ War on People, (Ide House, Los Colinas, 1995), “The Freaks,” p. 146.
[2] As this article says, many Hippies are writers, musicians or artists. Tom has been an artist since his high school days. Here are some examples of his work:
[3] See also Steve Otto, Memoirs Of A Drugged-up, Sex-crazed Yippie, (Authorhouse,